Canada Post and CUPW: when internal communications go external

photo from canadapost.ca

A story in today's Winnipeg Free Press about how "[t]housands of Christmas packages sat undelivered in the former downtown post office as late as New Year's Eve," according to a union official (were all or most of those packages mailed before the Christmas delivery deadline? We don't know...), appears to be the latest shot in the Canadian Union of Postal Workers' (CUPW) campaign to embarrass Canada Post into backtracking on a new initiative to have postal carriers carry more mail on their routes.

Unsurprisingly, some letter carriers don't like the initiative, which requires them to carry a heavier load -- and which, according to the head of Winnipeg's CUPW local Bob Tyre in an interview with the National Post, "obscures the feet from view, causing falls and injuries, and results in back and neck pain."

The Art of War

I have no connection to Canada Post or CUPW, but here are some things I think we can assume the union knows and is willing to use to its advantage:

• its employer's business has dropped since the rise of electronic communication;
• holiday gift packages and greeting cards represent two of the remaining personal communications many Canadians tend to rely on the postal service to deliver;
• the on-time delivery of those parcels and envelopes is a high-stakes matter to Canada Post's consumer clients;
• Canada Post's business clients are fighting huge message overload as they vie for their customers' attention during the holidays -- so the flyers and direct mail they pay Canada Post to deliver on their behalf is crucial (to them), too.

In the National Post story, Canada Post spokesman Jon Hamilton suggests the union didn't attempt to raise its concerns privately before going public: "There are other avenues where the union could address their concerns, make their views known without hurting or impacting service to Canadians and the businesses that depend on us.”

Dysfunctional relationships over the holidays aren't just at family dinner tables

From the outside, we can't know how this all went down - but we can reflect on the effectiveness of open, two-way dialogue between employers and unions.

An unfortunate fact is that sometimes, companies have to make changes that employees don't like.

And in my experience, management doesn't like to have to make those decisions either. I've worked on a number of communication strategies for layoffs and office closures in my time, and have never once seen an executive happy (or even neutral) about having to do it. They hate it.

The significant human empathy part of it aside, management also knows that happy employees are productive employees. Even if you believe management only cares about the bottom line, you have to recognize that executives are well aware that in the long run, the bottom line benefits from happy employees (and is hurt by unhappy ones).

But if the company's management has analyzed the situation and the unpopular change is the only way it can see achieving long-term success -- which, as Hamilton points out in the National Post, means continued jobs for employees in the first place -- then it's what the company has to do.

One thing we do know: having the spokesperson for the employees' union tell the public through the media that the corporation "doesn't care if they don't cover all their routes anymore," as CUPW's Bob Tyer is quoted as having said in the Winnipeg Free Press, doesn't help build customer confidence. Canada Post's customers have alternatives; I'm sure Mr. Tyer's members hope his words don't send those customers to the competition, reducing demand for their services (and, therefore, their jobs).

It takes two

If a company has a healthy, productive, two-way relationship with its union, it's in a far better place to begin communicating a change employees won't like, because employees aren't immediately on the defensive, thinking "management only cares about making money and doesn't care about us." When corporate communications are open and effective in helping unions and employees see the rationale behind corporate decisions and their long-term benefit, there's a far greater likelihood of acceptance and cooperation (even if the news hurts).

One way a company can help build that kind of cooperative sentiment is to involve employees in the decision-making process; there are always options, and involving employees and/or the union in determining how to implement a change can help build relationships and buy-in.

But that doesn't mean it's all up to the company to make two-way dialogue happen: it really does take two. When a union deals openly and in good faith with the employer, the employer can be more confident in communicating openly and cooperatively with it. When it doesn't, it's tough for the employer to take the leap.

If you don't have both sides working toward productive two-way communication, you get the kind of headlines we've been seeing about Canada Post.

When employees work against you

The president of the Winnipeg firefighters’ union, Alex Forrest, has a big job. He’s the guy tasked with speaking on behalf of the city’s firefighters, working both with and against City management to protect what his members feel are their rights, and to fight for the tools they feel they need to do their job well.

To be effective in that role, Forrest has to be credible with the public at large; without that credibility, his union would have a steeper hill to climb come negotiation time. Especially since 9/11, firefighters are generally seen as heroes, as selfless saviours who put themselves in harm’s way to protect us. An image like that makes it tougher for any city to turn down requests for funding without public backlash; it's worth protecting.

But what if the image of the local firefighter was to become that of an adolescent lout, spending his on-the-clock time flirting and making out with a woman in a shed behind the firehouse?

It sure wouldn't make Forrest’s job any easier.

While firefighters do indeed put themselves in harm’s way to save people’s lives, pets and homes, they also spend quite a bit of time hanging out in the fire hall waiting for an emergency. Now, it’s not in the union’s best interests to talk about that side of it, but Forrest's members get to spend quite a bit of their time at work doing things like playing cards, sleeping, making dinners, playing music, etc. – things most people could never get away with doing at work. But it’s reasonable. We pay them to be there and at the ready in case of emergencies.

With that said, playing cards and making chili are not the same as making out in the shed.

This morning’s Winnipeg Free Press contains a story by Gabrielle Giroday called “Firefighter sorry for shed tryst,” with the sub-head “’Horrible indiscretion’ no danger to public, union boss says,” which outlines an incident that took place at the end of July. It recounts how a local firefighter met a woman near Station No. 4 on Osborne Street, “showed her a nearby shed,” and then “the two began kissing until an alarm came in” a few minutes later.

Must’ve been some shed.

The fact is, every organization has employees who are, let’s say, less than professional. Or even, short on personal integrity and judgment. But when your organization’s “brand” is anchored by notions of heroism, these employees are particularly problematic for your communicators (would this have been a media story had the employee caught kissing in the shed been sneaking out on his bartending job? Likely not.)

In talking to the media about this case, Alex Forrest had a number of audiences, and a communication objective for each.

1. Citizens of Winnipeg (and specifically those served by Station No.4): reassure them that public safety wasn't affected; that it was an isolated incident, which is not supported by the union or its members; and that the union is reasonable, and willing to accept punishment for a member if it’s warranted (this helps with future negotiations, when taxpayers remember the union’s reasonableness).

2. Union members: show on the one hand that the union will stand by them if they mess up, while simultaneously working to prevent them from having to “wear” a colleague’s indiscretion.

3. City management: show that the union is reasonable in its positions, and won’t stand in the way of appropriate handling of a personnel issue (again, this can serve as “currency” in future negotiations).

The reader comments at the bottom of the Free Press’ story online suggest that not everyone is buying Forrest’s (and the firefighter’s) position. But from my reading of the story, Forrest has done about as good a job of each of those objectives as he can, at least publicly.

The firefighter did what he did, and there's no excuse for it; so the best thing to do is to admit it, denounce the action, reassure the public the incident didn't interfere with public safety, and accept the punishment.