I came across this article yesterday; it described a typical union organizing campaign but the one statement that caught my attention was the fact that in a 300-employee organizing unit the company was unaware of the union activity until they went public on social media, in the press and filed for a National Labor Relations Board (NLRB)

(“It was important that we had been able to keep our effort secret from the company while collecting cards, because we knew that when we went public, an intense union-busting campaign would descend upon us. And boy, did it ever.”)

As I have stated many times, a breakdown of communication is the biggest cause of future union organizing activity and on occasions can take years to get to the point where an RC petition is filed.

Many unaddressed issues can arise causing workers to feel unappreciated and further erode trust in their management team to the point where employees don’t bring matters of importance to their direct supervisors, preferring to complain to their co-workers, many times out of frustration caused by this inaction of the management team to address their issues or out of fear of retaliation.

Months of organizing activities and the fact that not one worker opened up to a supervisor or anyone on the management team about the organizing campaign tells me everything about the level of communication and trust within the unit. An after the petition communication blitz is helpful but many times it’s just not enough as reflected in the union win rate which was 81.9 percent rate in 2025.

 It’s important to always have an open dialogue with your employees, today’s workplace is more diverse then ever and the days of a one management style that fits all is long gone, managing a Multigenerational workforce is much more complicated with Boomers, Gen X, Millennial and Gen z employees working together.

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Communication breakdown is the biggest cause of union activity, but many issues happen in-between the breakdown and an RC petition, an erosion of confidence in management’s leadership to support their workforce.

Effective communication is not just going through the motions of having conversations with your employees, effective communication is to truly listen to them, strategic empathy, follow up, it doesn’t mean that you have to agree with everything they say or solve every problem, but they need to feel that they were listened too, treated fairly and respected.

The good news is that there is usually time for course correction if you commit to truly engaging with your workforce!

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Want to stay union free? How are those “Good Vibes” coming along?

#UnionFree
#UnionAvoidance
#UnionAwareness

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According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the percentage of U.S. workers who belong to a union has steadily declined over the last several decades, from about 20% in 1983 to just 10% in 2025, In the private sector, but it’s important to look deeper at the numbers and what industries are targeted to understand how the unions are evolving.

The labor movement has transformed dramatically since its origins in the 19th century, adapting to industrialization, technological change, and shifting political landscapes and as the labor movement continues to evolve, unions face new challenges. The changing dynamics of the workforce, including the rise of gig and freelance work.

Technology has transformed nearly every aspect of modern life, and labor relations are no exception. The infusion of technology into the workplace has had profound implications for labor unions, some have a negative impact for unions, for example automation has led to a decline of the workforce in their core membership base but technology has also provided unions with new tools for organizing and mobilizing members. Social media platforms, for instance, have enabled unions to reach a broader audience and engage with workers in real-time. Campaigns can be designed to go viral, rallying support for labor causes and increasing visibility for union activities. Additionally, online platforms allow unions to conduct virtual meetings, making it easier for members to participate regardless of their location, which makes organizing more cost efficient without the need for renting out as many meeting spaces or bringing in organizers to house call voters.

The labor movement has always been divided on organizing strategies, many in the labor movement are calling for Taking on Big Targets saying that union density can’t grow without it, the proportion of union elections has increased in customer-facing industries such as social services, digital media, retail and wholesale, and business, professional, and personal services.

The biggest private sector union wins in recent years have been in graduate student units in private universities such as Columbia, MIT, and Cornell.

Unions such as IFPTE and OPEIU have set up new nonprofit divisions, focused on organizing advocacy organizations and grant-funded institutions such as museums. Small independent unions, such as the Campaign Workers Guild and United Campaign Workers, have targeted political campaign staff.

Unions are trying to engage a multigenerational workforce that differ in how they approach work/life balance, career growth, loyalty, authority, and other issues that affect successful union organizing activity.

Understanding union tactics and what drives workers to reach out to unions along with having a consistent, positive and inclusive employee outreach policy is vital to maintaining a productive union free environment at your facility.

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Two years ago, the successful union drive at this plant was expected to spark victories throughout the South. But now, as members vote to make their contract official, momentum has fizzled.

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Unions call any employer “union Busters” if they don’t agree with any union demands in contract negotiations or any attempt to organize. I have seen many times where union staff fought hard with their own union which sometimes leads to strikes and walkouts so I guess it’s fair to call them union busters!

 For example the National Education Association Staff Organization (NEASO) was locked out of their jobs without pay by NEA management after an Unfair Labor Practice (ULP) strike over compensation and working conditions, UAW Staff United Strike in 2024, AFL-CIO Staff Union Contract Dispute in 2023, UNITE split from HERE, morphing into Workers United (WU) and affiliating with the Service Employees (SEIU) which left their staff filing ULPs against the unions, debate over the union’s internal culture has broken open around the question of pink sheeting which is the practice of collecting and using personal information about staffers and workers in organizing drives.

In the years I worked in the labor movement, it proved to be a every person fight for themselves environment, many of those years holding a management position where the staff and employees were viewed as dispensable. Union hostilities are not just limited to internal union struggles, they are prevalent at the highest levels of the international labor movement and many times lower tier union employees, and even rank and file members get injured, I have witnessed it firsthand many times.

In 2008 the Healthcare organizing war got so heated between the California Nurses Association and SEIU union that at a Labor Notes convention in Detroit it led to violence.  As the banquet began 200-300 chanting SEIU members and staffers rushed through the side door of the hotel, nearest the banquet hall. The doors had apparently been opened from inside by SEIU staff attending the conference. Most were wearing their SEIU purple T-shirts and many carried signs denouncing the California Nurses Association. Then CNA Executive Director Rose Ann DeMoro had originally been scheduled to address the banquet; this fight lasted for more than forty minutes with several hospitalized and one person suffering from a heart attack.

Union solidary in many ways is a lie, they will support each other as long as it is convenient and not a moment longer, In fact, Article XX of the AFL-CIO Constitution existed for the purpose of managing and resolving Inter-Union Disputes, Labor, as embodied by the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO), is perceived by many as a monolithic force but, in reality, is composed of a coalition of sometimes competing interests. Not surprisingly, and often raucously, the unions within the AFL-CIO compete for members in both representation and work assignment disputes which the article was designed to resolve.

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There’s trouble in paradise! this has always been the problem for union contract negotiations, the union organizers have one job and that is to grow membership by any means necessary and that includes lying.

Successful organizing campaigns are an emotional high for the union supporters, union organizers need workers to take ownership of the campaign, but many times the organizers promise everything under the sun to win the campaign, the organizers job is done after the ballots are counted and the negotiators need to try and fulfill those promises at the table.

When I taught advanced organizing strategies at the George Meany Center for Labor Studies / National Labor College, we encouraged the designated lead negotiators to engage with the workers organizing committee members prior to the election to educate them how the negotiating process works.

The truth is that unions don’t want to educate their potential members, they want organizing workers to think that all they need to do is to vote the union in and the contract process goes on autopilot, that’s why they spend tens of millions of dollars lobbing politicians to prevent management from educating workers on the realities about unions when there is union organizing activity.

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The Detroit Newspaper War was a take-no-prisoners battle between the two largest newspaper publishing companies Gannett and Knight-Ridder; it was one of America’s costliest newspaper wars.

The circulation war was so intense that it brought both newspapers to the brink of failure, Knight-Ridder and Gannett announced their application for a JOA under the newspaper preservation act. (1970) The application tagged the Free Pres as the failing newspaper. Testimony described a downward spiral of financial losses, a second-place share of advertising and declining circulation, the 100-year Joint operating agreement ended in 2026, only 36 years later.

The JOA had tremendous public and union opposition, and the DOJ initially recommended against approval of the JOA, it was barley approved.
The JOA Hubris also contributed to the newspaper strike/lockout of July 13, 1995, to Dec. 17, 2001, which I was a strike director on. During the strike, both papers saw huge readership declines from which they never recovered. (The National Labor Relations Board ruled on June 19, 1997, that the newspapers had “caused” and “prolonged” but a three-judge panel of the District of Columbia Federal Court of Appeals unanimously reversed the NLRB.

After all this I was surprised that the newspapers decided to end the JOA, which saves them millions of dollars every year by combining operations until I looked deeper.

On August 3, 2005, Gannett announced that it would sell The News to MediaNews Group and purchase the Free Press from the Knight Ridder company

On January 26, 2026, USA today announced that they are purchasing the Detroit News from the MediaNews Group, the then-chairman of Gannett, Al Neuharth, envisioned the startup newspaper and Gannett’s board of directors approved the launch of the national newspaper, USA Today, on December 5, 1981. In 2025 Gannett announced it will be changing its name to USA TODAY Co., Inc., effective November 18.

Now that both the Detroit Free Press and Detroit News are owned and operated by USA Today (Gannett) will this arrangement lead to true compilation, which was the goal of the newspaper preservation act and will both newspapers survive? I am very skeptical.

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The Typographical union, Mailers union, Pressmen’s union, Journalists’ union, went on strike in 2022, all but the journalist’s union (the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh) voted to accept buyouts ending their strike.

 The Supreme Court upheld the ULP status of the strike by declining to consider an appeal from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, which legally obligated the Newspaper to reinstate the workers plus reimburse all costs and benefits including back wages accrued during the strike, in effect declaring that management did not bargain in good faith.

Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh President Andrew Goldstein stated to management “We’re not here for revenge. We’re not here to destroy the Post-Gazette. We are here to rebuild it.”

Without getting into the merits of the strike or the Courts decision it is the intention/strategy for striking unions to damage the company sufficiently to force them back to the table and sometimes to the point of no return.

The last strike I directed with the IBT was in coordination with 5 other national unions and 6 union locals. This strike (The Detroit News/Free Press Strike) was immediately transformed into a national strategy against two of the largest newspapers in the nation under a joint operating agreement. The strike was fierce and took almost 6 years to achieve a Collective Bargaining Agreement.

A third of all subscribers were lost. Circulation fell eight times the rate for industry between 1995 and 2001, and dozens of veteran journalists left the papers and the city, taking with them years of knowledge and public memory. The Free Press and Detroit News have never recovered their pre-strike circulation numbers.

The anger between the company and strikers resulted in hundreds of arrests and injuries. Hand to hand combat with police and private security company guards which numbered over a thousand and over 4,000 replacement workers to do everything from delivering newspapers, drive trucks, man the printing facilities and everything in between. destruction of company property was happening daily, in fact the violence got so bad at the printing plants the Newspaper Agency rented helicopters to fly newspapers out of the plants.

I have seen companies large and small go out of business and lives destroyed, companies trying to stay afloat and make payroll, people who have put every penny they have into their dream – all erased because of strikes.

I have seen workers going on strike thinking that it was going to be a party, short and sweet but nobody thought that years later they were still going to be on strike.

Strikes serve nobody’s interest. People must realize that. It is the absolute last resort and, frankly, both sides should do everything possible to prevent one. The best way to avoid a strike is to stay union free but that also involves communication, effort, determination, and a desire to do right by your employees within reason.

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With federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents showing no signs of leaving Minnesota, loca

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