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Dialogue Process - case study Union / Management The Challenge: A large local from one of the biggest unions in Canada and a large Canadian telecommunications company were looking to further develop and improve a new dialogue process implemented between the company and the union. The process was initially company proposed and managed. The union participated in the process but did not feel a sense of ownership of it. Managers facilitated the various sessions. Essentially the process involved regular meetings between company directors and union vice president's and shop stewards. The goal was to build trust and hold informal discussions, as equals in the spirit of cooperative problem solving. The 7 different forums all had different formats and varying levels of success and regularity.
The Response: With the support of the labour relations manager, Robert began by sitting in on various meetings as an observer. After a few meetings, he made his role official by getting all to agree he was sitting in as conflict management expert. As the participants became familiar with Robert and began to trust him, the role was then further expanded to include facilitation of the meetings. Robert then helped the parties to make a whole range of improvements to the process. Process guidelines or rules were discussed and agreed on by all. Meeting agenda and minutes were standardized across all 7 forums. These meeting minutes were an important part of the dialogue process. They captured more than standard minutes including instances where one party recognized the other parties concerns, time when underlying interests where shared, and around any positive comments or common agreements. On the other hand they carried less information about sensitive or confidential details. This encouraged trust and open discussion in the meetings themselves since participants were not worried about statements on key/sensitive issues appearing in the forum minutes. This balance allowed keeping track of open items, recording relationship improvements and encouraging a full range of discussions from information sharing to the resolution of very sensitive issues. To help the parties manage the process, Robert implemented and facilitated a yearly “owners meeting” to reaffirm joint ownership, celebrate success and deal with concerns about the process. This owners meeting became a key component of the overall process. Robert also helped develop and draft a training module on the process to inform new and changing attendees and to use as a basis for continuing development of the process. He developed and implemented survey's to gain feedback on the process for input into the yearly owners meeting. He dealt with changing parties, concerns from all sides on the process, encouraged ongoing attendance, maintained neutrality of the process, encouraged and promoted joint ownership by the company and the union, ensured and encouraged full participation by all attendees.
The Results: This process is now an ongoing success and a key component for both the company and the union for managing their relationship. It continues to help in resolving grievances, preventing future problems from occurring and generally improving and maintaining the relationship between the company and the union. Very sensitive and serious issues are raised at these meetings, face to face in a respectful but honest way. The alternative would have been ad hoc e-mails without the sense of trust and cooperative environment provided by the dialogue process. Feedback on the process from all parties, management, union, human resources and labour relations continues to be very positive.
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