The Little Rock Pipeline
More companies are finding that partnering with their Unions improves operations and reduces worker tensions.
Membership numbers appear to tell a different story. According to the Washington, D.C.-based AFL-CIO (American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations), today's 13.5% represents 16.3 million union members, compared with 1930's 10 million. But having a slightly larger share of a much larger pie has not been enough to keep unions from struggling to maintain and build their presence in many parts of the country. Within the manufacturing community - which is second only to the U.S. government in union representation - this struggle has often resulted in a positive new approach to union relations. The growing number of alliances between unions and manufacturing firms, say those involved, has resulted in partnerships that not only benefit both parties, but help alleviate the traditional power struggle between the two groups.
Partnerships address common challenges
"We are starting to see partnerships cropping up in different forms and different industries than we did in the past," says Nancy Mills, an AFL-CIO spokesperson. "In addition to the single-union/single-company alliances aimed at improving productivity or reducing injuries in a single plant or company, we are beginning to see multi-union and multi-employer partnerships being struck in order to work on common challenges."Mills says single-union/single-company partnerships include a number of safety and quality agreements between the Detroit, MI-based United Auto Workers union (UAW) and individual automotive manufacturers. As an example of a multi-organization alliance, Mills points to a group of Wisconsin-based manufacturing firms that have banded together in a partnership with unions that represent machinists, paper workers, carpenters and steel workers to deal with common recruitment and training programs. Another alliance has been struck, she says, between some New York City garment manufacturing shops, their unions and the city itself to perform tasks aimed at expanding the market for their goods. In both forms, she notes, alliances are on the rise, largely due to increasing competition.
"It's clear that increased competition in manufacturing is creating pressures on management and unions to deal smartly with local and global competition," says Mills. "Union members want their employers to succeed because if they don't, they don't have job security."
Decoris Glenn, health and safety coordinator for the UAW, says companies and unions have almost been forced to work together if they want to succeed in a global economy. "The competition we are seeing now is no longer simply between GM, Chrysler and Ford," he says. "There's worldwide competition these days, and in order to be competitive, you have to work together."
Glenn points to the quality-targeted partnership between the UAW and Chrysler that helped pull the then-floundering automaker out of bankruptcy in the 1980s. Other alliances have developed to address a single, immediate need, he says, like a spike in the number of occupational injuries. "The UAW and Chrysler began a partnership to improve health and safety in the 1970s when Chrysler had a high incident rate and a high lost-workday rate," he says. "Chrysler figured that if we did something together they had a better chance of reducing injuries. It worked. Their rates have been on the decline."
Safety-based partnerships prevail
Ford Motor Co., the UAW and the federal Occupational Safety & Health Administration have also partnered to improve worker health and safety throughout Ford's facilities. The alliance is aimed at finding and fixing hazards that are specific to the automotive industry and establishing guidelines for streamlining the inspection process in 25 U.S. Ford plants.
Another agreement, this one between General Motors Corp., the UAW and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), will conduct joint research on work-related health issues over the next five years in various GM plants. The program, the second of its kind for the three organizations, will focus on hearing-loss prevention, exposure assessments that examine the air quality in the final assembly area, and control technologies that will lower emissions from new manufacturing processes.
One reason safety-based partnerships like these are so often embraced is because they benefit all parties. "From the union and worker point of view, we need a safer place for our members to work," says Mills. "And, management is not only concerned with keeping the workplace safe. They want to save money on worker compensation and insurance costs."
The benefits of these partnerships are easy to see if you look at the statistics, says Harold Shelton, UAW coordinator for the union's General Motors department, which works with the automaker to develop health and safety programs. "There were 29 injuries per 100 employees on an annual basis in 1993," he says, "but by December 2000, the annual injury rate dropped to 6.4 injuries per 100 employees. Our joint training programs and awareness contributed to these decreases, and helped both sides place a high priority on health and safety."
The UAW/DaimlerChrysler alliance has also brought significant improvements, says Glenn, particularly at the company's Kenosha, WI, engine plant and Newark, DE, assembly plant. Workers in the Kenosha plant, for example, were plagued by a large-scale outbreak of an illness related to breathing in machining fluid, says Ron Johnson, the plant's UAW safety and health representative. After a negotiation between the UAW and DaimlerChrysler, the Kenosha facility was chosen as a pilot plant for a program that would reduce mist in all DaimlerChrysler plants. Johnson worked with Kenosha's industrial hygienist and an independent contractor to design a system aimed at defeating the problem. They retrofitted older machinery with mist-collection guards to reduce the amount of mist coming off the machines, and redesigned HVAC systems.
"Since then, we have taken mist readings and, on average, we increased the cleanliness of the air by anywhere from 0.2 to 0.7 parts," says Johnson, "and sometimes as much as 1.5 parts per million. The workers have benefitted because the chance of them contracting this illness again has been lowered, which makes them secure in the fact that their workplace is a healthy one."
The DaimlerChrysler assembly plant in Newark, DE, has also seen improvements as a result of this partnership, says Elvis Arnold, Newark's UAW safety and health representative. "We have done a lot to increase worker safety, especially where ergonomics are concerned," he says. The team of plant management and UAW members has corrected trouble spots by implementing lift-and-tilt racks, ergonomic assist arms that eliminate repetitive lifting of heavy parts, electric torque guns that reduce kickback, and impact gloves that are padded for protection against vibration.
Reduced tension
Her UAW counterpart, Arnold, agrees. "In some cases we get resistance when we want to implement a change because it's going to cost the company money," he says. "But when we sit down and point out that it will save money over the long term on injuries and lost work days, they usually see the benefits, and we can come up with an agreement."
Johnson, the UAW health and safety representative in DaimlerChrysler's Kenosha plant, finds the same to be true. "There is occasional resistance from plant management, but it's nothing that can't be surpassed," he says. "This is a joint program, and when it comes to safety, both sides tend to drop the union/company barrier and agree that safety only has one way: the right way."
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