Articles to help stewards do a better job
These articles have been taken from past issues of the Boilermaker Reporter.
- What to Do When a Member Demands Arbitration (V50N2) — Without clear guidelines, many lodges end up arbitrating more grievances than they should.
- Build your case on good evidence (V49N4) — Your job as a steward is to find that evidence wherever your grievance investigation takes you.
- Five Common Grievance Issues (V49N3) — Five common grievance situations and suggestions for how to approach them.
- Defending grievances involving violence or threats (V49N1) — Protecting your members means ensuring they are not disciplined unfairly, but it might also mean finding a way to protect them from someone with anger issues.
- Lying (V48N4) — When you’re going into a grievance meeting where differing opinions of the facts of the case may be aired, it’s a good idea to avoid name-calling.
- Conducting an Investigation (V48N3) — Employing a few basic strategies can improve your investigations and thereby improve your chances of winning.
- Settling Problems Before They Become Grievances (V48N2) — Some tips on how you can successfully solve problems in your unit without actually filing a grievance
- The Reasonable Person Standard (V48N1) — Arbitrators consider how a prudent person might be expected to behave
- ULPs Ensure Company Complies With NLRA (V42N3) — The NLRB does not solve grievances, but makes sure everyone — companies & unions — complies with law
- What To Do When a Member Asks For Advice (V41N6) — Have your tools handy & be careful what you say
- Grievance Handling (V41N5) — A grievance log helps categorize facts
- Good Records Help the Steward and the Local (V41N4) — Keeping grievance information well organized not only wins cases, it can help win good contracts
- Sexual Harassment Grievances Are Never Easy (V41N3) — They can be really difficult when one member is accusing another one of inappropriate behavior
- Rights In Conflict: How can you represent two members involved in a dispute with each other? (V41N2) — You must protect the rights of both members based on the facts and the contract, not popular opinion
- Don't Jump To Conclusions -- Let The Facts Guide You (V40N5) — Let the Facts Guide You
- Organize Your Facts With a Steward Fact Sheet (V40N4) — This useful tool organizes the information you'll need to process a grievance
- Grievance Handling -- But We've Always Done It That Way! (V40N3) — Using past practice to win grievances
- Educate Your Members Regarding Their Contract (V40N2) — The more they understand, the easier your job will be
- Employers Must Have "Just Cause" For Discipline (V39N6) — Stewards can use these seven questions to establish whether the employer has just cause
- Five Steps To Winning Grievances (V39N5) — There's no magic bullet, but carefully following these basic steps can give you a great advantage
- How to argue your position (V39N4) — Evidence is key to winning the grievance Collect all the evidence you can, quantify it, make it trustworthy, and present it well for maximum impact
- Arguing a Grievance Is Like Arguing a Court Case (V39N3) — If you want to win your grievance, you need to know what argument to use and how to support your claim.
- Grievance Handling -- How to interpret contract language (V39N1) — Figuring out what the contract actually says is not always easy
- Information requests are a valuable tool (V47N4) — They can be used for more than just gathering facts
- Credibility is the key to success (V47N2) — Stewards with credibility are more likely to negotiate good outcomes for their grievants.
