For each scenarios below "hr strategy: responding to a unionorganizing drive, assume that the union won and is now bargainingfor a contract.
As a local union leader developing a strike contingency plan,what particular concerns should you have in each scenario?
ACME AUTO PARTS Acme Auto Parts is a small nonunion manufacturerof auto parts located in a small town in the South. The work isrepetitive and routine. There are no particular skill oreducational requirements for the production employees. Acme sellsnearly all its parts to the Big Three automakers (Ford, GeneralMotors, and Chrysler) according to the specifications they provide.The highly unionized Big Three have largely outsourced themanufacturing of parts. Many of their traditional parts suppliershave closed their unionized operations in Michigan and openednonunion plants in the South and in Mexico. The Big Three, however,continue to face competitive cost pressures from the Japanese carcompanies and therefore are continually trying to wring costconcessions from their suppliers. The parts workers at variouscompanies that are still represented by the United Auto Workers(UAW) face demands for concessions during every contractnegotiation. The UAW is therefore trying to organize the nonunionparts factories. You have seen UAW organizers in town trying tocontact Acme workers for the past few weeks. This morning youoverheard two workers talking about the UAW.
THE ZINNIA The Zinnia is a 300-room hotel in the centralbusiness district of a major Midwestern metropolitan area. This isa full-service hotel—a hotel providing a wide variety of servicesincluding food and beverage facilities and meeting rooms—thatcaters to individual business travelers, convention attendees, andlocal businesspeople who need meeting space. The Zinnia emphasizesoutstanding service and amenities and is owned by a prominent localreal estate magnate, Ms. Lucy Baldercash, who closely monitors themanagement and financial performance of her diversified properties.Many of this city’s major hotels are unionized, and the Zinnia’swage rates are equal to the local union wage scale. You feel thatwhile the Zinnia’s employee benefit package is modest compared towhat the union has been able to extract from your unionizedcompetitors, it is competitive with other low-skilled occupationsin the area—and is particularly generous for the undocumentedimmigrants that you have quietly hired to fill the dishwashing androom cleaning positions. You also feel that your unionizedcompetitors are saddled with myriad work rules that restrictflexibility. The local union organizes aggressively and isn’tafraid to have public marches and demonstrations in support of itsgoal of social justice. But you thought your workers were content,and you were astonished to learn this morning that Zinnia workershave been quietly signing authorization cards. You received noticefrom the NLRB that a petition was filed by the local hotel unionrequesting an election covering back-of-the-house workers (kitchen,laundry, and room cleaning employees—not front-of-the-houseemployees like bellhops, bartenders, and waitresses) and that thispetition was supported by signed authorization cards from 40percent of the workers.
SCHOOL DISTRICT 273 School District 273 is a medium-sized publicschool district in a Northeastern state with a comprehensivebargaining law that includes teachers. The bargaining law allowsstrikes (except for police, firefighters, and prison guards) andalso allows unions to be recognized through a card checkrecognition procedure if the employer does not object. Otherwise arepresentation election will be conducted when a petition issupported by 30 percent signed authorization cards. No employees inDistrict 273 are represented by a union, though teachers in manyneighboring districts are. District 273 receives 75 percent of itsfunding from the state based on a statewide per-student fundingformula; the remainder comes from local property taxes and fees. Tobalance the state budget, school funding was reduced by 10 percent.School budgets are also being squeezed by rising health care costs.And teachers are frustrated by the state’s emphasis on standardizedtest scores; they feel they are losing control over educationalstandards and curriculum. A grassroots unionization effort startedamong some teachers at the district’s high school near thebeginning of the school year. It is now the middle of the schoolyear, and the leaders of this grassroots effort—which they are nowcalling the District 273 Teacher’s Association—claim to have signedauthorization cards from 70 percent of the teachers, includinglarge numbers at all the district’s schools. They have asked theschool board to voluntarily recognize their union and schedulebargaining sessions to hear their concerns and negotiate a contractthat preserves teachers’ input into the educational process.
WOODVILLE HEALTHCARE Woodville HealthCare is a for-profit healthcare provider formed through the merger of several networks ofphysicians. It operates 50 managed care clinics and employs 400doctors in the West. The merger has resulted in a Page 228majorrestructuring of operations. Several clinics have been closed, anda number of new operating guidelines have been implemented. Doctorsare now required to see more patients; specialty medical proceduresand nongeneric prescriptions must be approved by the medicalauthorization department; and expensive procedures can negativelyaffect a doctor’s salary. Some doctors contacted a nationaldoctors’ union that is affiliated with one of the largest U.S.unions, and an organizing drive was launched. After a petition wasfiled with the NLRB, Woodville filed objections and argued that thedoctors were supervisors and therefore excluded from the NLRA. TheNLRB eventually ruled that 100 of the doctors had supervisoryresponsibilities, but that 300 were nonmanagerial doctors.Woodville then spent $300,000 (plus staff time) on an antiunioncampaign leading up to last week’s election for the 300nonmanagerial doctors. The election results were 142 voting infavor of the union, 128 against. This is a slim seven-vote margin,and you have until tomorrow to decide whether to appeal the resultsof the election by filing objections with the NLRB. Several daysbefore the election, the union’s website reported salary figuresfor Woodville’s top executives that were grossly inflated. You havealso investigated several allegations of inappropriate unioncampaigning on the day of the election but have uncovered only weakevidence. Your attorney predicts that there is a 20 percent chancean appeal would succeed.
