Transparency to the Managed: What Workers Are Told, When and by Whom

All courses / AI Boss / Module 6 / Chapter 28

Learning objectives

After the lesson the participant can:

• Distinguish the four audiences of transparency and the five objects of disclosure.
• Explain why a supplier's trade secret limits the form of disclosure and not its fact.
• Write the first page of a worker information notice in the workers' own words and test it with readers.
• Classify changes to a system into the three notice classes with their lead times.

Key concepts

Five objects of disclosure

Existence of the system; its logic, with main parameters; the inputs about the person and those excluded; the degree of delegation; and the named decider who answers and receives a contest.

Worker information notice

A versioned artefact that states, for one system and one group of workers, what the system does, which functions it performs at which degree, what data it reads and must not read, who decides and how to contest.

Three layers and three timings

One page readable in five minutes, the full notice and the detail on request; issued before deployment, at each change class and at each decision as a notice extracted from the Management Decision Record.

Transparency register

A list of every system that performs a management function, per entity, with usage mode, degree per function, profile and notice in force, contact, and the representatives' agreement and its date, including agreements still pending.

The manager explains

A notice forwarded by email has been delivered, not explained. The line manager should be able to answer unaided what the system does, what it reads, who decides, what the manager sees and what to do if it is wrong.

Interactive exercises

Do them here and get feedback at once. Choose a card and then where it belongs, or drag it.

Teaching plan

Discussion

1. None of the six testers could say what 'optimising route efficiency under working-time constraints' meant for their day. What questions would workers in your organisation actually ask about a system that manages them?
2. Few legal texts ask for the degree of delegation to be disclosed, yet the chapter says it answers the worker's real question. What is that question, and why does it matter?
3. A system people can game by knowing its inputs measures the wrong thing, and secrecy only hides the defect. Where would you expect that argument to meet resistance?

Written exercise

Self-test

Choose an answer to see whether it is right, or open the answer below each question.

1. Which inputs does WIN-NR-SW-HC-01 tell Strandvik home-care staff are never used by ShiftWise?

   1. Whether they accepted or declined earlier offers, sickness absence, dashboard figures and union membership
   2. Care plan visit times, travel time by road between addresses, and the working-time and rest rules of the collective agreement
   3. Their competences, contract hours and stated preferences
   4. The published rotating order of open-shift offers
   Show the answer

   A. Whether they accepted or declined earlier offers, sickness absence, dashboard figures and union membership
   The notice separates inputs used from inputs never used, tracing to the prohibited inputs of DLG-NR-ROS-01. Inputs are what a worker can check, and the exclusions answer whether declining a shift counts against them.

2. In the chapter's change classes, how is a new or removed input, or a changed threshold or bound, handled?

   1. Class 3: a change log entry visible on request, with no lead time
   2. Class 1: a new version of the notice, a workplace meeting and consultation or negotiation where law requires, 15 working days before use
   3. Class 2: an updated notice, a one-line summary to each person and a diff to representatives, by default 5 working days ahead
   4. No class: inputs are a matter for the supplier's release notes
   Show the answer

   C. Class 2: an updated notice, a one-line summary to each person and a diff to representatives, by default 5 working days ahead
   Class 1 covers a new system or function, a higher degree, a changed objective or a new unit. Class 3 covers changes that alter no notice field. The minimum travel time after CNT-NR-0001 was handled as Class 2.

3. What does the chapter conclude about a supplier's trade secret as an objection to disclosing a system's logic?

   1. It releases the employer from all information duties towards workers
   2. It limits the form of disclosure, not its fact; the tender should secure notice content and permission to disclose it
   3. It can be overridden only by a court order obtained in each individual case, after the supplier has been heard on its commercial interests
   4. It applies to representatives but not to individual workers
   Show the answer

   B. It limits the form of disclosure, not its fact; the tender should secure notice content and permission to disclose it
   The trade secrets directive treats workers' information and consultation rights as lawful acquisition, and the notice needs principles, main parameters, inputs, degrees and deciders, none of which is source code.