UK Data Archive Study Number 3955 - Workplace Employee Relations Survey: Cross-Section, 1998 1998 Workplace Employee Relations Survey User Guide Introduction
Introduction to the User Guide The 1998 Workplace Employee Relations Survey (WERS 98) is the fourth in a government-funded series of surveys carried out at British workplaces, which has always been considered to be the most authoritative source of information on employee relations in Great Britain. The other three surveys in the series, were conducted in 1980, 1984 and 1990. To aid in the usage of this valuable resource, a comprehensive User Guide has been produced. It has been designed to provide all the necessary information for those who intend to conduct secondary analysis of the data sets. In addition, it gives an accurate account of the way in which the survey data was collected, which will hopefully interest survey methodologists. A full account of the data sets which are a part of the WERS 98 study is given in Appendix A. We advise all potential users of WERS data to read the documentation carefully as the data sets are very complex. Some volumes will be more applicable than others. There are ten and they are structured as follows: CURRENTLY AVAILABLE FOR GENERAL RELEASE VOLUME 1 Survey in Transition: A guide to the design of WERS98 VOLUME 2 WERS 98 Technical Report Volume produced by the survey contractor, Social, Community and Planning Research (SCPR). VOLUME 3 WERS 98 Cross Section Questionnaire Part A: Management Questionnaire & Employee Profile Questionnaire Part B: Worker Representative Questionnaire. Part C: Survey of Employees Questionnaire VOLUME 5 WERS 98: Code book for cross section data sets Part A: Code book for cross section Part B: Instructions for editing the cross-section data sets VOLUME 7 WERS 98 Interviewer Training Manual
VOLUMES NOT CURRENTLY AVAILABLE FOR GENERAL RELEASE VOLUME 4 VOLUME 6 WERS 98 Panel Questionnaire. WERS 98 Code book for Panel data sets VOLUME 8 WERS 98 Derived Variables from the Cross-Section data sets. VOLUME 9 WERS 98 Derived Variables from the panel data sets. VOLUME 10 A Guide to using the WERS 80-98 Longitudinal Data Sets.
Appendix A: Cross-section data sets File name Description of the contents of the file Format of software Data collection method Number of cases or records per data file Status MQ98.SAV Contains data from interviews with the management respondent in the 1998 Workplace Employee Relations Survey. In addition there is data that was collected from the Employee Profile Questionnaire. This was a self-competition questionnaire, filled in by managers prior to the face-to-face interview taking place and inputted by interviewers at the time of interview. The survey population is all British workplaces with at least 10 employees except for those in the following Standard Industrial Classification (1992) divisions: A (Agriculture, hunting and forestry); B (Fishing); C (Mining and quarrying); P (Private households with employed persons); and, Q (Extra-territorial organisations). CAPI 2,191 General release MQOPEN.XLS Contains verbatim textual responses from interviews with the management respondent in the 1998 Workplace Employee Relations Survey. Interview contained open-ended questions, responses to which were recorded verbatim. These were subject to post-interview coding which appear in the management data set. Microsoft Excel CAPI 2,191 Originally REGION98.SAV Standard Government Office Region. Linked to cross-section data sets by workplace identifier. CAPI 2,191 Originally
MQ98_SIC.SAV Standard Industrial Classification (1992), at class level. Linked to cross-section data set by workplace identifier. CAPI 2,191 Originally File name Description of the contents of the file Format of software Data collection method Number of cases or records per data file Status WRQ98.SAV Contains data from interviews with the worker representative respondent in the 1998 Workplace Employee Relations Survey. Worker representatives were interviewed where there was a lay representative of a recognised union at the workplace or, if there was no recognised union, with the senior employee representative of any joint consultative committee operating at the workplace. Whether an interview with a worker representative was required, was determined in the course of the management interview and with the permission of the manager. CAPI 918 General release WRQOPEN.XLS Contains verbatim textual responses from interviews with the worker representatives in the 1998 Workplace Employee Relations Survey. Interview contained open-ended questions, responses to which were recorded verbatim. These were subject to postinterview coding which appear in the management data set. Microsoft Excel CAPI 918 Originally
SEQ98.SAV Contains data from a self-completion questionnaire that was distributed to employees in workplaces that participated in the 1998 Workplace Employee Relations Survey. Selfcompletion 28,240 General release Employees were randomly selected by the interviewer from a list of all employees provided by the management respondent. A maximum of 25 employees were selected, however, in workplaces with fewer than 25 employees, all were asked to complete the questionnaire. SEQOPEN.XLS Contains verbatim textual responses from self-completion Survey of Employees Questionnaire in the 1998 Workplace Employee Relations Survey. These were not pre or post coded and do not appear in the SEQ data set. Microsoft Excel Selfcompletion 28,240 Originally