Over the past few years, we have seen that no industry remains invulnerable to union activity. Sure, much of this activity was aided by pandemic conditions, yet here we are.
Unions are wily, too. Salts are progressively infiltrating the retail and food industries, and the Communications Workers Of America continue to chip away at tech workers through their CODE-CWA initiative. Almost absurdly, the United Auto Workers are increasingly composed of higher education workers, yet one must recognize these games for what they are: union efforts to adapt and survive.
Manufacturing no longer remains labor’s predominant stomping ground, and different tactics will come with that change in focus. The NLRB and the most pro-union presidential administration in history will also aid new union methods.
Still, unions must secretly see these times as challenging since their high media visibility has still yielded record low union density in 2022. So, one can expect their strategies to continue morphing. For example, organizers are wrapping their arms around high-turnover service sector workplaces in aggressive ways:
- Heavy recruitment, focusing on job switchers: The fledgling Union of Southern Service Workers strategically formed a cross-sector organization. As such, the union can more easily retain members who switch jobs, say from the fast-food to the retail sector, with relatively seamless transitions. Existing union members are encouraged to recruit heavily by merely walking into random businesses (convenience stores? Yes, anywhere) to discuss working conditions. At meetings, members are asked to bring multiple newbies into the fold.
- Holding events outside the workplace proper: Barbeques, ice-cream outings, and technology-based communication methods, including group chats, can woo the uninitiated. Some organizers have also petitioned to bar managers from break rooms to ease the flow of union-friendly propaganda.
- Social media is a prime avenue for sharing union agendas: Those handy hashtags and mobile-friendly apps can reach remote workers and those on the frontlines of restaurants and retail shops. These are much stealthier versions than chatting at the water cooler.
- Continued targeting of so-called “progressive” companies: Workers United succeeded at Starbucks, where baristas are likely to be college-educated, liberal, and prone to joining activist causes. These workers likely feel disillusioned by the current macroeconomic situation, yet they don’t have the union background to realize that salters keep their own (monetary) interests at the forefront. In other words, these workers are perfect union targets.
Are these new organizing tactics successful with high-turnover workplaces? Only sometimes. The Amazon Labor Union has successfully organized a solitary warehouse, Staten Island’s JFK8. This week, however, the NLRB decided to grease the union’s wheels by declaring that Amazon must allow access to workspaces for organizing purposes.
Also, museum workers across the U.S. are turning to unions out of frustration over wages. Retail workers at companies like REI continue grassroots efforts after feeling that forward-facing roles during the pandemic went unrewarded. These developments are worth watching as eyes remain on high-turnover workplaces.
