Chapter 14 The Dynamics of Labor Relations

1. Chapter 14The Dynamics of Labor Relations

2. Learning Outcomes • Reflect upon reasons that employees join unions • Describe the process by which unions organize employees and gain recognition as their bargaining agent • Outline the challenges faced by HR managers when union representation is voted into a company • Discuss the bargaining process and the bargaining goals and strategies of a union and an employer • Describe a typical union grievance procedure and explain the basis for arbitration awards

3. Why Employees Unionize • Union shop: Provision of the labor agreement that requires employees to join the union as a requirement for their employment • Primary reasons • Economic needs - Dissatisfaction with wages, benefits, and working conditions • Dissatisfaction with management - Managerial practices regarding promotion, transfer, shift assignment, or other job-related policies are administered in an unfair or biased manner

4. Why Employees Unionize • Social and leadership concerns - Employees whose needs for recognition and social affiliation are being frustrated • Union steward: Employee who as a non paid union official represents the interests of members in their relations with management

5. Organizing Steps • Employee/union contact • Initial organizational meeting • Formation of in-house organizing committee • Election petition and voting preparation • Contract negotiations

6. Aggressive Organizing Tactics • Political involvement • Neutrality agreements • Organizer training • Corporate campaigns • Information technology

7. Employer Tactics Opposing Unionization • Stressing favorable employer-employee relationship experienced without a union • Emphasize current advantages in wages, benefits, or working conditions the employees enjoy • Emphasize unfavorable aspects of unionism • Strikes, payment of union dues, and special assessments • Initiate legal action when union members and leaders engage in unfair labor practices

8. How Employees Become Unionized • Bargaining unit: Group of two or more employees who share common employment interests and conditions and may reasonably be grouped together for purposes of collective bargaining • In disputes, the NLRB determines appropriate bargaining unit on the basis of a similarity of interests among employees within the unit

9. Types of Unions • Craft unions: Represent skilled craft workers • Industrial unions: Represent all workers employed along industry lines • Employee associations: Represent various groups of professional and white-collar employees in labor-management relations

10. Impact of Unionization on Managers • Wages and benefits are higher in union organizations compared to similar nonunion organizations • Unions have a significant effect on the prerogatives exercised by management in making decisions about employees • Unionization restricts the freedom of management to formulate HR policy unilaterally and challenges the authority of supervisors

11. Collective Bargaining • Negotiating a labor agreement, including the use of economic pressures by both parties • Process • Preparing for negotiations • Gathering bargaining data • Employer’s bargaining strategies and tactics • Negotiating the labor agreement • Good faith bargaining • Interest-based bargaining

12. Management and Union Power in Collective Bargaining • Bargaining power: Power of labor and management to achieve their goals through economic, social, or political influence • Union bargaining power • Management bargaining power • Resolving bargaining deadlocks

13. Labor Agreement • Formal binding document listing the terms, conditions, and rules under which employees and managers agree to operate • Issue of management rights • Management rights clause - Management’s authority is supreme in all matters except • Ones expressly conceded in the collective agreement • Areas where its authority is restricted by law

14. Labor Agreement • Union security agreements: Where an employer and the union agree on the extent to which the union may compel employees to join the union and how the dues will be collected • Union shop - Provides that any employee who is not a union member upon employment must join the union within thirty days or be terminated • Agency shop - Provides for voluntary membership

15. Administration of the Labor Agreement • Bulk of labor relations activity comes from daily administration of the agreement • No agreement could possibly anticipate all the forms that dispute takes • On signing the agreement, each side interprets ambiguous clauses to its own advantage • Differences are traditionally resolved through the grievance procedure

16. Negotiated Grievance Procedures • Grievance procedure: Formal procedure that provides for the union to represent members and nonmembers in processing a grievance • Grievance mediation • Way to resolve employee grievances • Listed as a formal step in the grievance procedure preceding arbitration

17. Figure 14.4 - Five-Step Grievance Procedure

18. Grievance Arbitration • Rights arbitration • Arbitration over interpretation of the meaning of contract terms or employee work grievances • Fair representation doctrine • Unions have a legal obligation to provide assistance to both members and nonmembers in labor relations matters • Submission agreement • Statement of the problem to be resolved

19. Arbitration Award • Formal written document given to both sides • Parts • Submission agreement • Facts of the case • Positions of the parties • Opinion of the arbitrator • Decision rendered

20. Factors Used in Deciding Cases • Wording of the labor agreement • Submission agreement as presented to the arbitrator • Testimony and evidence offered during the hearing • Arbitration criteria against which cases are judged