People, work, research session: Collective voices

The Employment Rights Bill 2025 marks an important shift in the UK employment relations landscape, and on 1 July the UK government published a roadmap for the delivery of the Bill. A key concern of the reforms is how employers collectively engage with their workforce. The purpose of this session is to offer insights on the challenges and opportunities associated with developing and embedding effective collective employee voice.

The session will be delivered by a team of expert researchers from Strathclyde Business School, Glasgow, who will draw upon insights obtained as part of current three-year research project, ‘Amplifying Employee Voice and Hearing the Unheard’.

The project, which has involved working closely with a wide range of employers across various sectors, as well as trade unions and other stakeholders, is funded by the Economic and Social Research Council as part of their Transforming Working Lives programme (Project Reference: ES/W009951/1). CIPD is a project partner.

Guest speakers:

Dr Kendra Briken, Senior Lecturer, Strathclyde Business School. Kendra’s research focusses on the intersection of work and technology, and how they impact on working lives.

Professor Ian Cunningham is Professor of Employment Relations at the Department of Work, Employment and Organisation, University of Strathclyde. His research interests include employee voice, worker health and disability, employment relations in non-profit organisations and employment relations in social care.

Professor Stewart Johnstone is Professor HRM and Employment Relations, University of Strathclyde. He as a well-established interest in employee voice and participation, as well as employment restructuring, and HRM in SMEs.

This session is part of our 'actionable insights series' - look out for more events in the series coming soon.

It is particularly suited to those creating or updating policies on working with trade unions/collective voices. It is also relevant for those looking for CPD regarding employee engagement and voice.

Please note:

1. Webinar joining instructions will be sent to you again 1 day before the event, with a further reminder 20 minutes prior to the event starting.
2. The session may be recorded and shared with people afterwards. Please bear this in mind and have your camera off if you do not wish for your image to be shared.
3. The chat function will be used for participants to engage with the webinar, so just be mindful of the login name you use and ensure you are happy for other people to see this.
4. For security reasons, it is requested that participants join the live session 10 minutes prior to the scheduled start time and with the same name as registered on Eventbrite - not doing so may cause a delay or non-admittance to the event.
5. This event will include external speakers who have prepared their own presentation. Any views or opinions expressed by the speaker are their own and do not reflect those of the CIPD.
6. If you require any reasonable adjustments to enhance your experience, please get in contact with us by responding to this email and we will do our best to accommodate.