Don't ignore the warning signs of worsening collective employment relations

One of the most interesting work projects for me - and one with enormous value to an employer and its people - is working on improving the relationship between the employer and its union.

When joint meetings become more difficult, issues are getting escalated, comments are made more personal, less information is shared - you are in a downward spiral which is unlikely to improve without some kind of specific intervention. Some parties choose to ignore the signs of a deterioration in the relationship, maybe don’t see it or don’t prioritise it.

When both parties sense the relationship is under strain and want to have a robust, constructive relationship to take them through fast paced change, there are proactive steps which can be taken to reset the relationship before it deteriorates further. It's too important to ignore.

So, if you see some warning signs, an employer should consider taking the following steps:

-          Speak to your counterpart in the union – what are they seeing and feeling?

-          Get the commitment of the right people to undertake some joint work

-          Find an experienced facilitator who understands collective ER and has experience of team mediation approaches

-          Commit the time and resources for interviews, and a joint face to face session as a minimum.

Understandably there can be nervousness about the joint session so I work with both parties seperately beforehand to really listen to and understand their views and expectations. We will meet seperately until each party is happy to meet in a jointly facilitated and structured session. These sessions follow similar formats but are geared to address the specific issues raised by the parties. We always set ground rules, I always use uninterupted speaking time. There is a structure but I don't always follow it to the letter. It is always action focused, commitments are made and processes agreed for following up on these commitments. They may agree to further joint work.

We explore what the current relationship feels like, what they would say to the other party about the relationship. I ask them to think about how to give feedback constructively and how to receive feedback. We explore positive examples of what happens when they work well together. We then look to the future and describe what they want this to be like, what they will commit to doing to make this a reality and what they want the other party to do.

The joint face to face session is always a test of their intent, their ability to give and receive feedback and their commitment to creating a different future relationship for themselves, their members/their employees. In these sessions we will start to build some bridges, understand perspectives better and restore some trust.

I would encourage more organisations to spend time jointly assessing the state of the relationship with their unions, with an emphasis on continuously improving the collective ER climate, making it robust for today’s challenges, including the incoming Employment Rights Act in the UK.

Case studies from my previous work in this area can be found on my website