Industrial relations in the SME sector of the British economy: an empirical perspective

Despite the growing significance afforded to small and medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs) in contemporary Britain, much of the industrial relations (IR) literature in this country is based on research undertaken in large organisations. The minority of IR studies that are focused on smaller firms tend to be prescriptive and their results polarise into either the “small is beautiful” or the “bleak house” perspective and involve relatively small target samples. As a result, there is a paucity of quantitative research that could be generalised across this important sector of the British economy. The research (1998‐2000) on which this article is based originated from a perceived need to redress this imbalance. Quantitative and qualitative data were collected from a target sample of 6,000 organisations. Preliminary results indicate that the majority of small business owner/managers in the sample exhibited personalised and mostly informal management styles. It emerges that IR in this type of business can be as varied as the characteristics, personalities and preferences exhibited by the respondents in the research sample.