Coming Soon to a Community Near You: Worker Centers
In the wake of declining union membership, worker centers have become an increasingly dominant force in the labor movement, cropping up in communities across the U.S. You may think they are focused only on the fast-food industry in the fight to get workers a $15-an-hour wage, but worker centers are gaining formidable influence, organizing all kinds of employees without a union while operating outside the jurisdiction of the rules that typically govern union initiatives. Proactive employers need to prepare their leadership team to respond to and deal with this new movement in the workplace.
Learning Objectives:
- Get an overview of worker centers, which do not call themselves unions but nonetheless act as the bargaining representative for employees.
- Educate yourself about worker center methods and approaches for gaining employee support.
- Learn strategies to protect your organization from worker center tactics.
- Gain insight into how to improve the overall employee relations environment.
David Rittof
Mr. Rittof is the President and CEO of Modern Management, Inc. and an employee relations consultant His proactive approach to employee relations has roots in a broad spectrum of activities including organizational re-design studies, employee opinion surveys, communication audits, and labor relations seminars. As President/CEO, he leads a team of dedicated professionals in helping executives, managers, and supervisors face the challenges of the future.
A graduate of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Mr. Rittof holds a B.A. and M.A. in Organizational Communication. He has taught at the university level and is co-author of Quality Circles, a textbook utilized by several universities and businesses. Since joining the firm over 33 years ago, he has consulted in virtually all aspects of employee relations. His experience encompasses healthcare, manufacturing, gaming, hospitality, banking, services, insurance, and government.
A few of Mr. Rittof’s many accomplishments include successfully assisting numerous organizations in maintaining non-union status; providing preventive management training programs regarding the union campaign process; developing identification and action planning processes for responding to employee morale issues; and implementing communication plans for organizations in transition. He has also provided coaching and guidance for executives wishing to improve their public speaking skills and frequently facilitated executive retreats for strategic planning and team building.