Essay Sample: Negotiating Benefits and Working Conditions in Unions

There is also a difference in how the HR managers approach the benefits and the working conditions in the workplace. Chang et al., (2017) illustrate that the benefits, such as health covers, in the unionized organizations are determined through the negotiations between the company officials and the labor union representatives. For instance, the company may be willing to pay 50% of the employee's health cover while the labor union may be advocating for the 75% of the same. The final benefit is arrived at after a series of proposals and counterproposals between the HR managers and the labor union officials.

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The non-unionized employees do not have an avenue to negotiate for benefits like the retirement plan. Jimenez and Didona (2017) show that in most cases, the employers in the non-unionized organizations dictate the option of the retirement savings of their employees such as the employer's match. According to Chang et al., (2017), most union employees have better working conditions and benefits than non-unionized employees.

The nature of the organization, either for profit unionized or non-profit non-unionized organizations, has a great influence on the human resource managers' work. Despite the benefit of the labor unions in advocating for employees good working conditions, studies have found that labor unions can greatly affect the operations of the human resource managers in their roles of communicating, ensuring good employee performance and organization. I would prefer to work as a human resource manager in a unionized organization

As a human resource manager, I would be able to in a better position to improve the employee voice mechanisms in a unionized organization than in a non-unionized organization. According to Jimenez and Didona (2017), human resource managers in unionized firms can use employees' meetings and surveys, safety and consultative committees, collective negotiation, health and safety representatives, and equal employment procedures. Jimenez and Didona (2017) found that non-unionized organizations were less likely to use many human resource mechanisms-especially employees' surveys, supervisor-employee, employee-senior management meetings, and voice mechanisms.

Over the past decades, unions are the link between the organization administration and the employees. Many unions bargain for the rights of employees. When the employees have a grievance that they need to express to the employers, the officials represent the employee's grievances on behalf of the employees. Though the officials of the unions may sometimes not represent precisely the grievances of the employees appropriately, it is a faster method of channeling employees' complaints.

The consolidation of employees' grievances may have little effect on individual matters, hence losing trust by employees. Despite the small impact on personal issues, unions formalize the channels of communication between employees and employers. The formalization of communication processes leads to effective and efficient organizational processes. The formalization does away with the informalities in organizational processes hence making work easier for human resource managers. It is only the elected and legitimate officials of unions who represent the voice of employees to the human resource manager and the senior administrative officials of the organization.

According to flood and Toner (1997), unions positively impact the organization's culture and organization climate. The argument is that the presence unions help establish simple and rigid organizational processes that reduce the conflicts between employers and employees. The existence of union representatives also reduces the disputes between the employees in unionized healthcare organizations.

The employee voices are channeled only by the appointed officials hence not every employee. The presence of unions leads to the development of better human resource policies. Good human resource policies further lead to a robust corporate culture. Moreover, according to Flood and Toner (1997), establishing better human resource policies leads to employee satisfaction.

Over the past decades, employees in different sectors of the economy in the world, embrace the role of unions in their industries and organizations. Both the private and public sector employees have formed unions that act as the medium of expressing their voice to their bosses. Though the unions play an essential role in expressing the employees' grievances, a study by (Weisman, 2011) shows that there is a decline in the number of employees in unions. Many employees have opted not to join unions on different perceptions. For instance, Johnston et al., (2000) argue that many employees in various sectors of the economy say that unions are led by greed and corrupt officials who elect themselves. However, Gollan (2000) study shows that there is an increase in the number of health workers who have joined unions in the United States. Many of the employees have joined the unions for job security and because the unions act as a medium of expressing their grievances to the bosses.

As a human resource manager, I would prefer to work in unionized for-profit health care organizations. Unions act as a medium of communication to bosses on behalf of the employees. Though the unions provide an indirect voice to bosses on behalf of employees, this is a critical factor that has led to the 28 adoptions of employee communications and voice by union firms; besides that, there also other underlying factors for establishing unions. The other reasons for forming unions include the goal of providing employee satisfaction and avoiding subjecting employees to a dishonorable discharge from jobs due to lack of a better representation by unions.

The non-union employee representation plans in organization analyze and discuss some of the issues affecting employees such as pay, the effects of introducing a new technology in the organization, employees working hours per day, the working conditions, and promotions of staff in an organization. However, research by Gollan (2000) states that the nonunionized employee representations are of less help to employees as they are not effective at bargaining for employee rights to bosses. The nonunionized employee representations have less effect on policymaking in organizations. The managers of organizations play thei...