Food Plants Partner With Unions To Boost Competitiveness
Managers and unions who think outside of the box are partnering to improve plant competitiveness. New work systems are based on mutual trust and respect.
Business partnerships may be common, but partnerships between corporations and labor unions are a fairly new -- and relatively rare -- development. A true partnership requires sharing both risks and benefits, and few corporate managers and labor leaders have been willing -- or able -- to overcome decades of mistrust and suspicion between the two camps. "The biggest issue is lack of trust, based on old habits and paradigms," observes Wallace W. Graham, president of the management consulting firm W.W. Graham & Co. (Tempe, AZ) and a former Frito-Lay plant manager. "Unions don't trust labor/management relationships to get them the best contract, and management doesn't trust unions to deliver what's in the contract."
Dr. Phil Bromley, principal of consulting firm The Belgard Group (Orlando, FL), concurs. "The biggest problem in moving from confrontation to collaboration is to establish trust, which takes a long period of time," says Bromley. "You have to cross the abyss." The abyss being the point where fundamental change must take place in the way people think, act and organize their work.