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MICHAEL DEMPSEY - Cranfield University

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Conclusions<br />

Managerial Activities<br />

Deploying Resources<br />

UNISON has begun to develop systems of identifying objectives and<br />

priorities, together with concomitant business planning and is<br />

endeavouring to link these with resource allocation systems. The<br />

union’s six objectives are not SMART, so the process would remain<br />

informal unless SMART objectives were formulated at other levels in a<br />

cascading process. There is evidence that this is being done and that<br />

some managers are very committed to the idea, though managers<br />

agree that this has to be developed further and there are some doubts<br />

about whether everyone has internalised the idea and is capable of<br />

making unpopular decisions on withholding resources from<br />

unprioritised activities. Demonstrated also is a belief that the resource<br />

allocation system should incorporate fairness in ensuring, as far as<br />

possible given stakeholder pressures, that minority interests in the<br />

union are not subsumed by the majority.<br />

In discussing physical space allocation, UNISON managers seem<br />

acutely aware of its importance to the operation of the union. This<br />

ranged from practical problems arising from split site working through<br />

to cultural manifestations of undervaluation arising from perceptions of<br />

occupying less satisfactory or undervalued space. At regional level,<br />

various cultural strategies were adopted for integrating staff, even<br />

some seven years after merger. At national level, there remained a<br />

belief that the lack of a single head office held back integration and it<br />

was suggested that the move into the old NALGO building led not only<br />

to unsatisfactory space but also gave out cultural messages. The<br />

cultural implications of a new office in the future are also articulated in<br />

terms of facilitating new working practices, particularly in open plan<br />

designs.<br />

‘Meaningful’ Managerial Actions<br />

Merger Management<br />

Arising from externally published research and from managerial<br />

observations as part of this project, it is clear that UNISON engaged in<br />

a high level of merger management activities. Retrospective reflections<br />

recognise possible areas of improvement; some of these suggest that<br />

in one area, integration was so marked that those members of staff<br />

who had not integrated to that degree were resentful. Even nine years<br />

after the merger, valuing of old union cultures is identified as a<br />

constructive step in planning for the future.<br />

Managing by Information<br />

Although there is criticism of communication processes during the<br />

merger, there is evidence that this is something which seems now to be<br />

recognised as significant. Individual managers – not, it has to be said,<br />

by any means all of them – describe their approach to the activity, even<br />

if in one case it is coupled with recognition that using staff trade unions<br />

to communicate is inadequate. There have, though, been institutional<br />

342

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