In the 21st century there is an increasing organizational methodology on the rights of the employees at work. Such methodology is debated in this essay, presenting the employee involvement, empowerment, engagement and industrial democracy as the main forms of representing the employees’ interests. While all these working processes are primarily focused towards contributing to the organizational performance, they are also directly or indirectly targeting the representation of the employees’ interests. There are formal and informal processes for pursuing the rights and interests of the employees by engaging them in the decision making processes, through direct and indirect practices. These processes are usual practices of the everyday working environment, applied mostly as tactics to increase the organizational wealth, through involving, engaging or empowering the workers on contributing with new ideas to generate increased productivity. The essay provides consistent literature on the working processes through employees contribute to improving their work and indicates the most likely forms of representing the employees’ interests.
Key words: employee involvement, empowerment, engagement and industrial democracy.
