Collective Bargaining — 11

Summary

The challenge for each member, Local Lodge, District, and Territory, indeed for all of us together, as we go forward into the 21st century, is to collectively coordinate and utilize all resources to ensure the integrity of our collective bargaining agreements.

We must put aside individual preferences and desires to formulate the strategic approaches with maximum effort, structure, movement, mobilization, political power and community support in order to implement and enforce our contracts. The commitments each of us make, and more importantly follow through on, will allow us to implement our strategies in an effective and positive manner.

No one believes this will be an easy task, but it is definitely a necessary task to ensure the very survival of our union and the standard of living we experience today. The commitments and follow-through will enable us to enforce the agreements we have with more participation of our members, resulting in corporate America realizing they are facing the will of many, rather than the desires of a few.

The importance of coordinating our knowledge and experiences internally as well as externally cannot be over emphasized. There is simply no better proven way! Coordination with International Unions and Global Federations will help us to strengthen our density in particular targeted industries, dense product markets, and with employers of more than a few locations.

Flexibility to adapt responsibly to change is not always easily achieved as industrial and global societies undergo deep and pervasive transformations. We must fashion solutions acceptable to all parties as we deal constructively and conscientiously with changes and transformations on the way to achieving our goals. The processes we use in the achievement of our goals and aspirations will result in the safeguarding of our collective bargaining agreements for the future, and will ultimately be the proof of our success.

The Collective Bargaining Department, as always, will endeavor to maintain the relationships we have formed in the corporate world, while working diligently for the members we represent and striving to provide them with the best future we can collectively secure. “We Are Stronger Than We Think”!