WHO CONTROLS YOUR WORK SCHEDULE?
STARBUCKS and AMAZON are in the headlines a lot because a very small number of their locations might get unionized.
It's complicated because the jobs that are in the bullseye of the unions are jobs that people rarely stick with for more than a couple of years. So, for example, paying union dues to support the union's retirement/pension fund makes no sense. Paying union dues so that, maybe, you will get paid more after five or ten years on the job thanks to a collective bargaining agreement doesn't make much sense to the majority of employees who take these jobs because they are easy to get and easy to quit.
If you do stay at Amazon or Starbucks for a long career, you are going to move up in the ranks and become a manager. Many people do this and they end up with a lifelong opportunity that is great for them. They enjoy benefits that the unions cannot compete with but, that’s OK, because now they are the “boss” that unions are protecting the employees from.
Here's the hard part for the managers at both of these companies, they have to decide the work schedule for every employee every week. This is no easy task. Understanding your team is critical. This is not a simple spreadsheet because employees have different needs that managers try to accommodate. Also, the managers need to have a feel for productivity at the level of each individual employee. Who is an overachiever and who wants to fulfill the minimum expectations? Who needs training and who is good at training? Who can dive in when things are backed up and who is better suited to working when things are not too chaotic? Who has a disability that requires accommodation? Who has a sick parent that they are caring for? Who is going to school while working? Who is a working parent with young children? This is intuitive and difficult work.
Starbucks and Amazon are hugely dependent on their thousands of excellent managers for these skillsets. That's the tricky part of unionization.
When a location is unionized, the union gets control over determining who will work what hours and the job of the managers is to make sure that the warehouse or storefront is obeying the rules that the union determines. The non-union managers want to reward people who are doing far more than the average employee. The managers at union locations want to maximize the number of dues-paying employees that are needed to do the job.
Every time you get frustrated with air travel because your flight is canceled or delayed because a crew for your flight is not available, it is important to remember that Delta has no say over who works when regarding their pilots and stewards. When employees unionize, the union retains 100% of this authority. No pilot can raise her hand and say "hey, things are crazy right now, I feel fresh, I'll handle this flight." That can never happen in air travel. A pilot who behaves like that will be severely punished by their union. But, a pilot for a commercial airline loves her union and just wants to be a pilot for decades, they don't want to become a suit at Delta airlines anytime soon. So, it’s all good unless you are the air traveler sitting next to a grounded pilot while both of you wonder when your flight will leave.
Creative flexibility and dynamic scheduling are anathema to the Workers United of the Service Employees International Union
For Amazon and Starbucks, this is not about hourly pay, or healthcare benefits, or retirement pension funds - these companies are already way out ahead of union averages for this stuff - this is about who gets to decide what hours each employee will work.
I am sure that there are workers at both companies who have had a terrible boss force them to work way too many hours or way too few hours and these workers are upset. But, Starbucks and Amazon got to where they are today because of their savvy ability to eliminate bad managers. One of Amazon’s long term objectives is to become “the world’s greatest employer” and they appear to be on a trajectory to achieve that goal over the next decade. Just like Starbucks, they constantly survey their employees to make sure they are out in front of the complaints and the suggestions that only the front-line workers can provide. The employer must rely on the union to survey employees, filter the feedback, and then send it on to headquarters when a union is in control. So, it’s complicated.
(In fairness, public school teachers work an incredible number of overtime hours that are not approved by their unions and god bless them for that. The unions tolerate this with teachers because the teachers are NOT getting paid for those hours. But, god forbid a cop in a union offers to work some hours for free, the union will crush that person for even suggesting such a thing.)