ADVANCED GRIEVANCE HANDLING
Instructor’s Guide
OVERVIEW:
In this class you will review the "Keepers" that have been in the primary track grievance handling material for two years. This will help you refresh their recollections about what should be done in processing a grievance. Once this is done, you will ask them to review an arbitration decision and critique it using the "keepers."
OPENING: (5 Minutes)
Give the participants an overview of what the class will be about. You may want to ask them at this point to identify the parts of grievance processing that they find the hardest. Or, you might want to ask them to list some of the toughest questions they want you to deal with. Cover the objectives in the opening.
OBJECTIVES: At the end of this class, you will be able to:
1 Assess a grievance to determine whether it is written and investigated properly.
KEEPERS: (15-20 Minutes)
Walk the class through these documents by turning to each one, pointing out some of the highlights of the document, and asking if the document sparks any additional questions. Tell them that once you are done, you will ask them to read through and critique an arbitration decision using these forms.
THE ARBITRATION: (10 Minutes to read, 30 minutes to discuss in small groups, and 30 minutes to report out)
Now that you have covered the most important parts of grievance handling, have the class work on this case problem at their tables. Tell them to read it for about 10 minutes and to mark the places where the union made a mistake or where they think they union could have done something better. Then ask them as a group to go through and compare their thoughts. While everyone should refer to the KEEPERS as they do this, assign each table one KEEPER that they re responsible for most thoroughly applying to the case problem. If you have too many tables, assign two tables per KEEPER. Give them 30 minutes to work it as a group and remind them to appoint a reporter.
In the final 30 minutes, go through the problem as a full class. Make a decision about how you want to go through the material. You could go paragraph by paragraph, or you could go through it by KEEPER, or you could even go through it by stage of the grievance. It is your choice, but choose some rational method rather than just wandering around in the case.
As you go through it, ask each table for one observation or correction and then go to another. Do not let one table dominate the conversation. Once everyone has spoken once, you can open the floor to anyone.
As they provide their critique and hit on one of the "hard questions" about grievance handling that they listed in the opening, try to work in a more complete response. If you have cases of your own that are worth telling them about to further emphasize something, work them in here.
If you have time left, you might want to call for more questions, or tips from the participants themselves, or even examples of best practices from the group.
Here is a list of some of the union’s grievance handling problems or errors that the case highlights.
1 The union should have found all the potential grievants. At a minimum, they left out Chin and Jones. Talk about the value of filing on "behalf of all similarly situated employees" so that you do not have to name everyone. Talk about how a mass grievance raises the potential liability for management.
2 The union missed the age discrimination issue. Talk about using the NTEU grievance addendum to make sure you think of everything and that you properly cite it.
3 The union missed witnesses, e.g., Chin and Jones.
4 The union missed documents, e.g., how OT was distributed in other filing seasons as evidence of practice, Furlano’s time cards showing when she recently worked in the IFCS unit, Furlano’s performance records while she worked over there, management overtime records, etc. There are many things you can point out.
5 The union understated the remedy. Talk about the need to always ask for back pay or the catchall remedy statement of "any remedy appropriate under the contract."
6 Discuss how the union did not seem to have a theory worked out about what it meant to equalize OT.
7 Talk about how damage done when the steward conceded on the above point in a prior grievance.
8 Bring out how the grievance was not precise because it did not specify the time periods over which overtime was distributed.
9 Talk about how the grievant could have been asked more questions as part of the grievance investigation.
10 Point out how the union steward imporperly cited the ccontract in the grievance by only citing one subsection of the article.
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11 Discuss how the remedy should have been stated. In this case, the steward understated the remedy and cost the employee back pay.