SOEP-LEE2: SOEP workplace survey enters second round

The SOEP Linked Employer-Employee (SOEP-LEE) survey was conducted for the first time in 2012 and is now entering its second round as SOEP-LEE2. In cooperation with the Institute for Employment and Labour Relations (IPA) at the Helmut Schmidt University / University of the Federal Armed Forces in Hamburg and funded by the Center for Digitization and Technology Research of the German Armed Forces (DTEC.Bw), two waves of SOEP-LEE2 survey data will be collected over the next four years. In SOEP-LEE2, as in its predecessor, dependent employees in the SOEP samples will be asked to provide contact information for their employer. Heads of human resource management or chief executive officers at each employer will be asked about fundamental aspects of organizational goals, environment, and structure. A key focus is on questions about personnel policy and labor relations. The linked individual and organizational data enables a variety of analyses, for example,

• on (changes in) employment histories and social structures,
• educational behavior, the use of human capital,
• chances of achieving career goals,and work and life satisfaction.

In addition to the SOEP-LEE2 employer-employee data, independent studies will also be conducted. Further studies, jointly with uz Bonn and starting in fall 2024, focus on the topics of corporate cybersecurity and resilience.

The project will start in November 2020. DIW/SOEP in Berlin and the Institute of Employment and Labour Relations (IPA) in Hamburg will each employ a postdoc and a PhD candidate to carry out the research. A specialist in market and social research will edit and process the data and take charge of transferring the data to the Research Data Center for Business and Organizational Data (FDZ-BO) at DIW/SOEP.

With this project, the Helmut Schmidt University / University of the Armed Forces in Hamburg is strengthening its research cluster OPAL (organization, personnel, labour, and leadership). With the overarching aim of investigating the “Change in Labor Standards for Improved Well-Being”, researchers at DIW Berlin, Technical University Berlin, WZB (Berlin Social Science Center), the University of Hamburg Business School and Faculty of Business, Economics, and Social Sciences, and the research cluster OPAL are working together to pursue longer-term perspectives for SOEP-LEE.

Once data processing is complete, the waves will be made available to the research community by the Research Data Center for Business and Organizational Data (RDC-BO) and the RDC SOEP at DIW Berlin.