Please share with the rest of the class at least three statements of key knowledge gained in this course and provide a concrete example of how you think the knowledge will assist you in your work career. Include an in text citation for each of the three knowledge points.
Strengths
Employee satisfaction – it gives rise to a community feeling within employees and nurtures satisfaction with the workplace environment and resultant community endeavors.
Lower attrition – Satisfied and unified workforce tends to be self-motivated and is bound by a feeling of togetherness or community, which results in lower attrition amongst the workforce.
Quick communication – communication passes through the grape wine much faster than the formal channels usually. When labour union representatives are communicated on a pro-active basis, it results in faster and more effective communication, especially in troubled circumstances.
Partnership – Labor unions working in tandem and partnership with managements, tend to improve the speed of change management within organizations. In this volatile world of business, it is critical that organizations stay ahead of competition and agility is an important aspect of being so.
Weaknesses
Long winded negotiations- if the equation between the union reps and management is not warm, negotiations might not work out thereby leading to strikes and critical impact on business
Bureaucracy – if not carefully managed, labor union set-ups can lead to serious bureaucratic issues in day to day operations as well. Union intervention in daily management of production/operations is a known fact across various organizations.
Opportunities
Strategic alignment – Labor unions can potentially be involved for inputs into strategic initiatives, especially pertaining to CSR. This would also give a feeling of involvement on the part of the unions.
Advocacy – Relationships between management and unions, if cordial, can lead to union members and representatives being good advocates for the company thereby further enhancing the brand equity of the company
Threats
Automation – with the emerging trend of automation in both manufacturing and service industries, unions with a tarnished or negative image tend to lose out on understanding the impact of the same and lose management foresight and awareness on the same.
Supply – With automation comes demand supply mismatch. There is an abundant supply of labour however, demand is not catching up to the extent since machines are replacing what hands used to do earlier. Working in tandem with the management might also help in easing out the impact of such a scenario through skill building, internal postings and other constructive mechanisms.
Employees join unions traditionally for a sense of security as far as their job and pay is concerned. The belief is United we stand, however, there is also an element of mistrust with capitalism and management in general, which allures people to form unions. The community building and increased capability on the part of unionized set-ups to negotiate with management on key issues is a unique proposition for continued thriving of unionism in companies.