John Logan is Professor and Director of Labor and Employment Studies at San Francisco State University. Monitoring the NLRB and Other Pro-Labor Legislation and Regulations. Our team at Adams, Nash, Haskell & Sheridan will work with management to help your organization achieve the best possible outcome. Also, it should be noted that when companies wait to fix problems until after a campaign begins, the union is quick to take credit for any improvements, telling employees look, were already forcing the company to make changes, just wait until after the election.. Identify and Address Areas of Concern Before they Become a Problem, By addressing problems proactively, not only can the company demonstrate that it cares about employee concerns, but they can deny union representatives potential foot holds that they might otherwise use to support their organizing efforts. Littler Mendelson is the world's largest management-side law firm focusing exclusively on labor and employment issues. Since Littler was founded in San Francisco in 1942, union avoidance has been a major area of its expertise. Lolito, the attorney with union-avoidance firm Littler Mendelson, essentially tried to flip the script in an interview with Salon, saying that avoidance services are necessary and important . Question. Training and Strategy Jane McAlevey has spent most of her life as an organizer and negotiator. Our team has also helped companies avoid hundreds of campaigns across the country, including UAW, Steelworkers, Teamsters, CWA, IBEW, UFCW, UNITE-HERE, IAM, AFTRA, SEIU, The Laborers, GMPP, Sheet Metal Workers, 1199, just to name a few. recognized by the ILO, that is, its right to campaign vigorously against the union.21. With twenty six of its eighty-one offices located overseas, Littler has been the union avoidance firm most aggressive in expanding internationally. Prior to conducting the first session, Hutchison Group will meet with senior management to discuss the process, answer any questions, and identify areas of particular interest that should be explored during our employee relations sessions. Her Reliant bio page states: As a consultant, Rebecca has led numerous anti-union campaigns, resulting in a winning record for the companies with whom she partnered, including but not limited to government, non-profit, and for profit organizations within airline, transportation, healthcare, hospitality, energy and retail industries. Should you choose to contact an attorney at Barnes & Thornburg LLP (via This is a mail-in NLRB ballot that will end on March 29. Soft Opening for EPAs Green Bank Funding to Reduce Emissions, Partner Tina Dorr Named President of the Georgia Asian Pacific American Bar Association, Rare Victory for California Employers: Ninth Circuit Says State Arbitration Law Preempted By Federal Law. After first unionizing in 2016, Flexjet pilots voted to decertify the Teamsters, the first time that commercial pilots had ever decertified a union under the RLA, in May 2018. John Logan is Professor and Director of Labor and Employment Studies at San Francisco State University. Often the easiest way to solve a problem is to avoid it entirely, and avoiding a union is no different. When managers are ineffective, organizations become vulnerable to union organizing. . Union-avoidance specialists, and the employers that hire them, must disclose their arrangements to the Labor Department. Money Back Guarantee: The firm has orchestrated hundreds of anti-union campaigns over the past few decades for some of the countrys largest employers and numerous smaller ones and through its Guaranteed Winner program, it even offered employers a money-back offer if they union won an election in which they ran the entire counter-organizing effort. Research shows that even a few supervisors with poor interpersonal skills can instigate union organizing campaigns.. January 18, 2023. 17.The Littler Report: The 2011 Global Employer: Highlights of Littlers Fourth Annual Global Employer Institute, available at https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/the-littler-report-the-2011-global-empl-95500/. It is estimated that companies spend between $500 million and $2 billion per year on union-busting activities. Ogletree Deakins is the nations second largest management-side law firm specializing in union avoidance. Three of the biggest law firms that do this work are Littler Mendelson, Ogletree and Jackson Lewis, which have grown from regional operations into global union avoidance behemoths. 6.Fisher Phillips, International Employment Practice Group, available at https://www.fisherphillips.com/services-international-employment. . In the end, youre not the only victim of a labor relations conflict. The full picture of Amazon's spending isn't expected to come to light until well after the election has ended, but two union-avoidance consultants have already filed forms describing some of the work their firms are doing for Amazon. Learn more about the Union Free Privilege Academy Here. Framework agreements, the firm cautioned, are especially problematic for public-facing retail brands.14, Union avoidance attorneys have advised employers to deploy global standards offensively against labor organizations. Don't wait to take back the control you've worked so hard to achieve. 2013-2023 Adams, Nash & Haskell, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Faced with a wave of worker activism in its warehouses last year, Amazon paid anti-union consultants roughly $4.3 million in an effort to beat back union organizing campaigns, according to new filings with the U.S. Department of Labor. There seems little doubt that when the campaign at Bessemer is finally over, Amazon will have paid millions of dollars to its law firm and its union avoidance consultants. Union-Free Strategies and Considerations In the 'New Normal', Federal Court Orders Starbucks to Re-Hire Terminated Union Supporters, The Price for Refusing to Bargain May Soon be Going Up for Employers, Say It Aint So (Trader) Joes: Grocery Chain Workers File Union Petition, NLRB General Counsel Takes Aim at Employer Free Speech, Supreme Court Favors Employer Property Rights Over Union Access To Employees, Goodbye NY: No Union For Uber DriversFor Now, $250,000 in Grants Awarded to Five Nonprofit Organizations, Illinois Employers on Notice: BIPA Claims Accrue With Each Scan or Transmission, Court Says. LRI works with consultants based around the country, many of whom run their own satellite firms, such as Browns Road Warrior Productions or Smiths Rock Creek. October 15 - 16, 2019. By agreeing to remain silent, an employer effectively may deny workers information, opinions and ideas they have a right to receive . We have an extensive team of legal professionals that offer creative solutions and innovation, aimed at engaging clients in union avoidance activities prior to the formation of an actual campaign. An effective union avoidance strategy involves a number of other components, including: F When you start to notice the early warning signs of union organization, its too late. Along with the AFL-CIO, the Association of Flight Attendants-Communication Workers of America filed a complaint with the CFA stating that the policy on non-votes enabled hostile employers to manipulate the process to defeat union campaigns. The relationship between union membership and job satisfaction is still disputed vigorously among scholars. Smith and Rock Creek have been involved in several other anti-union campaign at hospitals a specialty for several union avoidance consultants including St Joseph Regional Medical Center and Mad River Community Hospital. (312) 836-0100. Public Integrity reviewed public records to see how much U.S. corporations paid union-avoidance firms in recent years. union suppression approach union substitution approach reactive human resources approach union avoidance strategy union acceptance . 7.Littler Mendelson, Labor Law Update, October 15, 2014, available at https://slideplayer.com/slide/6206656/. After all, you cant lose a union election that doesnt happen. Leaked files from IRI Consultants, a union avoidance firm, obtained by Vice's Motherboard show the disturbing lengths to which companies will go in order to derail workplace organizing. Research on union avoidance firms Power structure analysis and strategy Mission-driven sectors of the economy (health care and education) About Jane. to discredit them through global campaigns.8 Likewise, one senior Ogletree attorney (who advised the U.S. employer group at the ILO) has defended clients in global corporate campaigns.9 The firm states that it responds to all forms of union organizing activity, including global attacks.10 Jackson Lewis, meanwhile, has warned employers that global corporate campaigns are about to turn nasty,11 and predicted that, as multinationals struggle with more sophisticated union tactics, international corporate campaigns may shift more toward the American-style of organizing and counter-campaigns, particularly in European countries.12, Union avoidance attorneys have cautioned against signing global framework agreements with global union federations because they provide labor with ammunition and can deny a business the use of union avoidance measures.13 Littler attorneys have criticized Swedish fashion retailer H&M for signing an international framework agreement with UNI Global Union and a neutrality agreement with the United Food and Commercial Workers, which resulted in the unionization of over 2000 retail workers in New York City and Long Island. Through overseas offices or strategic alliances, Littler Mendelson, Ogletree Deakins, Jackson Lewis, and Fisher Phillips have expanded their reach to Latin America, Europe, and Asia. 2. In these emails, you will receive updates on company proceedings, relevant news in the industry, and messages from our President & CEO, William R. Adams. Flexjet is just their first target.. . 540 N Michigan Avenue. For example, the president of one anti-union firms with which Smith has worked, Joe Brock of East Coast Labor Relations Consultants (ECLRC) and Reliant Labor Consultants, claims to have worked for the Teamsters Local 830, the largest IBT local in Philadelphia, for over twenty years, before losing a union election in 2007 and becoming an anti-union consultant. In September 2020, almost 1000 nurses voted to join the NNU in a landslide victory, thereby providing the labor movements largest hospital victory in the South since 1975. 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