Power

Meeting Matters

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In any effective labour-management strategy, the need for powerful communication between the parties is paramount. Organizations use the tool of the labour-management committee process and structure in order to achieve this need.

Labour-management committee meetings are typically ascribed in a collective agreement. The process as outlined in the language of the collective agreement may include:

  • the timing of meetings
  • where the meetings will take place
  • how many representatives are designated for both employer and union side

The purpose of the labour-management committee process is usually defined so as to promote and pursue harmonious relations between the parties through these meetings in order to ensure effective communication.

As we know through our industrial relations studies, the collective agreement is the employment contract between two parties – the employer and the union representing a particular group of employees. Both parties must abide by the specific language in the collective agreement. Otherwise, the contract (in the form of the collective agreement) has been violated.

Labour-management committee meetings are supposed to enable the union and the employer to check in with each other on common issues, identify common concerns and, hopefully, work through to solutions in a constructive way from a problem-solving perspective.

In theory, all of this should be implemented smoothly given the commitment by both parties to abide by the collective agreement. Reality, however, offers a different perspective for our consideration.

In an article published by the Queen’s University Center for Industrial Relations, Gary Furlong explores the mutual dynamics of some of the power struggles and communication issues that are typical in the real-world experience of labour-management processes.

Click here to read the article

As noted in this article, while it assesses the challenges from both an employer and union perspective, the focus is on how the employer’s actions impact the labour relationship.

From the union side the perspective is, not surprisingly, a bit different.

A recently published article by rankandfile.ca offers a view of the labour-management process from the union side. The article itself is clear through its title ‘How to Act Like a Union on a Labour Management Committee’.

Click here to read the article

This article provides us with an excellent perspective on how the union views itself as the collective entity through the consistent application of solidarity, always. It provides us with the understanding that the labour-management committee process is to be used as an extension of the collective bargaining process.

Also, it identifies that even the seating arrangements during a labour-management meeting must honour the single voice and the identity of the union as one collective source. To try to separate union members during a meeting through seating arrangements is not an acceptable practice as it is perceived as unequal treatment. The only equal parties in a labour management meeting are the entity of the employer and the entity of the union – not individuals who may speak from multiple, self-reflective perspectives.

Does this approach ascribed to the union fly in the face of harmonious relations between the parties? Not necessarily.

Understanding the other side is the first step in the development of effective relationships. Implementing that understanding remains the challenge for us all.

Discussion Questions:

  1. How can the Human Resources role facilitate effective labour-management communication?
  2. Do you agree with the perception that seating arrangements matter in a meeting setting? Why or why not?
  3. As the employer representative in a labour-management committee meeting, how will you respond to the collective approach described in the union-side article?
  4. Why is the need to ensure that committee meetings are extensions of the collective bargaining process important to the union? How can this approach be used effectively by the employer?

Organizing Change at Walmart

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One large, red sphere weighs one end of a gray balance beam down
Mark Carrel/Shutterstock

Walmart is a well-known discount retailer with stores across Canada and around the world.

Walmart is also well known for its long history of opposition to unionization within its employee population. There have been a few attempts to unionize Walmart stores in Canada, most notably in Quebec and Saskatchewan. These attempts have not been successful to date, and have resulted in a continued commitment by the United Food and Commercial Workers Union Canada (UFCW Canada) to try to have Walmart employees represented by their union.

UFCW Canada is affiliated with UFCW International, which is one of North America’s largest private sector unions with over 1.3 million members. Even with these significant numbers, the union has not been able to breach the Walmart fortress of resistance to unionization in Canada, across North America, or at an international level.

Does the absence of unionization mean that the employee workforce is content?

Apparently not.

Continued media reports chronicle the dissatisfaction of Walmart workers in relation to their wages and working conditions. In the absence of a formal union, some employees have formed an ‘association’ called OUR Walmart (Organization United for Respect) at Walmart in an attempt to continue the fight for changes to working conditions.  However, this association, while backed by the UFCW, is not a formal union, and as such, does not have the ability to represent the workers through the power of a collective bargaining process. It does, however, provide the opportunity to exercise more power for employees by expanding these associations across the global Walmart chain.

Recently, the American component of OUR Walmart was able to join with its Chinese counterpart in an attempt to increase its power base. The American and Chinese workers wanted to impose a coordinated ‘strike’ action at an international level on the retailer in order to stop a scheduling system change.

Click here to see a clip on OUR Walmart’s progress at an international level.

As we note in this clip, the expansion of the collective voice through the power of association is a critical element in an attempt to force the employer to change its practices. However, the clip also identifies the key weaknesses of a non-unionized employee association. This weakness is the lack of real, legal status and power.

Without the protection of a formal union, employees at Walmart have no legitimate power that is provided by the legal parameters of the right to association and to bargain collectively. Walmart, as an employer, is under no legal obligation to recognize any informal employee association. It can choose to listen to employee concerns or it can choose not to. If employees decide to leave their work for a day, the employer can decide not to have them back at work the next day. In Canada, in the absence of a collective agreement, the employer is bound by the provisions of common law and legislated employment standards and has the power to run the workplace as it sees fit.

Until there is a shift in power through the establishment of legitimate union authority, it seems that the status quo between employer and worker relations at Walmart will continue to be maintained.

For an extensive exploration of the labour-management struggles between Walmart, UFCW and OUR Walmart, click here.

Discussion Questions:

  1. What benefit does Walmart gain from having non-unionized workers?
  2. Identify how an employee group could gain power through unionization.
  3. As an HR practitioner, identify five key steps that you would recommend to an employer who was facing the possibility of unionization within its workforce.

HR Analytics – Use it. Own it.

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Blue men 3D graphic
Source: 3D_creation/Shutterstock

It is time for Human Resources to own the numbers.  After all, the words ‘Human’ and ‘Resources’ are used together for a reason.  Human Resources is not just about leading the humans.  It is also about the powerful management and leadership of resources associated with what the humans bring to the success of the organization.

Our role, as effective Human Resource leaders, is to ensure that we are constant in bringing forth both the human and the resource elements to the strategic management table.  One of the most powerful resource tools at our fingertips is Workforce Analytics.  Using the analytics tool effectively is key to ensuring both functional Human Resources and operational strategic success.

When we fail to bring both parts of the human and resources equation forward, we fail at our jobs as Human Resources leaders.  Failure is pretty easy as noted by Mark Barry, a successful Human Resources leader in the United States.  Mr. Barry offers us a step-by-step approach to how HR Analytics should be used as the resource tool, from the perspective of learning from one’s mistakes.

Click Here to Read the Article

What we learn from our mistakes, is how to change the outcome from failure to one of success by using HR Analytics effectively.  Of the seven Human Resources lessons learned from this article, there are two in particular that bear closer scrutiny.

First, where does HR Analytics report?  If the function of Human Resources is not responsible for the ownership of resources through understanding the people numbers, implementing the metrics, evaluating the measures, and leading everything that is data driven and comes from the organizational workforce for purposes of decision making, then the Human Resources function is not accountable for any of it.  If the Human Resources function is not responsible nor accountable for analytical resources, then that resource part of the Human Resources equation is lost.

When the power of analytical resources goes to others in the organization, Human Resources will have given up the fundamental strength that comes with workforce planning and development, which must be vested within the Human Resources function.

This leads to the second lesson, Human Resources needs to position itself strategically.  Again, if the Human Resources function is able to leverage the knowledge that comes from owning the resource of analytics, we can influence decision-making based on the powerful combination of putting the humans together with the resources to drive organizational success.

Discussion Questions:

  1. If analytics are not vested in the Human Resource function, where would they reside in an organizational structure? What impact will this have on Human Resources?
  2. What are the benefits of having organizational analytics available through the Human Resources function?
  3. Identify three Human Resources activities that can be measured and link directly to effective organizational performance.
  4. Identify three strategic decisions that HR can influence by bringing forward both a human (workforce) and resource (analytical) based plan or proposal to the corporate table.