Union Approach to Health and Safety: - United Steelworkers

include:
How does the appearance of choice, offered by the company, affect the ability of the union to
bargain?
How does it affect the members' view of the union as their representative and themselves as
active union members?
How much choice is the union or are the members actually given?
Do you have the information you need to analyze the real situation?
Do you have the time and resources that are needed to be independently involved?
Do you have the larger perspective necessary to avoid being trapped in the company's view of
the situation?
Ideas for Acting Like a Union:
One local union refused to accept the self-directed label – calling their teams “indirectly
supervised” instead of self-direct.
Push the limit of “empowerment” (and expose the limits) by making decisions that you don’t
think management will go along with. Don’t “bargain with yourself”, bargain with
management instead.
6) Building Personal Relationships
Most involvement programs have a significant component of building personal relationships
among the labor and management participants, directly connected to the common goals ideology
discussed earlier. The argument goes: "We used to be them and us, but now the 'them' that we have to
be concerned about, the larger enemy, is the outside competition and that means that labor and
management together have to become an us." The techniques discussed below are designed to
downplay the institutional and representational aspects of peoples’ social role (their role as union
representatives), and have them enter into the discussion as individuals. They seek to build that feeling
of “us” on a very personal level.
Loss of identification as a union representative undercuts union particpants’ ability to represent
the members’ interests and is often accompanied by an increase in identification with the company and
therefore with management. Treating management participants as individuals rather than as
representatives of management leads union participants to lower their guard and leave themselves
more vulnerable.