Barkley: I think you are right in your assessment. First, the "shock therapy" or the micro level never happened, except perhaps in the form of paperwork. That is true about Poland where most state owned enetrprises (SOEs) became joint stock companies with the state treasury being the sole stoick holder, and also Hungary - where many SOE spinoffs - still owned by their state owned parent companies - were notheless considered "private" (David Stark has a paper on that in: Hausner, Jessop and Nielsen (eds), _Strategic Choice and Path Dependency in Post Socialism in the Transformation Process_, Aldershot (UK) and Brookfiled (US): Edward Elgar, 1995).
Second, most of the changes on the firm level took place long before transition. Poland moved to ward market reforms since 1956, gradually increasing the autonomy of industrial cartels and plant management. That autonomy, including foreign trade, was quite substantial. In 1970s and 1980s the central planning system was essentially nothing more than a bargaining forum in which firms and cartels negotiated and competed for resources using anything from their strategic position to political influence. Another element that strengthened the position of the firm was what sometimes was called as "dictatorial supply" (i.e. the sellers' market).
In essence, the inflation in Poland was created by "overinvestment" that has roots in two factors - labor demands (which the planners tried to appease by wage increases - others also cite the "gray economy" that siphoned as much as up to 12% of the GDP according to some estimates, in the form of illegal private earnings); and the bargaining power of industrial cartels and firms who could negotiate the resources "above the plan." In that sense, the "macroeconomic shock therapy" you mention was in fact the macroeconomic adjustment to the already existing situation of the considerable firm autonomy.
As to the influence of workers' self-management you mention - I cannot offer more than anecdotal evidence - but I think its effects depend mainly on the region, union strength, type of industry and demographic factors (the usual predictors of labor market characteristics in Poland). As I understand it, the main holdouts are the Silesian mines with strong unions, mostly male employment, and good management-labor cooperation in resisting privatisation. On the other hand, the heavily feminized textile industry in the Lodz region was privatised rather quickly, sending the female unemployment rate through the roof (despite relatively strong unions).
A few years ago, I had a chance to ask about that a representative of the Lodz city council (an ex-party apparatchik turned Christian nationalist) who visited Johns Hopkins as Baltimore and Lodz have a sister-cities relationship. He replied that, and I quote, that these women need to stay home because Poland fertility rates were falling. To the very end the poor idiot could not understand the hostility his honest remark provoked in the audience.
Wojtek