Employee voice is an important component of many contemporary human (Budd, pg.40). Employee voice strategy has become more effective and useful by management in nonunion organizations. Nonunion means just that, it is any person or employee that is not a member of a union and does not have representation in the workplace. Being in the military, we do not have any type of union representation for our voices to be heard.
We have more of a listen and wait to be told what is going to happen instead of asking for any inputs from employees. Over the years, the military has started to adapt to changes and allowing more ways for service members to be able to express themselves and have their inputs to heard and addressed.
This type of employee voice mechanism is called the direct formal employee voice. The direct employee voice is considered the general communication between the employers and the employee on any task or topic that would affect daily operations and all staff. The military implements this kind of communication through lots of meetings, emails, and select group brainstorming sessions.
These types of communication resolutions prove to be very effective if they are done the right way. If they have been done correctly, they have the benefits of increasing engagement between employees and employers, as well has enables effective decision-making and motivates others innovation.
In the military, even when we have these meetings we need to know that what we are trying to express is being heard and understood and that the leadership we are talking to really cares to understand and help. There would not be anything truly accomplished if junior people felt that their leadership doesn’t really care and that they could not be trusted.
If any employee feels that their opinions would not be valued or no resolution would be applied then no employee is going to want to express themselves and this would discourage anyone from voicing their opinions thus causing a strong division in success. Diversity is a huge way to get a great results from this type of employee voice. With diversity, you have different types of cultures and thought process therefore it allows many different opinions possible solutions to problems within the company.
This allows men, women, all races, and all religions to share their inputs in order to find the best way to make changes and adjust to different situations. However, as much as the military has expressed the need for open communication, there are limits to how and when they can use this form of employee voice. The military for instance, isn’t allowed to post certain things on social media about military news and if someone does there are serious repercussions to that happening which depending on how severe the post was, a service member could be kicked out of the military.
Direct employee voice is a type of employee voice that every company should implement, even in a unionized organization because it allows people to be able to express themselves and help improve different areas of a company. Although every employee needs to understand that there is a specific way to address the leadership which should always be done with respect and calm tone of voice as well as complete open line of communication without the risk of any type of negative outcome.
