The Tree of Trust: Trust between Managers and Employee Representatives in Organizational Social Dialogue

The central topic of this thesis is trust in organizations. In organizational and industrial relations, one of the main aspects that leads to cooperation and that also derives from cooperation, is trust. For that reason, trust has been studied extensively in the organizational context. Surprisingly little attention has been given to trust, it’s antecedents and its consequences in the relation between employee representatives (ERs) and management. Thus, the focus of this thesis is on trust and trustworthiness in the context of industrial relations, especially at organizational level.  The research objectives of this dissertation are the following: a)  to gain an overview of the literature on trust between these parties at organizational level; b) to gain an understanding of the perception of employers of the attitudes and behaviors of employee representatives, as well as their relationship with them; c) to explore the relation between several antecedents and consequences of trust; and d) To investigate the relation between investment by management in ERs and trust.

These four objectives are addressed in four studies forming the core of the present PhD. We start with an  introductory chapter, motivating the scientific and societal relevance of this dissertation, and we conclude with a general discussion. Chapter two contains the outcomes of a systematic literature review. Chapter three presents a first empirical study among 614 HR managers from 11 European countries, exploring the experiences and expectations of employers  about the attitudes and competences of employee representatives, as well as the challenges for social partners and differences within Europe in terms of social dialogue. Chapter four presents another empirical article with the data the previous study. It examines the relations between trustworthiness, trust and influence of ERs from the perspective of European management. Chapter five, which uses quantitative data from 719 ERs in Spain, investigates the perceptions of ERs on the investment of companies in their role and how that affects constituency trust and ERs forcing conflict behavior. Finally, the general discussion presents an overview of the findings, the strengths and weaknesses of the dissertation, as well as theoretical and practical implications.