Problem facing Sprint
Trade unions aim at ensuring that employees get good working condition and remuneration (Bacon 752). Hence, they compel organizations to increase employees’ salary and improve working environment, which lead to increased operations cost. This underlines the reason why organizations strive to make sure that their employees are not unionized (Booth 34).
The basic problem facing Sprint in La Conexion Familiar is ensuring that its employees remain non-unionized as unionization will lead to increase in operations costs. Besides, the company will not be able to exploit its employees since they will be able to fight for their rights through the union. Initially, employees were not allowed to take bathroom breaks.
They were expected to be at their workstations at all times, and this added to the company’s output. Besides, the company controlled the amount of water that every employee consumed to make sure that they did not keep on leaving their workstations.
Trade union curtails the powers that employers have over their employees (Boxall and Haynes 570-573). Hence, Sprint will not be able to fire its employees at liberty once they join a trade union. Besides, the union will ensure that all workers are treated equally, which will mean increasing the wages of the non-English speaking workers.
Sprint has gone to the extent of establishing policies to help in making sure that its staff does not join a union. The main problem is to dissuade employees from joining the union. All employees have the right to join unions and employers are not allowed to intimidate them (Clawson and Clawson 100-104).
However, managers in Sprint are going against the labor laws by using intimidation to discourage employees from joining trade union. Despite the intimidation, the company cannot overcome staff’s determination to join a labor union. A majority of the staff is willing to join a labor union.
The company has remained non-unionized for many years. Hence, the management fears that allowing one section of Sprint’s operations to join trade union will prompt other sections to demand for the same. Hence, the company is not ready to allow workers in La Conexion Familiar to join a union.
On the other hand, the company knows that even if it does not allow employees to join a trade union, they will use other means to make sure that they are unionized. Thus, it is hard for the management to reach a consensus with employees. The management is trying to threaten the employees that it will close the plant if they join a union. However, no employee can yield to these threats.
The closure of the LCF plant will have negative impacts on other plants owned by Sprint. Hence, the management will be forced to comply with employee demands as a way to safeguard the image of its plants.
Action the management can take
Labor laws prohibit organizations from using intimidation or coercion to discourage employees from joining trade unions (Brown 166). All employees are at liberty to join a trade union of their choice. Sprint has made sure that it factors in these provisions in its union policy. It discourages its managers from intimidating employees that wish to join trade union.
However, this does not happen during the negotiation process. The management goes to the extent of threatening employees that it finds participating in the unionization process. Besides, Sprint has tried to sell La Conexion Familiar as a way to preserve its non-unionized legacy. The main reason why employees seek to join a trade union is poor working condition and remuneration.
Hence, to address this problem, Sprint needs to sit down with its employees and look for ways to address their complaints (Kerr 42). Trade unions compel organizations to improve the working condition for their employees (Hyman 210).
Hence, Sprint does not require waiting until employees demand to join a trade union to improve its working condition. The company should talk with the employees to identify the challenges that force them to join a trade union and work on them. This will avoid cases of employees staging an organizing drive.
Apart from improving the working condition, Sprint should take the initiative to remunerate its employees in line with their performance or workload. Paying employees according to the workload or performance will lead to them not thinking of joining a trade union (Lucio and Weston 79-82). To deal with the looming organizing drive, Sprint management ought to meet with the employees and promise to address their complaints.
This will help to postpone the drive as employees wait to see if the management will keep its promises. Whenever organizational managers work closely with employees, it becomes hard for employees to revolt since the management responds to their complaints (Rynes, Gerhart and Minette 385-390).
Consequently, rather than considering the costs associated with labor unions, Sprint management needs to move swiftly and assure its employees that it will work towards improving their working conditions and remuneration. This will reduce the employees’ urge to join trade unions thus dealing with the looming organizing drive (Martin et al. 67).
Implications of Sprint’s response
The future of long distance service market depends on how Sprint will respond to the looming labor crisis. If the company goes ahead with its endeavor to stop its employees from joining trade union, it will kill the long distance service market. Employees require being motivated to offer quality services.
Hence, denying the employees the right to join a union without solving their problem will demotivate them, and eventually kill the long distance service market. On the other hand, if Sprint agrees to allow employees to join trade union, it will enhance the quality of long distance service market. LCF focuses mainly on the long distance service market.
Therefore, allowing employees to join trade union and solve the looming problem amicably will lead to employees improving their services (Sheehan, Barker and Rayner 55). In return, this will help in expansion and growth of the long distance service market.
The action that the Communication Workers of America (CWA) takes will depend on the response that Sprint takes. If the company denies its employees the right to join a trade union, CWA will take the necessary measures and file a petition with the National Labor relations Board (NLRB). NLRB is the body responsible for solving disputes between employees and employers in case labor conflicts.
The board may take time before giving its judgment. However, based on the seriousness with which the CWA is treating this matter, it appears that it is ready to take all the necessary time to see that LCF’s staff gets justice. Hence, CWA is likely to mobilize all LCF’s staff to pressure Sprint to yield to their demand. In case this endeavor fails, CWA will seek for assistance from the National Labor Relations Board.
Works Cited
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Booth, Alison. The Economics of the Trade Union. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996. Print.
Boxall, Peter and Peter Haynes. “Strategy and trade union effectiveness in a neo-liberal environment.” British Journal of Industrial Relations 35.4 (2002): 567-591. Print.
Brown, William. “The changing role of trade unions in the management of labour.” British Journal of Industrial Relations 24.2 (2009): 161-168. Print.
Clawson, Dan and Mary Clawson. “What has happened to the US labor movement? Union decline and renewal.” Annual Review of Sociology 25.1 (1999): 95-119. Print.
Hyman, Richard. “Trade union research and cross-national comparison.” European Journal of Industrial Relations 7.2 (2001): 203-232. Print.
Kerr, Allan. “Why Public Sector Workers Join Unions: An Attitude Survey of Workers in the Health Service and Local Government.” Employee Relations 14.2 (2003): 39-54. Print.
Lucio, Miguel and Syd Weston. “The politics and complexity of trade union responses to new management practices.” Human Resource Management Journal 2.4 (2007): 77-91. Print.
Martin, Andrew, George Ross, Lucio Baccaro, Anthony Daley, Lydia Fraile, Chris Howell, Richard Locke, Rianne Mahon and Stephen Silva. The Brave New World of European Labour: European Trade Unions at the Millennium. London: Berghahn Books. Print.
Rynes, Sara, Barry Gerhart and Kathleen Minette. “The importance of pay in employee motivation: Discrepancies between what people say and what they do.” Human Resource Management 43.4 (2004): 381-394. Print.
Sheehan, Michael, Michelle Barker and Charlotte Rayner. “Applying strategies for dealing with workplace bullying.” International Journal of Manpower 20.2 (1999): 50-57. Print.