U.S.
DEPARTMENT OF LABOR
Working Together for Public Service
EVERYONE HAS A ROLE TO PLAY
ENSURING THAT STATE AND LOCAL GOVERNMENTS
CAN MEET THE CHALLENGE
Making cooperative labor-management relations that support service improvement the norm in government instead of the exception will require ongoing leadership and assistance from the extensive network of organizations and institutions to which labor and management belong, or can turn to for guidance or support.
This support network must be ready to provide assistance, training, encouragement and expertise to those labor and management leaders across the country who demonstrate a willingness to engage in a cooperative approach to relarionships focused upon public service improvements
Taking the first step requires courage and leadership from local labor and management leaders. In fact, the Task Force observed numerous examples where local leaders were much more willing to take risks when they had assistance and backing from their peers, their professional associations or other supportive institutions and professionals. In addition, the Task Force saw a direct connection between the success of these pioneering efforts and the level of assistance and encouragement local leaders received at the regional and national level. If service excellence, particularly through labor-management cooperation, is to become a reality in state and local government, these institutions will necessarily play a key role. The Task Force encourages the necessary expansions, new efforts and related investments needed to further develop these support capacities.
Who is in this support network? It's a diverse mix that includes:
- national and international unions, their staffs and their regions or districts;
- organizations of elected officials at all levels -- local, state and national,
- employer associations,
- professional associations of personnel officers, labor negotiators, budget officers and other professions;
- the various quality network organizations;
- neutral" resource organizations, such as state labor relations boards or the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service;
- independent neutrals.
- universities and other training institutions; and
- private consulting and training organizations.
Each and every one of these groups can have a valuable role to play in promoting labor-management cooperation to improve public services. They can educate parties and provide them with new skills. They can be catalysts for change. They can expose people to new ideas, processes and strategies that lead to mutual gains. They can serve as "institutional" memories to assure continuity of the best practices. In professions that have a high turnover rate (such as elected or politically appointed officials), providing institutional memory even while responding to new ideas would serve a particularly important purpose.
The intent of this chapter is to discuss the ways in which these institutions can assert the necessary leadership and support to become powerful locomotives on the track toward labor-management cooperation in the pursuit of service improvement.
Becoming an Agent of Change
As Gerald W. McEntee, president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, observed, "We have a number of quality, collaborative, cooperative or problem-solving experiments taking place around the country. Not nearly enough, and certainly fewer than there will be next year, but the point is we have taken the leap and there is no turning back."
This chapter highlights needed activities as well as some activities currently underway by specific members of this support network. They represent a useful start, but clearly the expansion of these types of activities is essential to the growth of labor-management cooperation in pursuit of service improvements. In the following observations, the Task Force suggests specific ways that members of this network can adopt more active and enhanced roles to expand these activities. It is important to keep in mind that these organizations or institutions have considerable overlap of members as well as types of support.
Encouraging Progressive Leadership Behavior
Labor-management cooperation requires change in relationships and processes and therefore requires change in leadership knowledge and behavior. Institutions that orient, support and train these leaders have an obligation to help people understand and adjust to their new roles in productive workplace arrangements for service improvement. This includes union and management leaders at all levels.
Thus, the national and international unions and professional associations where labor and management leaders tend to turn for advice, support, resources, and expertise, must keep up with the changing times. These institutions need to be ready to serve their members on these questions of service improvements and cooperative relations. When these institutions are current and active in the area, then the local players will have better information and expertise available.
Further, if the message from these different national labor and management institutions and information services is reasonably consistent -- i.e., that cooperation and employee participation creates an opportunity for mutual success -- they will serve to reinforce each other. Consequently, it then would be more likely that local parties would be able to engage in service improvements through cooperation rather than perpetuate conflict over questions that traditionally have separated them.
The Task Force observed that a foundation of such support is beginning to be laid through a variety of initiatives.
Management Organizations
Relatively few officials come to public office with the background needed to successfully initiate service-oriented cooperative relationships, or related service issues. However, there are peer organizations or a set of associations to which they can turn for orientation or advice in making the transition from political candidates to stewards of a broad range of public services and issues. These groups provide orientation, training and technical assistance and learning from peers. They provide forums in which to share policy goals and receive feedback.
These organizations are in an excellent position to use their materials, their training, their staff and other resources, to share lessons like those the Task Force has learned regarding the accomplishments of cooperative labor-management relations in achieving service excellence. This will allow newly elected leaders, who demonstrate an intention to apply these innovative approaches, to do so for the benefit of their communities.
Information on cooperative, service-oriented relationships would be particularly valuable in instances where officials came into office following campaigns premised on negative views of public employees. Perhaps the avoidance of campaigns "against" public employees, and instead, campaigns based on possibilities for reform would speed the advent of cooperative service initiatives.
The Task Force saw first-hand the importance of the services and support rendered by these peer organizations in changing officials' perspectives, in opening them to new possibilities, in giving them information and ideas, even in assisting them in considering the internal politics of their own organizations or communities so that they would assume the risks, take the steps, and have the confidence to begin or persevere in a cooperative, service-oriented relationship.
For example, the Council of State Governments, which has followed closely the Task Force's activities, serves as the institutional memory of a wide variety of professions. Their outreach includes elected legislators, personnel and human resource directors, and finance officers, through the means of conferences, technical assistance and publications. The National Conference of State Legislatures is a primary resource group for state legislators, tracking policy developments throughout the country and sharing information with its thousands of members and their staffs around the country. The National League of Cities also offers a widespread training and publications program affecting the knowledge base of mayors and other municipal officials.
In addition to its work on national policy issues affecting the cities, the U.S. Conference of Mayors has long had an informational service related to labor-management relations. Its staff has closely followed Task Force activities. Additionally, the Conference recently inaugurated a "best practices" session at its annual conference to share service improvement accomplishments and strategies. The role of front-line workers and the manner in which their involvement is developed could be an important dimension of such a useful session. With two cities (Indianapolis and Louisville) recently winning Harvard/Ford Foundation Innovation awards for workplace service improvements through cooperation, the Conference has much to contribute.
Similarly, the National Governors' Association, which brings together the nation's governors to debate and influence policy, helps new governors and their key staff to hit the ground running through a mentors program and many other activities affecting management and administration. This association also works with sitting governors and their staffs and has several members on the forefront of labor-management cooperation at the state level. Much could be identified and shared to highlight how workplace partnerships are supporting service improvement -- and how this is happening without regard to political party, but rather for the sake of effective government.
The International City/County Managers Association has many members with comprehensive municipal service responsibilities, some of whom enjoy workplace partnerships that produce greatly improved service results. This association has examples to share in addition to its well-known program of publications, professional training requirements and other services to help professional city managers become leaders in innovative workplace practices leading to service excellence.
The National Association of Counties (NACo) provides new officials with a full-day orientation session, including training and education on labor-management cooperation and other issues. Randy Franke, immediate past-president of NACo and a 17-year Marion County, Oregon, commissioner, said the session is available upon entering office, usually in March--"the earlier the better." Franke pointed to the pressing need to aggressively market cooperation among elected officials and then to follow up with the education and training to build the needed skills. NACo, he said, can use several approaches to spread the word about labor-management cooperation, including achievement award programs, a data base of projects and key contact people as well as by holding conferences and issuing publications.
Important to the area of education are the efforts being made by the National Association of School Boards, the American Association of School Administrators, and the National Parent-Teacher Association, an independent, community-oriented organization for the betterment of schools. The two management organizations educate, encourage and provide technical assistance to elected boards and appointed administrators engaging in labor-management cooperation as a strategy for improving public schools. The PTA can help play a leveling role on the parties when old, confrontational habits threaten to disrupt cooperative approaches at the local level.
Representing university administrators, Thomas Hustoles, a partner in the Michigan based law firm of Miller, Canfield, Paddock and Stone, cited experience from many examples where "mutual gains" or collaborative bargaining were superior to traditional bargaining, and where sharing rather than withholding budget and related information among the parties went a longer way toward solving problems. His firm has had experience with these more productive kinds of bargaining relationships, helping resolve financial and other problems universities face and making effective use of faculty input. He also described the use of arbitration and other conflict resolution practices as useful alternatives to litigation, solving the problem more quickly and with less negative impact on trust in the relationship. Experiences like these by innovative professionals, perhaps, could be shared effectively with peers in other states under the auspices of the appropriate professional organizations.
Labor Organizations
Everywhere the Task Force went, it heard the same thing: Employees yearn for a voice in decision-making at the workplace. They crave the ability to help create a more efficient public service and to be respected for who they are and what they accomplish. Front-line workers have something to contribute to how the job can be done better and more cost-effectively. Unions have a strong motivation to help their members have a voice and a clear role to play. And, as the Task Force has seen, all the major labor organizations in the public sector are beginning to develop the resources and expertise they need to better serve their members in the cooperative arena.
Additionally, many union leaders told the Task Force how important it is to be able to hear how other local leaders are able to enter workplace partnerships, particularly those that follow such unpromising situations as negative political campaigns or difficult rounds of bargaining. The details of how these relationships occurred, including how the external and internal politics are managed, allows more local union leaders to confidently enter a set of discussions and negotiations over possible partnerships.
The Task Force found that it was union leaders more often than managers who brought proven principles from union training or reports of other leaders into their discussions with management prior to establishing a cooperative relationship. This phenomenon is reflective of the very useful efforts begun in many of the national and international unions to ensure that members and leaders are part of the effort to improve the quality of services.
The American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association have a number of substantial institutional initiatives and field activities to help members as well as state and local leaders acquire improved professional skills and knowledge. These activities are focused upon improving our nation's educational system as well as efforts to develop cooperative relationships.
The AFT provided the Task Force with numerous examples of creative local bargaining, participation and cooperation including Cincinnati, Ohio, where a comprehensive labor-managment partnership affects a broad range of educational improvement issues, and Albuquerque, New Mexico where a similar initiative is in progress. (For more detail, see "Snapshot: Cincinnati.") Two national initiatives provide examples of promoting service-oriented professional behavior that can contribute to a shared vision of workplace purpose. AFT funded an award-winning Educational Research and Dissemination program in response to members' desires for easier access to state-of the art classroom management and professional practice techniques. This program has been so popular that it has now a "train-the-trainers" component, so that more members can get more information faster. The AFT also sponsors a national professional issues forum called "The Quest Conference" that brings together national education leaders from all sectors of the education community to share experiences, research and models for improving education. Such conferences provide assistance to both labor and management on how to apply research at the local level to raise standards.
This program reflects the AFT's position on the importance of improving schools' academic standards and standards of conduct and behavior. Also, based on this theme, the AFT has launched a nationwide campaign called "Responsibility, Respect, Results: Lessons for Life." This campaign involved not only AFT members, and school officials, but others in the local community, including business, civic and neighborhood groups in an effort to focus on changes leading to excellence in education.
In addition to professional development, the NEA also has specific programs to help parties in adversarial relationships gain a better understanding of how to work together. Marilyn Monahan, testifying as National Education Association secretary-treasurer, pointed to Illinois as an example, where job satisfaction as well as dollars is recognized as important and is achieved through increased teacher involvement in professional decisions. In Bellevue, Washington, she described a relationship based on an acknowledgment of mutual dependence, respect and shared interest that has led to trust and cooperation. Other local NEA initiatives supported by the national association include forward-looking attempts to redefine bargaining relationships, and others to directly work with management on educational needs. These service-focused initiatives have reduced workplace conflict and improved and speeded bargaining outcomes.
The American Association of University Professors, in an appearance before the Task Force by it's president and by it's general secretary, described a number of efforts of value to cooperative labor-management problem solving, with particular reference to the public sector. They referenced a number of helpful local initiatives to resolve service and quality issues in colleges and universities, and described a number of national level activities, including publications, to support this type of cooperative problem solving activity. Given the pressures on higher education, such efforts are to be commended and encouraged for expansion.
The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees conducts extensive staff training and sponsors national and regional conferences in order to re-orient union staff toward a more cooperative approach to labor-management relations. AFSCME also funds field trips for union staff to see innovative joint programs first hand and to view the positive attitude displayed by AFSCME members who have demonstrated their willingness to embark on cooperative ventures. Steve Fantauzzo, executive director of Indiana AFSCME Council 62, in a typical comment, noted how much he learned about the benefits of cooperation and how to engage members, through exposure to the subject during national union conferences.
The Service Employees International Union has expert staff who report directly to the president with responsibility for research and technical assistance on workplace cooperation. This technical assistance often proves critical to the ability of locals to compete with the private sector and begin labor-management cooperative ventures. At MassHighway, for example, international SEIU staff assisted local members with knowledge and funding during the preparation of an effective bid. In Los Angeles, sanitation department workers received considerable information and consultation from the international regarding effective techniques for cooperation. A recent survey of 86 SEIU local unions revealed 61 separate programs in labor-management cooperation and strong worker enthusiasm for these efforts.
Alfred Whitehead, testifying as president of the International Association of Fire Fighters, described how the union has resources devoted to service improvements. He said that the most significant factor contributing to service improvements is a cooperative partnership between labor and management. Some of the areas in which the IAFF has assisted local governments are: development of national performance standards for the profession, the design of functional systems and the conduct of training. For example, the union provided hazardous materials training to Contra Costa, California, at no cost to the county. He described an excellent cooperative relationship with the City of Phoenix, resulting in low turnover, superior working conditions and the recognition of the department for excellence. In Portland, Oregon, the union partnered in designing the Emergency Medical Services system.
For the past decade, The Public Employee Department (PED) of the AFL-CIO has directed an active program of promoting labor-management cooperation as a strategy for problem-solving and service improvements. Through numerous publications and conferences, the Public Employee Department has offered assistance in such areas as grievance mediation and other forms of alternative dispute resolution. Among the Department's recently produced resources is a widely distributed booklet, "Excellence in Public Service," with three dozen examples of productive labor-management cooperation leading to service improvement. The commitment of the public employee unions comprising the PED to labor-management cooperation is reflected in their 1995 unanimous resolution to advocate workplace cooperation.
The AFL-CIO's George Meany Center for Labor Studies, the Federation's education center, began its work on labor-management cooperation after the AFL-CIO's Committee on the Evolution of Work issued its February 1994 report on labor-management partnerships. The center, together with four international unions (United Auto Workers, United Steel Workers, Communication Workers of America and Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers) and the Department of Labor's Office of the American Workplace, created the Labor Leadership Institute for Workplace Change, which completed its first-year, private-sector program in October 1995. This program will be offered to other AFL-CIO affiliates beginning in 1996. The center is developing a Labor Leadership Institute for Workplace Change that gives particular attention to public sector partnerships.
The center also is developing a pilot, public sector curriculum in cooperation with the AFSCME Education Department and AFSCME Local 11, the Ohio Civil Service Employees Association. The center's training is targeted at full-time experienced staff and the skills emphasized are primarily the development and implementation of organizational change strategies. This training supports the labor-management quality initiative described in "Snapshot: State of Ohio."
"I am persuaded that today's workers are hungry for a new way of dealing with their employers," Thomas R. Donahue, president of the AFL-CIO at the time of his testimony, told the Task Force. "I am likewise persuaded that the labor movement has not kept up with the changing work force and has not sufficiently adapted to the new workplace. And I believe that it is the responsibility of the AFL-CIO to help this generation -- and to develop a new generation -- of labor leaders who are prepared to function in a very different environment requiring expertise and skills quite different from those required in the past."
Develop New Management and Planning Practices and Policies
Many of today's practices and processes for managing and planning public services are insufficient to respond to today's climate of efficiency demands, fiscal pressures, impact of changing technology on the work force, or to respond to the value of employee involvement. The institutions that develop and promote effective management and administrative processes need to adapt to this changed world and come up with processes for planning and management that are effective in this climate.
The Task Force heard repeatedly how, with present budgeting practices, it is impossible for most jurisdictions to say how much it costs to perform a specific service, such as trash collection or street repair. Many cost accounting practices make it hard to measure and therefore compare and improve services.
One response is being developed by the Finance Officers Association. It has organized a national task force headed by Paul Soglin, the mayor of Madison, Wisconsin. This group is charged with finding new methods of budgeting and cost accounting that, among other things, will allow workers, managers and elected officials to identify cost and service improvements, and allow labor and management to better cooperate in productivity efforts. Many existing budget systems implicitly discourage otherwise avoidable cost savings partly because of the difficulty in trying to measure costs. Some of the problems stem from systems which are not timely in their reports; others because of incentives for year-end spending, and because of other shortcomings.
Personnel departments have too often been focused upon the legal and regulatory dimensions of the workplace relationship, often to the detriment of problem-solving and service. While everyone agrees that civil service protections are important, many of the current systems preclude flexibility in response to service needs. These systems require serious re-examination. Service has not been part of the mandate of many systems. Instead, the mandate is regulatory control, which generally leads to less-useful service improvement decisions. Where the system is administered within the context of a service-oriented, cooperative workplace relationship (e.g., a facilitative versus regulatory approach), the result and the capacity for reform is greater.
The Task Force found that jurisdictions which have been successful in promoting service improvement, retraining of people, providing job security and responding to constant change also implemented major changes in the role of the human resource and labor relations professionals. These same jurisdictions often reported major changes in jobs classifications and in hiring and disciplinary practices.
Progressive leadership by many of these professions has produced effective efforts in a variety of jurisdictions. The Task Force heard about many partnerships and reform activities underway in various states.
Much needs to be done to refocus and update personnel practices to reflect the service, team and partnerships required to deal with the kind of workplace changes expected in the future. The International Personnel Management Association and the National Association of State Personnel Executives have shown a keen interest in Task Force work and are in a key position to affect the progressive future of their fields.
Unique among the management-oriented organizations, the International Association of Fire Chiefs testified about, among other things, a set of joint conferences. One such conference was held in Massachusetts in cooperation with the International Association of Fire Fighters. Attendees had to come in pairs -- chiefs and local union leaders -- to learn skills for problem-solving, service improvement and better workplace relationships. This joint conference may be an interesting model with which other professionals can experiment.
When organizations that oversee these administrative and management practices demonstrate their innovative capacities and focus increasing attention on service needs, then they can best help develop practices that actually support these better services. Through their national conferences, literature and training programs, they can spread the word on what can be done to improve management skills in this connection.
FMCS: A Catalyst for Change
The Task Force wishes to recognize the valuable and influential role played by the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service in the promotion of labor-management cooperation to improve public service. No single institution has proven more capable of exerting such a wide-ranging, positive influence than the FMCS, particularly through its cooperative grants program. In the examples studied by the Task Force, the FMCS frequently played an important financial or technical assistance role.
The agency provides five types of services in collective bargaining settings, all of which are focused upon the ultimate goal of improving labor-management relationships, job security and organizational effectiveness, said FMCS Director John Calhoun Wells in testimony to the Task Force:
- Mediation of collective bargaining contract negotiations (state and
local governments account for 16 percent of the FMCS caseload);
- Preventive mediation and training to labor and management in skills and processes to help transform adversarial environments into more collaborative ones (in 1994, at least 14 percent of the 2,200 preventive mediation cases were in the non-federal public sector);
- Arbitration to resolve collective bargaining disputes (in 1994, about 6.5 percent of all panels of arbitrators sent to requesting parties were for public sector disputes);
- Alternative dispute resolution, in which mediators assist agencies in institutionalizing mediation and other forms of conflict resolution as an alternative to costly litigation, and
- Labor-management cooperative grants programs designed to improve relationships and workplace processes. Since 1991, nearly a third of the $10.9 million in grants has gone to public sector applicants.
Wells noted that these grants have launched many innovative projects. In the city of Miami, for example, labor-management committees were developed in 16 departments represented by four unions to address issues of mutual interest such as health care cost containment and community concerns facing the police department. In the city of Burlington, Vermont, city-wide labor-management committees developed an entire city budget. The Chicago Regional Transportation Authority developed joint approaches to dealing with accessibility to commuter rail service for persons with disabilities. The Pennsylvania Health Care Cost Containment Council promoted joint efforts to control health care costs.
Union leaders and employees in Seattle, Washington, representing thirty-three different unions, recently joined with the city's administration to provide employees in various departments with the opportunity to make decisions affecting their workplaces, aimed at increasing the city's productivity, efficiency, quality control and customer service. FMCS mediators provided skills training in joint problem-solving techniques, information sharing, communications and consensus decision-making to ten employee committees and twenty committee facilitators.
The FMCS has a proven track record in effectiveness and clearly is deserving of support in order to continue these kinds of activities. These innovative projects have multiplier effects that extend the benefits far beyond the original projects.
Labor Relations Professionals Moving Beyond Tradition
Similar to human resource professionals, labor relations professionals can be in a pivotal position to promote labor-management cooperation. These professionals conduct negotiations at city, county and state levels and normally serve as chief advisors to mayors, governors, chief executives and others in positions of leadership. Labor relations professionals often possess well-developed skills in problem-solving. However, these professionals are being called upon to adapt to the demands of a service-oriented, partnership-style workplace -- a situation different from the adversarial relationship that often has prevailed and for which they normally have been prepared.
The National Public Employer Labor Relations Association has a growing following and program agenda that can be of enormous influence. Its executive director, Roger Dahl, testified before the Task Force about many of the issues facing the field, and the organization has shown a keen interest in the Task Force's findings. A similar, but smaller organization, the National Association of State Employee Relations Directors, is in a key position to provide helpful advice to governors where opportunities exist to engage in cooperative labor-management relationships.
Similarly, state labor relations boards exist in states with collective bargaining laws to resolve conflicts and, as necessary, adjudicate conflicts in labor-management relationships. Among their other responsibilities, these boards provide mediation services, and thus have become a neutral source of problem-solving assistance that both labor and management turn to and trust. The ability of these professionals to assist labor and management to initiate cooperative processes is contingent upon their mandate and the extent to which they know about practices and successful innovations.
When the Association of Labor Relations Agencies[15] (ALRA) conducted a detailed survey of its members' activities 10 years ago, labor-management cooperative processes were not even mentioned. Similarly, in a text ALRA publishes on public sector labor relations, the first two editions contained only a brief reference to cooperative processes.
"But now that is changing," testified Shlomo Sperka, director of Michigan Bureau of Employment Relations/Employment Relations Commission and immediate past-president of ALRA. He said state agencies hold an influential position because they are neutral, credible and committed to protecting the rights of all parties. They are dedicated to assist the collective bargaining process, have expertise in dispute resolution and are familiar with the parties and their issues. They are used to working side by side with the FMCS, both in "dual" mediation situations and working as a resource to the labor-management cooperative grants program.
"State labor agencies must now assert leadership in helping their clients, the public sector employers, labor organizations and employees, cooperate in achieving excellence in public services," Sperka said. "Organizations such as ALRA can coordinate and reach a large number of agencies. Staff members can be introduced to new ideas at conferences and through various training activities. State and federal cooperation, as demonstrated in Michigan, can quickly increase skills levels and introduce new ideas... Use of cooperative processes will grow either because parties ask the state agency for help or the agency suggests new approaches to parties. Therefore, we need to stimulate both. As parties become more aware, they will ask agencies to assist them. As the agencies become more aware, they will propose new ideas."
In some states, notably Oregon (see below) but in others as well, some of these state agencies have developed expertise in training for cooperative collective bargaining relationships. These training efforts and related facilitation efforts in early stages of cooperative relationships have been cited with great enthusiasm by numerous Task Force witnesses.
The Oregon Employment Relations Board's State Conciliation Service, which provides conflict resolution and other services for collective bargaining relationships in public agencies, has developed an innovative program which the Task Force found also employed by the FMCS and, to some extent, by a handful of states. Known as collaborative bargaining using interest-based negotiations, it aims to change the parties' historical way of relating, covering grievance procedures as well as collective bargaining negotiations. Oregon labor and management officials from more than 69 jurisdictions and state agencies have been trained in the various techniques including interest-based negotiations, consensus decision-making and problem-solving. Participants testified that while the training can be time-consuming (2-3 days), the results are very gratifying and provide the ability to frame new, cooperative relationships. Further, between 1990 and 1994, when interest-based negotiations were first introduced as pilots and then expanded, there was only one strike of public employees. This is in marked contrast to the 31 strikes that occurred between 1974 and 1990. This program is a model and holds great promise for other state mediation agencies.
The Task Force believes that neutral agencies must do more of this preventive kind of work in order to foster development of the cooperative kinds of relationships that will be necessary in the future. This type of neutral agency work is a worthy investment of public resources.
Labor relations agencies also could play a salutary role in sharing information about those states which engage in cooperative labor-management training with others. By shining the light on these progressive models, the Task Force and ALRA can help state labor relations boards assist their clients in breaking with the past.
Another important player is The State and Local Government Labor-Management Committee, which brings together major national-level public employer and union organizations. Ever since its initial meeting in December 1985, the committee has dedicated itself to the promotion of excellence in government through labor-management cooperation. At the committee's urging, the Council of State Governments included in its 1994 volume of Suggested State Legislation the committee's draft legislation to provide for state-sponsored public sector labor-management cooperation.
The committee has produced "Working Together," a video that depicts examples of labor-management cooperation in cities, counties, states and public school districts across the country. The program has appeared on 153 public television stations.
In 1992, the committee hosted a symposium that brought together 16 top-level political and labor leaders, heads of management organizations and various "think-tank" institutions to explore ways for labor and management to work together more effectively. One of the more important outcomes of an event such as this is the unusual opportunity it provides participants to share views and visions with others who wouldn't normally have the opportunity for candid exchange.
In 1994, the committee brought together public sector labor and management leaders in Ohio and separately in Wisconsin for in-depth discussions of cooperative activities. Using its membership from the major management and labor organizations (many of them discussed in this chapter), the committee is in a unique position to disseminate credible information, assistance and encouragement and to sponsor training, pilot projects and forums for discussion and problem-solving. A recent, additional grant from the Ford Foundation to the committee holds great promise for several new initiatives that can be undertaken to build on the work of this Task Force. Expected are a series of training programs and workshops for both labor and management in the practical aspects of beginning and sustaining a cooperative relationship as well as other kinds of technical assistance for local parties.
The Task Force encourages all of the member labor and management organizations to take an active part in assisting and responding to the work of this useful committee. (For listing of the institutional members, see Appendix F)
Re-energizing Academic Interest in Public Sector Labor Relations
From the late 1960s through the 1970s, there was a surge of scholarly interest in public sector labor relations, coinciding with many states enacting collective bargaining laws for their pubic employees, according to testimony by both David Lipsky, dean of Cornell University's School of Industrial and Labor Relations and Margaret Hallock of the Oregon Labor Education and Research Center and the University and College Labor Education Association (UCLEA).
This legislative activity was accompanied by considerable research as well as opportunities for training and service as "neutral" parties in public sector negotiations. As the laws matured, conflict declined and the challenges in the field diminished or held less interest for academics. The pendulum swung toward more interest in private sector bargaining, which in the late 1970s was beginning to face the challenges of deregulation, international competition and globalization. Then, the number of courses and students studying private sector relations, particularly in the field of international labor-management relations, increased relative to those involved in the public sector.
Consequently, since the early 1980s, the number of public sector courses being taught has dwindled. There has been a virtual stoppage of books and articles on this sector's labor relations, reflecting an almost total lack of academic research -- despite the fact that demands and pressures on the public workplace have been increasing.
There is a critical need for both intensified research and revamped training/educational programs. Just like the private sector, those leading and those employed in the public workplace need to learn how to respond to the rapidly changing conditions and pressures they face. Only a handful of schools of labor relations, by their own admission, have begun to recognize the need to train union and management leaders as well as workers on how best to participate in effective workplace partnerships.
Universities, community colleges and similar training institutions should be natural places to which local officials and leaders can turn for help and guidance when they seek worker-retraining programs, relationship training, critical research and other assistance.
Margaret Hallock, chair of the international committe and former executive board member of UCLEA, noted in her testimony that a key aspect of achieving labor-management cooperation is learning how to restructure jobs for both service and job quality. Hallock pointed out that universities and other training institutions are recognizing that two distinct types of learning are needed for the successful introduction of workplace change: training in the constellation of technical skills implicit in how the work gets organized, and training in skills for participation. In this latter area, which she says is too often overlooked and needs better attention, she listed training for workers in communications, decision-making, planning, leadership, participation and problem-solving.
Hallock explained that UCLEA primarily consists of public learning institutions throughout the U.S. and Canada that offer both credit and non-credit courses focusing upon managing change in today's workplace, such as introduction of new work systems, technology and the development of labor-management partnerships.
The Industrial Relations Research Association is another source of research. The IRRA frequently gathers together labor, management and neutral professionals, as well as academics for serious discussions of labor-management relations issues, including cooperative partnerships. For instance, a recent conference sponsored by an IRRA chapter and the Governor's office in Oregon brought together local, regional and national speakers on trends, examples and workshops covering specific issues in achieving cooperative, service-oriented relationships in the public and private sectors. This type of conference, which brings all sides together, shows much promise for spreading thoughtful and practical information by practitioners and observers about participation and cooperative approaches.
Based upon its year of fact-finding, the Task Force knows there is a rich research agenda and a need for training services, including identification and confirmation of the best labor-management cooperative practices as well as the public policies and legal structures to support these practices. Case studies should be produced for others to analyze and learn from and to serve as objective sources of non-advocacy information. Schools need to identify resources to allow them to be sources of research, training and technical assistance to their local communities. Hopefully, foundations interested in the future of our communities can devote some resources to the necessary research and services.
Educational institutions, in their research function, should accept a leadership role in providing objective and thorough examination of issues affecting service-oriented and cooperative workplace practices. Often, the study of such issues is conducted by advocacy organizations. While these organizations normally have good intentions, they also have their own particular agendas and perspectives. In addition, advocacy groups often do their work during the early development stages of new practices, rather than later, when more results are available. Research from such organizations often spawns new ideas and useful debate, but there remains a need for later objective study and research, which can be usefully performed by appropriately selected universities and research institutes.
Role of Quality Networks
The Task Force saw evidence of an emerging trend among public employers and employees to form organizations similar to those in the private sector that are dedicated to supporting local quality efforts and provide valuable training forums and information exchange. Oregon Quality Initiative, the Washington State Service Quality Network, the Madison Area Quality Improvement Network, the South Carolina State Quality Network Association and the American Society of Quality Control are all illustrative of networks that often include community, university and private sector leaders, as well as those from the public sector. They share a common philosophy that successful models are the best teachers and quality begins with trust. These quality networks will become increasingly valuable as word spreads that they are a source of information about what other places are doing. The American Society for Quality Control, for example, recently began a public section similar to its private sector activities that is becoming a useful national clearinghouse for the exchange of ideas.
Role of Nonprofit and For-Profit Organizations
Consulting firms, be they nonprofit or for-profit, can have a constructive role to play in assisting the evolution from traditional or adversarial relations to more productive labor-management partnerships.
For example, KPMG Peat Marwick, a national accounting and consulting firm, used to run advertisements that basically promised to show jurisdictions how to contract out services and fire employees. Today, KPMG Peat Marwick advertises that it gets down into the trenches with front-line employees to learn how work is actually performed and seek improvements. This knowledge helps to develop better cost accounting measures so jurisdictions can, in fact, make the measurements needed to know how much it costs to do certain jobs. This capability allows cities like Indianapolis (where KPMG's efforts to directly involve employees and their unions first began), not only to analyze but to measure, report and compare service improvement initiatives. Such a data-driven approach as part of a cooperative relationship is obviously much more constructive and helpful in finding service improvements than pitting two sides against each other in a conflictual relationship.
Also, many independent neutrals and consultants have assisted parties in a wide range of jurisdictions to learn the skills or create a process for service improvement in a labor-management partnership.
News Media
Although not generally considered a part of the network of organizations and institutions to which labor and management turn for advice, the news media wields enormous influence in the dissemination of information, and thus the forming of public opinion. The Task Force believes that jurisdictions engaging in successful cooperative relationships that are producing measurable, positive benefits for the public should take the initiative to tell this story through the news media. In so doing, local jurisdictions should keep in mind that few news outlets, (the exception being those in large, metropolitan areas) have reporters who cover the subjects of labor relations or workplace efficiencies on a regular basis. Thus, just as labor and management must educate themselves regarding cooperative relationships, they must be willing to take the time to "educate" reporters as to the importance of this new approach to the delivery of services in the public workplace.
Similarly, the Task Force encourages those media having reporters regularly assigned to labor relations or service quality issues to realize their responsibility to go beyond the negatives, the strikes, the discord, and to seek out and report upon the positive benefits being accrued from the cooperative partnership approach. Labor-management cooperation that produces improved public services is "news."
Leading by Example
National professional and peer organizations can have a positive impact upon the quality of government service. In some cases, this will require an expansion of their mission; for some, the addition of new services; for others, a change in philosophy or interest toward service or workplace issues.
Some organizations' conference agendas are beginning to include more on labor-management cooperation, others focus more upon service delivery. These areas can be merged to provide more "how to's." Rather than training that focuses on "how to win" at bargaining or arbitration -- no matter which party offers it -- the American public would be better served if the emphasis is on joint problem-solving and service improvement. Conference and training sessions that focus on legal and technical dimensions of the workplace relationship would be more useful if they focused instead on the integration of service and workplace issues, or at least give these topics their proper place. While recognizing and respecting differences, leaders in all of these organizations can seek to lower the rhetoric at the national and local level. They have the responsibility to demonstrate to their members the possible benefits from working with the other side on issues of common concern and responsibility -- namely, the provision of excellent public services in a cost-effective manner.
