For the "real deal" is a challenge. The proposals, that I am not able to reveal tonight, are in management's court. The executive teams from management and labor have caucused numerous times today. We have been instructed to be cautious in what we say on the blogs and e-mails. I have been very impressed by the solidarity that has been demonstrated by this diverse coalition. We all have widely varying issues and concerns, yet we manage to reach consensus. Our common interest as brothers and sisters, employees and employer, is to sustain the business that feeds us. Last night John August spoke of the "tragedy of the commons"- a situation in which multiple individuals, acting independently, and solely and rationally consulting their own self-interest, will ultimately deplete a shared limited resource even when it is clear that it is not in anyone's long-term interest for this to happen. This thing called "The Partnership" is a treasure. And our jobs- there is no Health care system in the world today that is as elegant as kaiser Permanente, and we have the best health care jobs in the world. We must not repeat the "tragedy", and preserve our sustaining "commons".
I am eagerly anticipating a signed agreement tonight!
Thursday, May 27, 2010
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
The Final Stretch
Here we are at the table again....and still no discussion of wages and benefits. Labor fine tuned our final language from the past three weeks of work in the subgroups. We were all feeling very hopeful, when we found out that the right people, the actual decision makers, have not been a part of the process. After hours of thoughtful deliberation, we were told that management did not intend to re-write the National Agreement, they just intended to meet with us and figure out ways to improve it!
Of course, we did not roll over, and after a long hard day, we won most of the changes that we agreed on two weeks ago. I was there, and I saw all of the thumbs pointing up.
Tonight, we were given the financial reports, a repetition of the very first day of bargaining last month. It is pretty clear that concessions will be expected. We are girding ourselves for the actual bargaining, starting at 9:00 A.M. Many of us are tired and our patience has worn thin with these long days of repetitive discussion. One sister compared this to a courtroom, with both sides presenting their cases, and asked when we would be getting down to the real nitty gritty. It certainly broke the tension in the room, and labor applauded her for her candor.
We all stand firm in our commitment to accept no benefit reductions, and to come away with wage increases.
Tomorrow night we should know more, so stay tuned!
Of course, we did not roll over, and after a long hard day, we won most of the changes that we agreed on two weeks ago. I was there, and I saw all of the thumbs pointing up.
Tonight, we were given the financial reports, a repetition of the very first day of bargaining last month. It is pretty clear that concessions will be expected. We are girding ourselves for the actual bargaining, starting at 9:00 A.M. Many of us are tired and our patience has worn thin with these long days of repetitive discussion. One sister compared this to a courtroom, with both sides presenting their cases, and asked when we would be getting down to the real nitty gritty. It certainly broke the tension in the room, and labor applauded her for her candor.
We all stand firm in our commitment to accept no benefit reductions, and to come away with wage increases.
Tomorrow night we should know more, so stay tuned!
Thursday, May 6, 2010
National Bargaining Notes- Week 3
It's been a long and productive, and tiring week. This time I was accompanied by stewards Joel Levitt and Brenda Tolbert, who attended as observers. That is an understatement- their ability to attend other subgroups was invaluable. We also worked on summarizing the results of our bargaining survey to give to Dave Regan. More importantly, our chapter had additional representation.
The subgroups presented their recommendations to the Coalition Caucus of the Common Interest Committee, and we reached consensus on all. The big sticking point, front loaded sick leave, was settled with a compromise to receive their annual allotment on the anniversary date instead of in January.
My subgroup on LMP broke out in to three smaller groups, and that worked well. We recommended that a joint committee be chartered to develop and implement a means for building direct accountability for improving the partnership, that trust resources be expanded, and that there be an educational curriculum developed to foster business, union and contract literacy. We felt this is particularly important for middle managers and physicians.
We want timely resolution of disputes and grievances, and methods to share and adopt best practices.
We recommended a universal UBT rating system be established to help increase and reward the number of high performers, and to identify and support under-achieving UBTs.
The final plenary session today consisted of labor and management presenting their final interests.
I will provide a summary of both in my next post.
In Unity,
Therese
The subgroups presented their recommendations to the Coalition Caucus of the Common Interest Committee, and we reached consensus on all. The big sticking point, front loaded sick leave, was settled with a compromise to receive their annual allotment on the anniversary date instead of in January.
My subgroup on LMP broke out in to three smaller groups, and that worked well. We recommended that a joint committee be chartered to develop and implement a means for building direct accountability for improving the partnership, that trust resources be expanded, and that there be an educational curriculum developed to foster business, union and contract literacy. We felt this is particularly important for middle managers and physicians.
We want timely resolution of disputes and grievances, and methods to share and adopt best practices.
We recommended a universal UBT rating system be established to help increase and reward the number of high performers, and to identify and support under-achieving UBTs.
The final plenary session today consisted of labor and management presenting their final interests.
I will provide a summary of both in my next post.
In Unity,
Therese
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