Post by Judge Sam on Jul 9, 2009 3:48:18 GMT -5
When I was writing up Imprisonment #9 - Another Emotional Vote there was a lot of things I wanted to include but didn't have space for. It is already one of the longest Imprisonments I've done as is. I thought about separating it into a two-parter but there's still a bit of story to move forward with and there isn't much time left!
So instead of telling the story I'm just going to say what I was going to write here, I thought it was pretty interesting.
There was going to be a section on this. This is actually what real union busters do sometimes during authorization elections. So they want to know the chances that the election is going to be successful, right? You can't develop a strategy to combat unionization if you don't know what the current situation is haha. Do most people want it? Are most people against it? You've got to have data to have a battle plan.
Employers are not allowed to take polls of the employees to just ask them and see how supportive they are of unions. They just can't ask for a straw poll, or raising hands at a meeting, that's illegal. But they need to know how popular the union movement is...
So here's one way they find out. They create a little guessing game contest on a table in a public area. "Win $500!" it says. All you have to do is answer a simple innocuous question: "What do you think the % of yes votes will be at the upcoming union authorization election?" Sounds like a harmless, fun game just to see who can guess closest. And win a little cash. But in reality it gives employers so much data about how the workers are feeling... by averaging the expectations they can get a really good idea of how the workers feel as a whole about unions. It's so helpful.
Not only that, but they also have the individual expectations of anyone who participates. They have the name of each person and how much support they think the union will get. If it's high, maybe that worker's group of friends all support it and he does too. No need to waste resources trying to get him to change his vote. If it's low, maybe this person is on your side and he can help you out. The union busting agency might want to go talk to him.
But it's those guys who think it's gonna be close... 40%-60%... those are the ones you want to go talk to. Those are the ones whose minds can be changed. With a little extra propaganda, a little conversation with management, maybe mail them an anonymous, false letter that says they may be under review for credit card fraud so all of a sudden they get scared about money... the union busters might be able to get that person's vote.
Second, there's another trick similar to the one featured in the Imprisonment story that management can use to sway votes. In the story, McNeal made a public plea for a second chance right before the election. He promised a bunch of things, made some early changes, and said everything would change. (Of course, none of these things are going to happen besides a few temporary, seemingly significant changes to con people, it's just a ploy.)
With this scene that was going to be included, lower-level supervisors and the bottom rung of management are forced to beg the workers. It is illegal to fire a worker because he votes for a union. However, it is not illegal to fire a supervisor or a lower-level boss for this reason. This tactic strong-arms these supervisors. Basically the higher up management tells the supervisors they will lose their jobs if the union election passes. The supervisors are then forced to beg for their jobs to the workers... telling them stories about how they need the money, employment, and how they really love their jobs. The workers feel really guilty and may feel like it is their fault if the supervisors get fired because the union election passed.
Finally, I didn't get to include the results of the election. Surprise: the union is now official! Yes, the International United Brotherhood of Accomplished Auto Assemblers – Burg Chapter is now officially a union in the eyes of the government! Yay! Things might start getting better.
(btw that link and some of those names are hilarious... so detailed... my favorite is the International Brotherhood of Bookbinders. Sounds so sweet I want to be a part of that club. also, omg they changed the link like yesterday, it's fixed now though.)
But while things are looking up with the success of the union election, there's still a long ways to ago... and some more interesting battles to fight.
So instead of telling the story I'm just going to say what I was going to write here, I thought it was pretty interesting.
In fact, through some nefarious methods*, McNeal had discovered that the outlook for him to defeat the authorization election was not good.
There was going to be a section on this. This is actually what real union busters do sometimes during authorization elections. So they want to know the chances that the election is going to be successful, right? You can't develop a strategy to combat unionization if you don't know what the current situation is haha. Do most people want it? Are most people against it? You've got to have data to have a battle plan.
Employers are not allowed to take polls of the employees to just ask them and see how supportive they are of unions. They just can't ask for a straw poll, or raising hands at a meeting, that's illegal. But they need to know how popular the union movement is...
So here's one way they find out. They create a little guessing game contest on a table in a public area. "Win $500!" it says. All you have to do is answer a simple innocuous question: "What do you think the % of yes votes will be at the upcoming union authorization election?" Sounds like a harmless, fun game just to see who can guess closest. And win a little cash. But in reality it gives employers so much data about how the workers are feeling... by averaging the expectations they can get a really good idea of how the workers feel as a whole about unions. It's so helpful.
Not only that, but they also have the individual expectations of anyone who participates. They have the name of each person and how much support they think the union will get. If it's high, maybe that worker's group of friends all support it and he does too. No need to waste resources trying to get him to change his vote. If it's low, maybe this person is on your side and he can help you out. The union busting agency might want to go talk to him.
But it's those guys who think it's gonna be close... 40%-60%... those are the ones you want to go talk to. Those are the ones whose minds can be changed. With a little extra propaganda, a little conversation with management, maybe mail them an anonymous, false letter that says they may be under review for credit card fraud so all of a sudden they get scared about money... the union busters might be able to get that person's vote.
Second, there's another trick similar to the one featured in the Imprisonment story that management can use to sway votes. In the story, McNeal made a public plea for a second chance right before the election. He promised a bunch of things, made some early changes, and said everything would change. (Of course, none of these things are going to happen besides a few temporary, seemingly significant changes to con people, it's just a ploy.)
With this scene that was going to be included, lower-level supervisors and the bottom rung of management are forced to beg the workers. It is illegal to fire a worker because he votes for a union. However, it is not illegal to fire a supervisor or a lower-level boss for this reason. This tactic strong-arms these supervisors. Basically the higher up management tells the supervisors they will lose their jobs if the union election passes. The supervisors are then forced to beg for their jobs to the workers... telling them stories about how they need the money, employment, and how they really love their jobs. The workers feel really guilty and may feel like it is their fault if the supervisors get fired because the union election passed.
Finally, I didn't get to include the results of the election. Surprise: the union is now official! Yes, the International United Brotherhood of Accomplished Auto Assemblers – Burg Chapter is now officially a union in the eyes of the government! Yay! Things might start getting better.
(btw that link and some of those names are hilarious... so detailed... my favorite is the International Brotherhood of Bookbinders. Sounds so sweet I want to be a part of that club. also, omg they changed the link like yesterday, it's fixed now though.)
But while things are looking up with the success of the union election, there's still a long ways to ago... and some more interesting battles to fight.
