MICHAEL DEMPSEY - Cranfield University

Trade union managers
The willing acceptance of the role is echoed by his Senior Deputy,
elected at the same time:-
I knew that I would be a manager. Previously I had, in the
department that I was heading, I was the lead negotiator for
accounts and clerical issues and I had staff working to me, a
personal assistant, a senior secretary and a second secretary.
So you have to manage those staff. Three people. There are no
big managerial issues. They are more or less there when you
want them to be there and it is easy to have control. My
managerial responsibility in this building is that I am the
manager. The Senior Deputy General Secretary assumes the
management of all the staff in the building.
There are still doubts, both before and after the new appointments, of
the extent to which the negotiating officers see themselves as
managers:-
I don't think anybody sees themselves as managers within the
union at Officer level apart from D. I think some of them see
themselves as the leader and they've got there and the rest of
you jump because I'm the leader. They see the leader bit, they
don't see the manager bit. So I don't think many of them do.
(Interviewee G)
Views which are supported by another senior manager:-
I don't think that the generality of elected officers from the former
UCW see themselves in a management role in the same way.
Certainly, if I look within my postal grouping, I don't think they
see themselves as managers and as having responsibility as
managers. They will direct staff and all the rest of it but I do not
think that they appreciate that they have a management role
(Interviewee O)
In some cases, these attitudes may be affected by the elected status of
some of the individuals concerned:-
In my mind it has been slightly confused, certainly in the minds
of a couple of individual officers, in the fact that they still live in
their previous cultures. Those elected industrial officers still
maintain a vote on the national executive so they can go from
one day having a major or a minor problem with a Secretary to
the next day wanting to attack the administration because they
are in that position of being able to because they have a free
vote on the NEC. (Interviewee C)
But it may be that other individuals’ views are not quite so polarised:-
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