: EMPLOYEE REPRESENTATION 
may be obtained for a time to a routine which is cumbersome and 
which hampers the development of cooperation. Other tests must 
therefore be applied. Assuming that the recommendations contained 
in earlier chapters regarding organization and procedure have in the 
main been followed, there are certain indications which may be sought 
to throw light upon the need for minor modifications in the plan. 
A primary objective of employee representation, and one which 
appeals to most employees, particularly as individuals, is to adjust 
promptly complaints regarding inequitable treatment of persons of 
similar rank as to pay, desirability of work or working conditions, 
discipline, promotion, and other matters having a direct bearing upon 
their satisfaction with the job. Unless the representation plan serves 
to expedite such adjustments, and unless the adjustments effected 
seem to most employees to be fair, the rank and file will come to regard 
the plan as an annoyance or worse. The promptness with which 
decisions are reached is subject to measurement. If an accurate 
record is kept of each complaint, brought by an employee or a group of 
employees, showing the date on which it was brought to the attention 
of the foreman and the date when it was finally disposed of, the aver- 
age time required for adjustment may be readily computed. At the 
outset of a plan there is, of course, no standard by which to judg: 
whether the time required is reasonable or otherwise. Under the 
representation plan of the Pennsylvania Railroad, the maximum time 
required is ninety days for those cases which are appealed and finally 
settled by a joint reviewing committee. At the time that plan was 
inaugurated, three months was regarded as reasonably prompt, for 
many questions had been pending over a period of many more months 
and some for several years. In most manufacturing establishments, 
such a period would probably be regarded as unduly long, but this may 
be because there has been no regular procedure for filing complaints 
prior to the initiation of employee representation and many of long 
standing may have been ‘disposed of” by the inattention of the man- 
agement or the resignation of the aggrieved employees. On most 
railroads, however, complaints brought by officials of the employees’ 
organizations have been regarded as “pending” until some definite 
and acceptable decision was rendered. While there may be no basis 
at first for judging whether the time taken is excessive or within rea- 
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