recent college graduates for management. Factory workers started with simple task and gradually learned more difficult ones; young managers had more explicit training programs and job rotation. Large corporations might have training departments. Promotion tended to follow training schedules, one could move up as one learned to handle more complex assignments. There were often "fast tracks" for employees with special relationships or with highly desirable qualities. Organizational structures were organized by function. Decision-making power was at the top and had to flow through too many levels. There was a sense of job security, based on a seniority system. Middle managers enjoyed a high degree of job security. The stakeholders carried the risk for business outcomes, not the workers and consequently there was relatively little association between pay and company performance. Pay tended to vary by job title and seniority, not according to individual performance. Since the 1980’s a new employment restructuring has come to replace the traditional organization. New organizational structures are flatter (middle management have been cut out), more profitable, have been downsized, and provide a new relationship with employees. According to Robert Reich in his book “The Future of Success”, “American corporations have become more productive, and their goods and services dramatically better. All jobs and earnings have become less secure, and wages and benefits of routine production workers have eroded. Employees now bear many more of the risks of doing business due to reduced job security and contingent pay. “In 1997, almost 30 percent of the U.S. workforce was in non-traditional jobs.” Reducing staff to minimal levels and hiring contingent, part time, or contract workers may be a permanent trend rather than a temporary measure to increase profits. Robert Reich further states, that “companies are ...
