Reference no: EM133160531

1. Do you think that people would still join unions if supervisors provided them with fair working conditions from the start? 

2. How do you think that management should deal with labour unions?

Current Situation

A labour union is an officially recognized body representing a group of employees who have joined together to present a collective voice in dealing with management (Dessler & Chhinzer, 2019). The purpose of a union is to influence HR policies and practices in order to achieve greater control over the jobs being performed, greater job security, and improved working conditions (Dessler & Chhinzer, 2019). The idea is to ultimately increase job satisfaction and meet employee's affiliation needs (Dessler & Chhinzer, 2019). Labour-management-relations is a term used to refer to the interactions between labour unions and management in organizations (Dessler & Chhinzer, 2019). 

Link to HR

I think it is very much the case that if supervisors communicate effectively with employees, deal with their concerns, and treat them fairly, that employees are far less likely to be interested in forming or joining a union. After all, the main reason for the formation of a union is to increase job satisfaction and meet employees' needs, so if the employees felt that there needs were being met in the first place, there would be no need to join or form a union. If management were more concerned with the effective communication and fair treatment of their employees, I think in many cases they would be able to avoid the headache of having to deal with labour unions. The objective of unions is to ensure job security and improved working and economic conditions for their members. 

Deeper Dive

Since the main goal of a labour union is to influence HR policies and practices in order to increase overall job satisfaction and meet employee needs, it stands to reason that if supervisors were to communicate effectively with employees, deal with their concerns, and treat them fairly, that employees would be far less likely to be interested in forming or joining a union. The only reason that an individual would seek to join or form a union is if they were dissatisfied with their work conditions and felt that they were being treated unfairly by the management at their workplace. So if the management team took more care to provide its employees with fair working and economic conditions from the get-go, there would be far less incentive for employees to look to join or form a union.