Why employees turn to unions — and how smart employers prevent it

Here is the truth employers resist hearing: employees do not unionize because unions are persuasive. They unionize because management is absent, inconsistent or afraid.

Union campaigns are symptoms, not causes.

Unions sell themselves as saviours of the unappreciated. And they succeed when employees believe:

• Their supervisors are not listening
• The company does not care about them
• They are at risk of layoff
• There is discrimination or arbitrary meting out of rewards and punishments
• Wages, benefits and working conditions are not merely worse but considerably worse than in other companies they compare themselves to

The three drivers of union organizing

First, unmanaged supervisors. Favouritism, poor communication and conflict avoidance are union organizers' most reliable allies.

Second, unclear standards. When no one knows what "good" looks like, discipline feels random and salary increases seem arbitrary. Inconsistency breeds resentment — and resentment seeks representation.

Third, fear-driven HR. "Let's not rock the boat." "Legal told us to wait." "We'll deal with it later." Later, invariably, becomes organizing season.

The secret drive

Union drives are never spontaneous. They leave fingerprints:

• A sudden interest in policies (the union is asking employees to gather information to identify your vulnerabilities).
• Group complaints replacing individual ones. Employees speaking the language of "rights" rather than performance.
• "Friends" lingering in lunchrooms.
• Management portrayed as detached and out of touch.
• Employees huddled in conversation quickly scatter when management walks in the room.

The most dangerous sign of all? Supervisors stop talking — and start avoiding their teams.

Unions seldom announce their campaign to organize your company. They find some disaffected employee or, more often, that employee approaches them.

Maybe the employee had worked as a member of that union before. They find likeminded discontents and quietly collect membership cards — carefully at first, to avoid anyone seen as loyal to management.

They secure employee lists, home addresses and social media to ultimately flood your workers with promises and then have meetings where they sign them up to join.

The percentages differ in each jurisdiction, but when a certain percentage of employees sign membership cards, the labour board will order a vote. In some provinces, a high enough percentage will result in automatic certification.

Unions are allowed to say whatever they like — to promise wages, benefits, working conditions or anything else. Even things they know they have no prospect whatsoever of obtaining. And there is no consequence for them doing so.

But if management makes any promise or threat, however truthful, to induce an employee to not sign a card, they risk automatic certification and damages. Yes, the law is deliberately imbalanced.

The truth is that, in my experience, many employers are unaware that a drive is even underway until they receive an application for certification from the labour board, and then they are stunned to find that most of the employees had already signed membership cards.

How employers usually get it wrong

At the first hint of organizing, employers panic or freeze. Communication shuts down "on legal advice." Everything is delegated to HR. Employees are treated as liabilities rather than people.

This is precisely when leadership presence matters most.

Let me be clear: employers cannot threaten, spy, promise benefits for votes, retaliate or interfere with lawful organizing. But they are absolutely entitled to manage, communicate, set standards, enforce expectations and tell the truth about what unionization actually means.

They can compare their wages and benefits to peer organizations, talk about what management has done for employees in the past and talk about the disadvantages of being unionized.

Silence is not neutrality. It is interpreted as guilt.

The only union-avoidance strategy that works

The most effective union-avoidance strategy ever invented is a well-managed workplace.

That does not mean generosity. It means leadership.

It means relentless front-line management. Supervisors are either an employer's greatest asset or the union's recruiting arm. Either the "strength line" or "danger line" of labour relations. Train them to document, communicate, confront early and apply rules consistently. Inconsistency is the oxygen of unions.

It means performance management without apology. Employees respect clarity, predictability and follow-through. They do not respect avoidance, delay or double standards.

And it means having supervisors who your employees respect and who treat all of their subordinates by the same standards. Managers who have looked into their own emotions and understood and overcome their own biases as to how, like most people, they respond better to some employees than others — sometimes for instinctive reasons that have nothing to do with that employees' merit.

Managers who disabuse themselves of that "halo effect" and treat every subordinate equally and dispassionately. For when an employee sees another (even a co-worker they do not like themselves) being treated unfairly, they lose respect for that manager.

And it means fixing problems before they become symbols. Most union drives begin with one unresolved complaint that metastasizes into a cause.

You must build a contented workplace structured on recognition, fair play, flexibility and genuine appreciation such that employees feel valued and listened to.

Communicate constantly. Unions sell themselves as the voice employees feel they don't have (the main cause of organizing campaigns). If you have a record of addressing grievances quickly and fairly, that pitch will fall flat.

Ensure you have a widely distributed, well known and rigorously complied-with grievance procedure and harassment policy with quick timelines. Far better than the tens of thousands of dollars in arbitration costs to deal with a grievance once you are unionized.

Most importantly, since management is often unconscious of their own deficiencies, involve experienced labour counsel before there is a problem — when there is still time to fix it. Not to interfere, but to identify vulnerabilities, correct behaviours, train managers and ensure leadership understands exactly where the legal lines are, so they can lead without fear.

Howard Levitt is senior partner of Levitt LLP, employment and labour lawyers with offices in Ontario and Alberta, and British Columbia. He practices employment law in eight provinces and is the author of six books, including the Law of Dismissal in Canada.