Hi libcom folk,
Just wondering if you have any tips/advice for organising in call centres.
we are doing a union drive in Auckland, New Zealand in market research call centres so if you can offer advice, tips and point us in the right direction with info and research on call centres, it'd be cool if you could let us know.
i've read this:
http://libcom.org/forums/organise/anyone-work-in-a-call-centre
I think all of those suggestions sound pretty solid.
The only other thing I'd add is, like with any organizing drive, don't go public until you have built the committees and have sufficient support & momentum.
thanks for that posi. lots of interesting info.
shift booking works kind of how it does over there in some firms.
mass cancelations is certainly an interesting tactic and we are looking at what tactics will be available during bargainning.
we're taking an industry wide approach trying to scoop up as many of the 1500 market research workers in auckland as possible.
we've recruited around 200 people over the last three days. lots of supervisors/teamleaders joining up.
our organising drive is around our "Calling for Change" campaign for better pay($15 min wage), better conditions(longer breaks, right to permanancy, securer hours for those who want it), and healthier workplaces(ping-pong tables, rotating massagers).
we're still in recruitment mode at the mo, but will start training activist, building commitees as the campaign goes on.
no staff rep structures, which is good, from our perspective and yes lots of students. we're already getting up to 90%-95% density in some places we've visited.
just wondering if people knew of any other industrial tactics available, especially "informal" ones.
Time-wasting techniques would include logging out of your PC every break, no matter how short, "because of client confidentiality", forgetting to log out of your 'phone software when you leave so that the next worker can't immediately log in, dropping clients claiming the line was dead/it was an automated advert/xerox machine, getting everyone to approach the supervisors every time they get a call about a new product/service to "ensure they maximize client satisfaction" etc, etc.
Outbreaks of 'flu, throat bugs and viral-related stomach bugs are ten-a-penny in all the call centres I've worked in too... 
Hi omar - when you say 'recruit', do you sign people up for dues right away, or is it like the US, where you're getting signatures on cards?
signing people straight away up for $2 a week dues.
In less than two weeks time hundreds of neo-Nazis and racists will descend on the coastal town of Dover calling for Britain to “close the border”. It is vital that anti-fascists and anti-racists...
A short history of the riots against new education laws that turned into a mass collective rejection of apartheid South Africa by thousands of working class black youths.
Class conflicts and colonial expansion in the context of the Little Ice Age lead to the emergence of capitalist agriculture and the transformation of social relations on a world scale.
Please read the posting guidelines before posting. If you see anything which falls outside them please use the down' button on the offending post to flag it for the moderators' attention, or in the case of spam, click the 'spam' button. Site admins are listed here, and feedback can be posted in the feedback forum.
Click here to register now. Logged in users:
Can comment on articles and discussions
Get 'recent posts' refreshed more regularly
Bookmark articles to your own reading list
Use the site private messaging system
Start forum discussions, submit articles, and more...
From a UK/London perspective...
How does shift booking work over there? Here, most market research companies will have people book shifts a couple of weeks in advance, and then give them the option to cancel at (say) 24 hours notice, with no or minimal penalty. (This is because most callers are students, actors, aspiring creatives, etc.) Therefore, you can launch informal industrial actions with mass cancellations at short notice. However, you've got to be careful, because schedulers will probably assume a cancellation rate of 40%-50% anyway - be clear about the numbers you need.
If the workforce is full of creatives, stress the community aspect of the workforce in your organising - and try and find ways for people to use their skills in support of the union - e.g. putting on a 'pay rise party', writing or laying out a bulletin, etc.
Also, identify clients of the companies who will be vulnerable to public pressure. Try to establish relationships with them once your density is hitting 50% of the core workforce (i.e. the callers who really drive the company's profit, don't worry so much about those who're only in occasionally). For this, collecting testimony will be useful.
Once you've got a fairly solid core together, activists should stand up and make announcements during breaks. This takes cojones for the first people to do it, but will build confidence in others to stand up as well. Be open, and agitate around issues.
Is there any sort of staff representative structure? If so, stack it and expose its limitations!
Petitions, sticker days, regular bulletins...
Clear demands that unite the workforce - e.g. $1 extra per hour for everyone!
At first, even if you can't maintain it, look for a possibility of a union of interests with team leaders/first tier managers. They are likely to be very influential, work as a cartel, and if they want to crush something early on, probably can do so. What are their gripes though?
Open meetings. Workforce turnover is likely to be so high that you can't rely on a tight, exclusive organising committee. These people (organising committee type people) must be the core of what's going on, but trying to get that group to be stable or self-sufficient is nigh on impossible.
Anyone disagree? What are your ideas Omar?