Case Study

In taking the management role, I will find a way to create a strategy to maintain a nonunion employment situation. Some important facts about this case study is that Custom Conveyer Division employs about 120 production employees and 11 supervisor/management positions. The 120 production employees are split evenly between five semi-skilled job classifications. There are two other plants in Cumberland that hire employees with the same type of skills and start pay about $1 less an hour than CCD. There is room to expand the company but work has been steady lately, a layoff is possibly in two months if new orders aren’t received.
One employee contacted the district director of the United Steelworkers in the region because of the differences in wages between the Custom Conveyer Division (CDC) and the General Materials and Fabrication Corporation (GMFC) and also stating that some of the preppers were dissatisfied because their worker was more repetitive and dirtier than the other jobs but the pay was the same (Fossum, 2009, p. 190). Management was notified that one of the workers (Dave) had a Steelworkers local sticker on his toolbox. Although there hasn’t been any union activity at the CCD, top management wants to keep it that way.
First step in strategy to make sure that the company stays without unions is communicate with the employees and making sure that you have an open door policy that can be enforced if there is a problem or if an employee is unsatisfied they can come to the employers with confidence. If Dave is a new hire and is already seeing there is dissatisfaction in the work area than it can’t be hiding. Doing an attitude survey for early identification of potentially troublesome areas will help get the problems out on the table so at least management is aware of the problem (Fossum, 2009, p. 204). The CCD is already leading the market with wages so it won’t be a point where the union can gain at the bargaining table.
As management, I would approach