Posted on May 7, 2015 by AdminUN

MADAME CAROL’S BANGED UP CRYSTAL BALL AND THE MAGIC “S”

J. K. Rowling should be writing this given the elements of wizardry in a recent FLRA decision making it look like it is right out of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. The Authority confronted an interesting question, namely, should an agency that is excluded from the provisions of the labor law be required to respect the rights that act guarantees to covered employees. When a bargaining unit employee was accused of viewing porn on an agency computer, his employing agency, Hill Air Force Base, sent in the Air Force Office of Special Investigations (AFOSI) to interview him.  AFOSI promptly refused to let the employee bring a union rep on the grounds that AFOSI was excluded from the labor law’s obligations. FLRA had to decide whether the employee’s right were violated, and by a 2 to 1 decision it held they were not. AFGE, 68 FLRA 460 (2015) Continue reading →

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Posted on May 7, 2015 by AdminUN

HOW TO KILL A UNION FROM WITHIN

Kodak, Borders, Blockbuster, Lehman Brothers, Circuit City—and the list goes on.  Most business schools will tell you now that they have had a chance to examine the corpse of each of those once great companies that they died from leadership suicide. Their top leaders made it very clear to employees that they did not want to hear any bad news, that questioning the status quo was frowned upon, and that candid, reality-based planning for the future was not worth the leadership’s time. That is a lesson that is even more important for top union leaders because of the very fragile state of unionism in this country.  We can’t survive much more trauma from the outside.  So, the last thing we need is damage from within.  The Harvard Business Review people just put out a short, thought-provoking article that union leaders should read entitled, “Make it OK for Employees to Challenge Your Ideas.”  We all know it is common that when national union leaders meet with local leaders that everyone likes to hear what the national president is up to and the national president likes to hear what a great job he is doing.  If  not a great job, at least no accusations, criticisms or tough questions.  But every one of those national president-local presidents meetings should devote a large portion of the agenda to one request from the national leadership, “So, tell me what I could do better, what I am missing, and what you need from me.”

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Posted on May 5, 2015 by AdminUN

UPDATE ON OGE ADVERSE ACTION REGULATIONS

Not long ago we pointed out a case where MSPB overturned an employee’s removal from FDIC because the agency failed to get approval from the Office of Government Ethics (OGE) of an FDIC-created rule of conduct. It was titled, “MSPB Recognizes OGE Defense to Disciplinary Actions.”  When the Board returned the case to the Regional office judge to conclude, the employer, FDIC, appealed again.  Only this time it asked OGE its opinion about whether FDIC needed to get conduct rules it created approved by OGE before applying them to employees.  FDIC also changed its rhetoric to boost its chances, calling its rule not a conduct rule but a minimum fitness rule. To our surprise, OGE bought into the FDIC change of labels and declared it did not have to approve a fitness rule in advance. Although the OGE decided to ignore the MSPB’s thinking on the issue, the Board decided that politeness, which lawyers call “comity,” required that it respects OGE’s view—even though OGE trashed MSPB’s view first.  The Board adopted the OGE/FDIC argument, reversed its previous decision and upheld the employee’s termination.  (See Jonson v FDIC, 2015 MSPB 36 (2015)) maybe now Jonson appeals arguing that FDIC did not follow the regs dealing with minimum fitness or qualification rules and the Board can deal with this a third time. So if you run into the same wording shell game by an agency imposing a new rule for firing employees, contact the local’s lawyer and start pushing back early, e.g., by demanding bargaining before implementation.

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Posted on May 5, 2015 by AdminUN

INTERESTING DRESS CODE DECISION

Several federal judges have held that the FLRA should follow closely NLRB case law precedent since the private sector law was the model for the private sector one.  The NLRB just issued an interesting decision about dress codes and wearing union pins that was written about in this article, “Board Nixes Honda Dress Policy.” It is a quick read that we recommend.

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Posted on May 5, 2015 by AdminUN

AGENCIES MAY HAVE TO BARGAIN WITH UNIONS OVER EMPLOYEE DATA BREACHES

The NLRB recently indicated it believes employers are obligated to bargain when employee data they hold is hacked. Take a look at this article, Employers May Have to Bargain With Unions Over Response to Employee Data Breaches

Issues can range from the quality of the ID theft protection the agency implements to protect those whose data was stolen to an agency decision to do nothing. So far, nothing blocks a union from demanding changes when it opens its term contract.

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Posted on April 30, 2015 by AdminUN

FLRA REGIONAL OFFICE SEMINARS AVAILABLE

FLRA just distributed the announcement below.  We have found these meetings interesting and helpful.  Sign up fast before all the seats are gone. Continue reading →

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Posted on April 29, 2015 by AdminUN

A PLEASANT PARTICULARIZED NEED PRONOUNCEMENT: Test Yourself

A nice thing happened last week.  The Authority issued an easier to understand than normal, unanimous decision on particularized need.  (AFGE, 68 FLRA 492 (2015))  See if you can predict what the ruling was from the facts below.  It is also an important case because it addressed whether a union can get information merely to examine the validity of a management decision that it had every right to make without bargaining over the substance of the decision. The union had not yet filed a grievance or demanded bargaining. Continue reading →

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Posted on April 29, 2015 by AdminUN

NTEU’S JUNK YARD DOGS DIG UP EVEN MORE CBP MILLIONS

Less than four months ago we wrote about how FLRA had upheld an arbitrator’s decisions awarding what likely will be over $100 million in back pay to Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Officers because management violated the law about how to schedule employees.  Well, FLRA just upheld another NTEU arbitration victory that orders back pay as far back at the late 90’s and that is likely to generate just as much money.  This case proves so many things about how an agency should not operate a labor relations program, but before we get to those lessons learned, let’s review what happened. Continue reading →

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Posted on April 26, 2015 by AdminUN

WHAT’S NEXT FOR NTEU—AND YOU?

There are two reasons why NTEU might have a big impact on your union soon.  First, it is about to install a new national leadership after 16 years under the current one. New leaders often mean substantial changes. In fact, if new leaders do not try new things the organization usually deteriorates because the policies and perspectives of the past almost always lose their effectiveness with time.   Second, unlike all the AFL-CIO affiliated unions that are prohibited from raiding one another, as an independent union NTEU is free to raid wherever it likes—and with over $40 million in the bank it has the cash to do it. So, we thought we would share with you the brainstorming we have been doing about the options NTEU has for its future—and yours. Continue reading →

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Posted on April 26, 2015 by AdminUN

UNDERSTANDING CATEGORY RATING SYSTEMS

As we have said before, category rating is brimming with opportunities for agency HR and managers to abuse the process.  There are very few rules, and MSPB has consistently looked the other way so that there is no public hard data about just what agencies are doing. For those unfamiliar with Category Rating, it replaces ranking candidates by their numerical score in favor of putting them in one of two broadly defined qualification categories.  Once they are placed, management has the ability to select anyone in the category, although veterans in the category usually must be considered before others in the category.  Consequently, an applicant who might have otherwise been rated ten points below other candidates can get selected over them because there are no numerical scores. Given MSPB’s cowering, it falls to unions to challenge category rating selections when their members are passed over.  OPM has posted some information about the concept in its archives. The FedSoup people also have a decent explanation of what category rating is about. And the law firm of Passman & Kaplan have posted material which could help union reps. But before you put together a plan, be sure to read a journal article published by Xavier University  that looks beyond all the OPM PR blather about how great this is to reveal its fundamental flaws. Here are some things we would build into our plan: Continue reading →

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