A Study on Quality of Worklife among Workers in Salem Textiles Limited

Abstract

                         Quality of Work Life is the existence of a certain set of organizational condition or practices. This definition frequently argues that a high quality of work life exists when democratic management practices are used, employee’s jobs are enriched, employees are treated with dignity and safe working conditions exist. Quality of Work Life refers to the level of satisfaction, motivation, involvement and commitment individuals experience with respect to their lives at work.

Quality of Work Life is the degree to which individuals are able to satisfy their important personal needs while employed by the firm. Companies interested in enhancing employees Quality of Work Life generally try to instill in employees the feelings of security, equity, pride, internal democracy, ownership, autonomy, responsibility and flexibility.

                                   Historically, work has occupied an important place in the life of human beings. How people have thought and felt about the working experience has also been an age old concern for both workers and managers. The term quality of work life (QWL) was probably coined originally at the first international conference on QWL at Arden House in 1972 (Davis &Churn’s, 1975). Mills (1978) probably coined the term quality of work life and suggested that it had moved permanently into the vocabulary of unions and management, even if a lot of the people using it were not exactly sure what territory it covered. During the twentieth century, our social science conceptualizations regarding work have been labeled scientific management, human relations, socio-technical systems theory, and now possibly holistic learning organizations. Churn’s (1978) argued that:

QWL owes its origins to the marriage of the structural, systems perspective of organizational behavior with the interpersonal, human relations, and supervisory-style perspective.