You are using a union working environment to describe every working environment. If every business operated with a union, then yeah, the way you described it is how jobs get done. But the reason for that is because unions have collectively decided what baseline performance is required. Then, the lazy guys that are slow or suck at their job gets to coast by as long as they do the minimum amount of work. This results in the guys who work faster, having to pick up there slack.

However, in a non-union business, those guys that consistently under-perform and are always behind are fired. Then, they workers like yourself that are good at your job and consistently perform well are promoted or given a performance-weighted raise.

There shouldn't be a level playing field because the bum down the hall that does the minimum amount of work necessary to collect his pension in 25 years shouldn't get paid the same (or with the same scheduled raises) as a work who does a consistently good job and tries to go above and beyond do perform well.

I run a business that runs on the non-union method and I know a lot of other non-union businesses that run the non-union method.

Nope, but a business doesn't have to be union in order to assure quality, American workers.

Businesses aren't here to make sure Dad gets paid enough so that Mom and the kids can stay home and live in their 3 bedroom house. Long gone are the days of a single working parent and a stay-at-home mom being the norm.

Unions have an "Us vs.Them" mentality when dealing with employers. Your posts are pretty consistent with sticking to the cliche Union talking points. Unions aren't the only guilty party, big business definitely is to blame as well. But don't try telling me that Unions are the innocent little guy in all of this.

The union I work for doesn't dictate baseline performance, the companies work practices do.

The problem in America is everyone wants to be rich, no one wants to be satisfied end of story.

My understanding is that the union and company typically set guidelines for performance through the Collective Bargaining Agreement.I'd bet in the CBA there is a very explicit, clearly-articulated framework for what is expected of each union worker and an equally excruciating process for how you fire a bad worker.

No other thoughts on my opinions on the lack of incentive to do more than the minimum necessary?

GE (who I do not work for) looks at their entire NON-Union work force every single year. They look at the top 10% performers, The middle 80% performers and the bottom 10% performers at ALL levels. They call it "rack and stack". They get rid of the bottom 10% EVERY YEAR, work one on one on how the remaining 80% can get better and give the top 10% above average raises and stock options (regardless of level, it is all based off of performance).

Not a bad model for someone that's motivated. Unlike a Union it rewards those that achieve and cuts the fat off those that do not perform.

When did they start doing that...I worked for GE for 9 years and never heard of it......

Found some info on it.......looks to be a Jack Welch concept at GE that is not used there anymore...


Vitality curve - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"GE is by far the most famous company to utilize this form of corporate management. However, since Jack Welch's departure from the company, less emphasis has been placed on eliminating the bottom 10% and more emphasis placed on team-building."

It still is very well alive, my wife works for GE and is in HR, she does it every year and it still continures under Immelt..........

Wife has been with them for almost 13 years and has it every year still. Goes from Jan-March typically. She is in HR. Some of it has been minimized a bit from the Welch days due to large layoffs and GE actively selling buying of businesses but it is still very much alive and practiced. Basically it's all level exempt employees involved and happens arounf review time.

I think a lot of it might also n=be getting minimized due to it not really being as functional a way to manage as originally thought.....what if your people in the bottom 10 are still meeting or exceeding their goals? Just not by as much of a margin as the higher percentage. do you chitcan a person for actually meeting his goals?

was reading a couple of articles on this after you brought it up and found that a lot of companies are shying away from this approach as it has also brought about a lot of Falsifying of information, sand-bagging numbers, and was counter-productive to Morale.

Seems to me it would also undermine the Team Concept that a lot of companies try to establish.

just saying....it might not be the end-all be-all, but it has some merit and probably works well in certain environments.

YOur understanding is wrong. The company sets work standards, and safety practices, as well as productivity numbers. The union's position has been and will always be work to the company's rules. The problem is the people who excel in productivity often skip safety steps to speed up the productivity. The company always looks the other way until someone gets hurt or killed, then if you were only lucky enough to be injured they will suspend you from work with out pay when you are healthy enough to come back.
That is the biggest problem in America is everyone has an understanding but no one knows the facts. It's not like it was in the old days.

I apologize for my misinformed view on how the standards are set. Not living that aspect of dealing with unions, my understanding is definitely limited. I do have to contest one statement though:
There's a difference between being thorough yet efficient with your time - something that produces a quality product/performance in a quicker amount of time - and haphazard laziness that results in being done quicker but at the expense of poor results and potential danger.

There have been a few times now that you've stated blatantly that if someone excels at their job then they must be cutting corners, and I just can't agree with that. I have employees that do high quality work in an hour that takes other employees 1.5-2 hours. I have also let go employees that will do a job in an hour, didn't care about the quality and had no intentions of improving.

Excelling at a job means doing a better job than the typical employee - whether it is through higher quality of work or a more efficient use of time - while not sacrificing other aspects of the work (protocol, safety, etc).

Let me ask you this: have you never heard of a union worker that does quality work, up to safety standards and finishes quickly being told that they need to "slow down" or "find something else to do for a little bit"? If so, you'll be the first union employee I've ever met to say that.

I can tell you for a fact, that out of 35 guys the top 4 producers have been caught skipping safety to increase productivity numerous times. I have witnessed it myself. On top of it we are going back on more of their jobs because something wasn't done right as compared to a guy that takes the time to do it right the first time.

I don't know what business you are into but the problem is that blanket negative, misinformed statements about unions, are like stereotyping people, sure there are some bad systems and some bad apples, but alot more good compared to the bad.

As far as your last statement, we take non productive time, until upper management decides to move the bar again an increase the number. We don't call the shots the managers do.

No, what was remarkable about the situation was the potential for short-term credit, which most companies rely upon for operations, would have blown up. Instead of the weak being culled out we would have likely seen otherwise stronger companies burn up their cash trying to stay alive. This would have been much more serious that the bad situation we actually saw...and it appears we were very close.

I think it's a reasonable argument that reduced federal power would bring less potential for federal abuse, but the flip side is less beneficial oversight. Believe it or not a lot of Federal regulations are positive and I don't think the States are equipped to make up the balance.

Yes, and the Tea Party spits on black people.


So you're saying it's all a "spectrum"? :humpty: :devil2: :hihi:

I think the two movements are a reflection of the undercurrent (frustration with the "system" be it government, private industry or a combination) expressed through two large lenses that make up the USA.

The Tea Party might not have camped out, but then again they probably had to be at work in the morning.

It's relative. When times are good people are more likely to ignore it.

Don't understand this paragraph.

I think we'd both agree that our current trajectory (in many regards) in not sustainable. Regardless of ones politics, our future leadership will be required to lead America into an even more competitive global economy, with at present less than firm footing and the daunting task of addressing our fiscal issues. This will require innovative thinking...not just lower taxes and less regulation. Doesn't mean we have to give up our identity, but we have to adapt so that we can continue to lead.

-spence

I do agree that our current trajectory is not sustainable. I think one of, if not the main, reason is that our current trajectory is being guided more by central government administrative "experts" rather than innovative entrepeneurs who can think outside the administrative box. If our future political leadership sticks to constitutional governance and lets the market be mostly free and self regulating so that innovaters can operate and profit, the fiscal task will be much less daunting--though daunting will always exist. Without daunting , stagnation creeps in. But if the innovation must come from central planners, and the fiscal issues are government issues, adaptation will stagnate. If we insist on "leading" by government oversight and regulation, we can look forward to leading from behind.

I think you stole this blather from an Obama telepromoter...maybe we've located the thief....:uhuh:


Steve Jobs was a pretty innovative thinker.....

HuffPo:

"You're headed for a one-term presidency," he told Obama at the start of their meeting, insisting that the administration needed to be more business-friendly. As an example, Jobs described the ease with which companies can build factories in China compared to the United States, where "regulations and unnecessary costs" make it difficult for them.

Jobs also criticized America's education system, saying it was "crippled by union work rules," noted Isaacson. "Until the teachers' unions were broken, there was almost no hope for education reform."

It surprises me how little non-union workers actually understand about how unions do work. Judging from the rhetoric you'd think some people here actually worked in administration and dealt with unions on an adversarial basis. But it turns out they do neither.

What does the Energy Dept claim as holding up Fisker(Solyndra II) and their production of the Goredsel?



The Energy Department confirmed this week that it has eased expectations after conditionally approving the loan to Fisker and has made allowances for scaling back projections in the final loan agreement. But the agency declined to make public those adjusted terms, including projected car sales volume or milestones the company must meet in connection with its $529 million loan. Agency officials attributed Fisker's delays to regulatory hurdles and issues beyond the company's control.($100,00 price tag and 20mpg might be a couple of "issues"....more "innovative thinking" funded by US taxpayers

sidenote: The Fisker commitment was questioned by some from the start, partly because of the company's political connections. A key investor is a venture capital firm, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, whose partners include former Democratic vice president Al Gore. The investment house raised $2 million for Obama's 2008 presidential campaign

I've done both. Worked as union worker for 4 years. The mentality was always us vs. them. People did the minimum they had to do and cried foul at the smallest slight. Guaranteed pay raises resulted in the people who worked there 15 years+ being some of the laziest people I'd ever worked with. They cruised through the day and didn't give a damn.

On the other side of the coin, I have 5 union guys working for me as I type this. I'd also be working but because California allows unions to run-a-muck out here, I can't touch my own equipment. As such, my client's labor costs alone are going to be $11,000 out here in San Francisco, as opposed to $3500 for the exact same job we just finished in Boston.

If anything it was a stopgap measure. I agree though, the banks should have had more responsibility to the taxpayers aside from just paying back the loans.

I'm sure many Federal regulations you'd probably assert are not Constitutional others would argue in many ways increase our freedoms and are beneficial to business.

By providing a common Federal standard, businesses aren't burdened by a myriad of redundant and unnecessary state regulations. Several medical device customers I work with actually like the fact in the US they only have to deal with the FDA while in the EU there are multiple regulatory agencies. Similarly, another manufacturer I was speaking with this week, who plans expansion into Europe, is faced with the daunting prospect of managing product specifications that will be different in nearly every country...even though the product is essentially identical.

Constitutionality is certainly a required test for all laws, but the idea that everything is black and white only works in a vacuum.

It was a reference to a focus on a tree rather than a forest.

I think most Americans prefer a greater degree of free market, though I'd also think most Americans would say that too pure a free market would be inherently destructive.

That being said, I think what we have today in the grand scheme of things, isn't anywhere near being close to a "greater degree of socialism".

I wouldn't say they're trying to rig anything in their favor, rather just undo some of the "rigging" that has arguably gotten us off track.

Nobody is asserting that the Government should be the primary innovator to drive the market. The government sets conditions, regulates and for the many decades of Keynesian thinking has also rightly or wrongly tried to keep everything between the lines.

I'm not sure what basis there is for an argument that states minimal or strict behavior always is better. If there was no FDA would the states be able to regulate less effectively or more? There are plenty of examples where deregulation at the federal or state level has not led to any benefit for the consumer or public.

I also don't think to say there's room for interpretation, as long as it's done within the system, is in any way not adhering to the Constitution. Even passionate issues like Roe, where the pure Constitutionality argument is perhaps weaker, are still considered settled by the majority of people and backed by judicial findings.

Ultimately I think issues need to be evaluated in context of reality, where things really sit today and not some purist theoretical world that is the fancy of academics.

-spence

A relativist speaking about the context of reality begs the question of which or whose reality? And if you don't apporve of "the fancy of academics" ruling from "some purist theoretical world," I would think, then, you would disapprove of SCOTUS rulings which are exactly that. They use academically inspired theories such as Monumentalism, Instrumentalism, Realism, Cognitive Jurisprudence, Universal Principle of Fairness, and Rule According to Higher Law, to get around the plain words in the Constitution. These are the fancy academic theories used to philosophically justify what are obviously unconstitutional decisions.

SOLDIERING
 

My oldest son went and worked today and got paid. When he came home I tried to shake him down for 25% to give to his siblings who didn't work today (even though at least one of them had an opportunity). I call his brother and sister "Occupy Livingroom". We also told him we have a progressive system in our house, so the more he makes the higher the % we take to give others who don't have "enough"...

Needless to say he was opposed to having the wealth that he intends on using to improve his standard of living confiscated, lesson complete.

In essence, unions make it so that the better, harder workers must make up for the lazy bums because the lazy bums cannot be gotten rid of and the bums get the same scheduled raises as the hard workers. In businesses without unions, the lazy workers become unemployed and the hard workers are given raises relative to their performance.

Its not just the union jobs
 

It is not just unions that do this, it happens across the entire sprectrum, in all businesses. Lazy workers are coddled/hidden in the private sector as well, maybe not as much, but almost. What about the company suckasses and the group that surrounds him/her?

The private sector has an incentive to toss out the lazy workers - some definitely do make it though the cracks though.