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In the United States, times have long been tough for the country's trade union movement. But in recent months, organized labor has found a new lease on life, led by employees at Starbucks, Apple and other companies across the country. And it's a phenomenon that's changing the way tomorrow's business leaders are trained.
In the United States, times have long been tough for the country's trade union movement. But in recent months, organized labor has found a new lease on life, led by employees at Starbucks, Apple and other companies across the country. And it's a phenomenon that's changing the way tomorrow's business leaders are trained.
At least, that's what's happening at the Haas School of Business, at the University of California, Berkeley. The school is currently working with Roy Bahat, director of Bloomberg Beta, to develop a course to teach future managers how to deal with unions and organized labor, reports Quartz. "We’re talking about different forms of labor organizing [because] there are many other forms of labor organizing that students deserve to understand. And we’ll talk about how companies respond, and how they should respond," Bahat told the specialist news website.
This course will give Haas School of Business students an opportunity to learn more about the history of labor in the United States -- a vast subject "that people hardly ever talk about," according to Roy Bahat. Also discussed will be the aspirations and demands of American employees today. As yet, the University of California, Berkeley has not shared information about the exact content or enrollment details for this management course.
But Roy Bahat says this program, advising business leaders on how to manage a unionized workforce, will be a first for a US university listed in the prestigious Shanghai ranking. "I can’t find anything else at the major business schools about this," he told Quartz. "What went into designing it was the feeling that if it doesn’t exist, it should exist, and I should try."
Resistance from business
The creation of this kind of course reflects the resurgence of unionization in the United States. Seven in ten Americans now say they support labor unions, according to the Pew Research Center. This is a significant increase from the 48% reported in 2010 by the US research center, and the highest percentage since 1965. This change in attitude is explained by the fact that the economic context is favorable to employees, as evidenced by the country's falling unemployment rate (3.4% in December 2022).
American workers, generally young and educated, are taking advantage of this climate to organize in small groups and demand better working conditions. They have scored a few victories in recent months, particularly in large companies such as Starbucks, Amazon and Apple. President Joe Biden lent them his support in a speech to the Building Trades Unions legislative conference in April 2022. "The choice to join a union belongs to workers alone," he said at the time.
So should we expect all American workers to be unionized soon? Figures from the US Labor Department's Bureau of Labor Statistics suggest otherwise. The share of employees belonging to a union fell to 10.1% in 2022, 0.2 percentage points lower than the previous year. While the number of union members increased last year (+1.9%), the growth in total employment was much more sustained. This paradox shows that, although American public opinion is more favorable towards unions, business management is much less so. Companies often refuse to accept an intermediary in the management of their labor relations, and sometimes turn to consultants for help preventing the establishment of unions.
Hence the importance, says Roy Bahat, of teaching future business leaders how to interact with a unionized workforce. "People know fundamentally that the system they’re looking at just isn’t working that well. And so they’re groping for some alternatives to the way the system currently works," he told Quartz. "I really think that we’re just in this place where we’re trying to figure out a different way to look at things. If we treat [organizing] as a battle, we’ll get a battle, and if we get a battle, we’ll all lose."
