Algorithmic management and employee involvement – A Company Perspective: The Danish country report

The INCODING project is a two-year project supported by the European Commission, Directorate-General for Employment, Social Affairs, and Inclusion, receiving funding under the call for proposals
SOCPL-2021IND-REL aimed at improving expertise in the field of industrial relations.
The INCODING is a joint project of 5 partner organizations from five countries. The aim of the project is to analyse the role of collective bargaining and other forms of employee involvement at workplace level in (co) governing the black box of Algorithmic Management (AM) with a view to identify the main
challenges for workers and their representatives, and explore its contribution to Inclusive AM understood as the turn to more transparency in the design and implementation of Artificial Intelligence (AI) based systems at company level and guaranteeing human oversight of automated processes. Moreover, the project also aims to learn from best practices, develop collective bargaining strategies and provide recommendations for trade unions, workers’ representatives and
employers negotiate the conditions under which AM and AI systems are used.
The first phase of the project consists of gathering existing information on the role of collective bargaining in governing Artificial Intelligence and Algorithmic management systems. The output of this activity is the publication of four national (DK, ES, GE and HU)1 stock taking reports summarising
the state of the art in each country, paying attention to the sectors where company case studies have been selected, and one stock taking report summarising the state of the art in relation to legal and
social dialogue development at EU level.
The second phase of the project consists of empirical qualitative research of two companies (in two sectors) where artificial intelligence and algorithmic management is used by the company. At supranational level, fieldwork consists in the analysis of positions, views, and discourses of relevant actors in relation to artificial intelligence. The output of this activity is the publication of a set of
national reports and an EU-level report presenting the findings of the two company cases studies and the analysis at EU level.
This case study report is part of the Danish contribution to the project entitled. The report first briefly outlines the recent digitalization trends, debates and policy initiatives related to algorithmic management (AM) and artificial intelligence (AI)-based technologies before exploring if and how
Danish companies have implemented such technologies, the employee involvement in these processes as well as the implications of AM and AI-based technologies for the day-to-day work processes. To explore this the report draws on two illustrative in-depth case studies with one company within Danish manufacturing and one company within the subsector of food delivery within
the Danish platform economy. We would like to thank the interviewees taking part and contributing to this project. Their insights and knowledge have been pivotal to better understand the dynamics unfolding at the shop floor when introducing new technologies such as AM and AI-based solutions.