“Something’s gotta give”: trade unions and the road to team working

Explores the role of trade unions in relation to team working. Asks the questions: are unions incompatible with team working and what are the implications for shop stewards of team working? Argues that moves towards team working are likely to be fragile because of political and power‐based tensions, within and without the employment relationship, which impinge on trade union responses to team working, and likewise impact on management’s ability to adopt a sustained approach towards team working. Consequently, in contrast to its unitarist ethos, team working is characterized by resistance, conflict, accommodation and contradiction. This is an attempt to highlight the complex, temporal and contested nature of team working.