Tredway Tire Case - Authority

525 Words3 Pages
The next area that needs to be focused on is the authority that the foremen have over the line workers. It appears as though this may be one of the biggest concerns affecting the employee turnover. According to an article on heritage.org(2009) it is stated, “Employers are prohibited from negotiating directly with unionized employees.”(Unions in the workplace, para. 1) What this means is that the problem cannot be fixed by changing what the line workers do, but by changing how the foreman lead and direct the line workers. The way to do this is to have the foreman sit in on the discipline meetings with the union negotiator and the line worker. It is known that the foremen will in no way be able to discipline the line workers, but by sitting in on the discipline meetings they can hopefully come to a better understanding of the concerns and problems with the line workers. It has been noted that currently the foremen have little to no input in these meetings and appear to be left completely out of the discipline process. They have no clue what the outcome of the discipline meetings are and are left to wander why their opinions and concerns might not have been addressed. The idea of having the foremen sit in on the meetings is to allow the foremen to at least know what the verdict is and to come to a better understanding of how they can address the situation the next time it might occur. This will allow the foremen to adjust their leadership and only address the issues that they are able to control. Hopefully this will create a better understanding between the foremen and the line workers, allowing them to work in better unison with each other and become more productive. The second part to this equation is that the foremen need to create an atmosphere among the line workers where they feel they can communicate directly and more openly voice their concerns to the
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