QUALITY OF WORK LIFE AND ITS IMPACT ON QUALITY AND PRODUCTIVITY IN THE HANDICRAFT SECTOR IN BRITISH COLUMBIA

Authors: Ajay K. Garg, Ph.D., Amit Kohli, Ph.D. & Smrutisree Mohapatra, BDS

ABSTRACT

Purpose: The economy across the globe is under a terrible slump due to the recent COVID-19 and Russia-Ukraine war and needs to take rigorous measures to boost employment opportunities and standard of living. The handicraft sector is one of the several top solutions for achieving this objective.

Methods: Various qualitative and statistical tools are used to analyze the data collected from 97 handicraft personnel during the period between Octobers to December 2022 in British Columbia’s handicraft sector.

Results: The quality of products and productivity of employees are highly influenced by their Quality of Work Life (QWL). This study considered different dimensions of QWL, such as nature of the job, experience in the handicraft sector, work-life balance, job security, growth opportunity, and employee relations with reference to the variables like gender, age group, religion, family size, and education level.

Research limitations/implications: This study proposes a model solely based on the study on craft workers only in British Columbia, Canada due to limited resources such as time, effort, and funds.

Conclusion: The study suggests that improving the Quality of Work Life of employees can enhance their and Organizations’ productivity and product quality. This study has practical implications for policymakers in handicraft sector to promote employment opportunities and improve the standard of living. This study also offers a unique model by concentrating on the handicraft units in British Columbia by examining the impact of various dimensions of Quality of Work Life (QWL) and certain variables of individual employees. This is an original work based on primary data collected from handicraft units’ employees in British Columbia.

Keywords: Handicraft, Totem poles, Productivity, Quality of work life

REFERENCES

  • Blum, M. L. (1956). Industrial Psychology and its Social Foundations. Harper Brothers, New York.
  • Einstein, A., Podolsky, B. and Rosen, N. (1935). Can quantum-mechanical description of physical reality be considered complete? Physical Review, 47(10), pp.777-780. https://doi.org/10.1103/physrev.47.777.
  • Fernández Bellver, D., Prados-Peña, M.B., García-López, A.M. and Molina-Moreno, V. (2023). Crafts as a key factor in local development: bibliometric analysis. Heliyon, 9(1), pp.17-18. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.heliyon.2023.e13039.
  • Fernandes, R.B., Martins, B.S., Caixeta, R.P., Costa Filho, C.G. da, Braga, G.A. and Antonialli, L.M. (2016). Quality of work life: an evaluation of Walton model with analysis of structural equations. Revista ESPACIOS, 38(3), pp.5. https://www.revistaespacios.com/a17v38n03/a17v38n03p05.pdf.
  • Fillis, I. (2008). The internationalisation process of the smaller firm: an examination of the craft microenterprise. The Open Business Journal, 1(1), 53–61. https://doi.org/10.2174/1874915100801010053.
  • Gamage, A. and Wickramaratne, W.P.R. (2021). Quality of life and quality of work life as determinants of employee productivity: self-reports of tea harvesters in Sri Lanka. Emerging Markets Journal, 11(1), pp.55-56. https://emaj.pitt.edu/ojs/index.php/emaj/article/view/217/407.
  • Haythorne, V., George, (July/Sep 1963) “Productivity and the Worker”, Productivity, vol. IV No. 3.
  • Indian Handicrafts Industry, Handicraft Industry, Handicraft Industry in India. (n.d.). http://www.india-crafts.com/business-reports/indian-handicraft-industry/
  • Kenton, W. (2022) What is productivity and how to measure it explained. Investopedia [online]. https://www.investopedia.com/terms/p/productivity.asp.
  • Kshirsagar, So. (2020). Effect of motivation on employee Productivity- a study of service industry in Aurangabad District.
  • Levine, M., Taylor, J. and Davis, L.E. (1984). Defining Quality of Working Life. Human Relations, 37(1), 81–104. https://doi.org/10.1177/001872678403700105.
  • Shahab, H., Fatima, A. & Ali, M. H. (2019). The role of ergonomics and quality of work life towards increasing employee productivity. Handbook of Fire and Explosion Protection Engineering Principles for Oil, Gas, Chemical, and Related Facilities. 14 (3), 132. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/361416405_Ergonomics_and_Quality_of_Work-Life_for_Waste_Management_Service_Providers_In_Nigeria.
  • Nguyen, T. N., Nguyen, T. H. O. and Le, V. T. M. (2021). Environmental protection policies at craft villages in Hanoi in the context of sustainable development. E3S Web of Conferences, 258. https://doi.org/10.1051/e3sconf/202125805014.
  • Swamy, D. R., Nanjundeswaraswamy, T. S. and Rashmi, S. (2015). Quality of work life: scale development and validation. International Journal of Caring Sciences, (8) 2, pp.281-300. https://www.internationaljournalofcaringsciences.org/docs/6_swamy.pdf.
  • Väänänen, N., Pöllänen, S., Kaipainen, M. and Vartiainen, L. (2017). Sustainable craft in practice: from practice to theory. Craft Research, 8(2), pp.257–284. https://doi.org/10.1386/crre.8.2.257_1.
  • World Health Organization. (2012). WHOQOL – measuring quality of life [online]. https://www.who.int/tools/whoqol.