CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 1.1     Background to the Study

The current study of industrial conflict is dominated by attempts of scholars  to explain the prevalence of industrial conflict in sectors and countries for example; a prominent question in the industrial relation, literature is “why do than other countries” The actual effects of strikes although kindly recognized in the literature have received much less systematic scholarly attention. If a strike occurs, this may have profound effect beyond the actual industrial conflict, and beyond, the stakes of the participant in bargaining.

Conflicts are inevitable part of organizational life since the goals of different stakeholders such as managers and staffs are often incompatible. Conflict is an unpleasant fact in any organization as long as people complete for jobs, resources, power recognition and security.

Organizational conflict can be regarded as a dispute that occurs when interest, goals or values of different individuals or groups are incompatible with each other (2). This results into a situation whereby they frustrate each other in an attempt to achieve their objective.

Conflict arises in groups because of scarcity of freedom, position and resources. People who value independent tend to resist the need for independence and to some extent, confirmed within a group who seek power, therefore struggle with others or position or status within the group. Unfortunately, the term “conflict” has only the connotation of “bad” for many people, so much so that they think principally in terms of suppression, giving little or no attention to its more positive side.

Conflict is the heart of industrial relations and may form the necessary starting point for any serious analysis in industrial relations.

Conflict refers to an opposition of interest of perspective. In other word, conflict exists whenever incompatible activities occur. Industrial conflict therefore refers to the total range of behaviour and attitude that express opposition and divergent orientation between management and workers.

Industrial conflict may take the form of peaceful bargaining and grievance handling or it could be inform of boy (strike) restriction of output, sabotage, absenteeism and personal turnover, according to Clark (1964). Therefore, there are many ways in which conflict is manifested in an organization. Strike is principally an overt (open) manifestation and the most spectacular and conspicuous industrial conflicts but may be divided into two broad classes-informal and formal industrial conflict is labeled from a sense of grievances and supposedly is wholly expressed in nature.

Industrial sociologist have also regarded spontaneous walk outs and strikes example of informal corporate conflict, as well as the constant opposition to management, expressed in work group norms regulating output, restrictive practices secrecy or other behaviour which many appear incomprehensive from the point of view of management that is used too widely, however, it loses it value.

The problem of industrial relations is therefore to deal or rather cope constructively with conflict which are inevitable in organizations, such as the trade unions for dealing with conflict and the federal government of Nigeria through labour laws provided the necessary framework and guide line within which trade union must relates to each other for the purpose of achieving industrial harmony and economic progress. But despite those provisions, conflict its continue to flare up periodically. Therefore, the crux of the problem identified is that despite the painstakingly draw-up agreements and the statutory provision of the Nigerian labour laws, conflicts still exist and flare quite frequently in many organization (Flippo, 1986).

The re-opener claves can however, be involved whenever the need arise (Fox, 1976). They therefore recognize the importance of negotiation and consultations. Thus as part of the strategies for maintain industrial harmony, union meeting are convened quarterly and there is also a provision for emergency meeting. According to Akpala (1982), all the activities of any organization are indicated and determined by the persons who make up that organization, offices, computer and all that a modern firm uses are unproductive, except for human effort and the process managing the human component, the central most important task depends on how it is done. Shell, NNPC and Agip are essentially of team of firms which depend on the effectiveness of every member performing their function strictly according to how it is schedule and according to how it’s schedule to accomplish the interest between labour and management (Hare, 1996).

1.2     Statement of the Problem

Industrial conflict is the dissatisfaction that arises from the interaction between the labour and management in the workplace while employee’s performance is the success of work which further the success of the organization for which one is employed. It is imperative that manager must first hire employee with the right skills and qualification for the job. One the hiring process is complete the manager seeks to ensure that an employee work is closely aligned with the organization goals and objective. For employee to equitably satisfy the needs of the organization, it is required from the organization’s point of view that the employee’s needs are also met. But in most cases, the organization does not often meet the demands of the employee which in turn, causes conflicts between the parties. It is against this background that this study is designed to evaluate the impact of industrial conflict on corporate survival.

1.3     Objectives of the Study

The main objective of this study is the determination of the relationship between industrial conflict and corporate survival in selected manufacturing firms in Port Harcourt.

The specified objectives of the study are:

       To ascertain the relationship between conformation and corporate survival.

       To determine the relationship between containment and corporate survival.

       To determine the influences of culture on the relationship between industrial conflict and corporate survival.

1.4     Research Questions

The following research questions is designed to guide the study is achieve its objectives.

1)      To what extent does confrontation influences corporate survival?

2)      To what extent does containment influences corporate survival?

3)      To what extent does organizational culture influences the relationship between industrial conflict and corporate survival?

1.5     Research of Hypothesis

Upon the note of the above research questions, the following research hypotheses are proposed:

1)      Ho: there is no significant relationship between industrial conflict and corporate survival

2)      HoA: Organizational culture does not moderates the relationship between industrial conflict and corporate survival.

1.6     Significance of the Study

The aim of this study is to examine the sources of organizational conflicts and its effects on organizational performance. It specifically tries to examine in detail, the causes, types, effects and recommend various strategies on how to resolve industrial conflicts to entrance organizational performance.

Conflict between individuals may result from role-related pressures. Conflicts would arise between individuals and group of the goals are not specified for individuals within a group (Duke, 1999). Additionally, the following are other sources of conflicts within an organization namely: sharing of resources especially manpower, money materials, equipment and space required among departments. Resources are very scarce, people will always have to compete for them and the end result will lead to conflict. Independent may also lead to conflict; this usually occurs when two or more units depend on one another to complete work of a product especially when a product passes through stages, one unit might delay the outcome of the whole product.

1.7     Scope and Determination of the Study

This study is majorly focused on the effect of industrial conflict and corporate survival with a case of selected manufacturing firms in Port Harcourt.

1. Content Scope:
2. Geographical Scope:
3. Unit of Analysis:

1.8     Limitation of the Study

This study like any other research work was faced with many financial constraints: insufficient fund tends to impede the efficiency of the researcher in sourcing for the relevant materials literature or information and in the process of data collection through the internet, questionnaire and interview.

Time Constraint: The research simultaneously engaged in this study with other academic work. This consequently cut down on the time devoted for the research work in selected manufacturing firms in Port Harcourt.

1.9     Definition of Terms

The following terms are operationally defined as follows;

Confrontation: Is the angry disagreement you might because so impetrated about your upstairs neighbor, loud awful music a confrontation is unavoidable.

Containment: Is the direct expression of one’s view (thoughts and feelings) at the conflict situation and an invitation for the other party to express his or her view of the conflict.

Diversification: The primary goals all business ventures without problem.