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INSIDE STRATEGIES
by Aaron Brenner

Click here for a PDF version of this chapter.

Workers have the power to inflict economic damage on a company without going on strike. They can use this power to extract concessions at the bargaining table by disrupting production, undermining management control on the shop floor, and hurting the company’s profits—while still on the job. Such “inside strategies” are not easy, but they can be better than walking out, especially when the company is prepared for a strike.

With an inside strategy, workers keep working, even after the contract expires. That means they can keep earning wages, keep building solidarity, and keep acting collectively against management. They will have to withstand intimidation, threats, arbitrary work orders, discipline, and dismissal. An inside strategy requires great creativity and serious collective willpower, but the rewards can be a better contract and a stronger union.

Inside strategies combine shop floor tactics with the tactics used in contract campaigns. The key difference is that the contract has expired, though the strategy begins long before. Once the contract expires everything can change. As long as bargaining continues, the old contract applies. However, the company may declare a bargaining impasse, which allows it to suspend dues check-off and impose its last contract offer. This could mean an end to the grievance procedure, radically different work hours, and inferior benefits. The company will also feel freer to discharge workers for union activity, technically still illegal but easy to get away with given government indifference. Under such circumstances, workers must rely even more on their collective power.

The most common tactic of an inside strategy is work-to-rule. Working to rule is not exactly the same as a slowdown and it is not sabotage, neither of which are legally protected union activities. Working to rule generally means restricting output, undermining quality, or cutting back on service by working strictly by the book.

Other inside tactics may include sick-outs, overtime bans, demonstrations, and button wearing. They may be accompanied by boycotts, corporate campaigns, fundraising, and just about everything else unions do in contract campaigns.

In some ways, inside strategies are harder than going on strike. Many unions ask strikers to do little more than picket a few days a week. Inside strategies require many coordinated activities among the workers throughout the workplace. Not only must workers figure out ways to hurt the company’s bottom line within the bounds of the rules, they must motivate their co-workers to maintain the campaign even in the face of management hostility.

And there is more. To implement a successful inside strategy, workers must understand the economic position of the company, how best to cut into its profits. They have to know the strengths and weaknesses of their managers, how they can be frustrated. Workers must understand the ins and outs of the production process, where exactly to “throw a wrench in the works.” They have to be familiar with their union contract, even if the employer has imposed a “best and final offer.” They must know the basics of labor law, the limits of their workplace rights. And they must have a sense of the mood of their co-workers, how much solidarity they have built.

Work-to-Rule at Staley
by Steve Ashby and C. J. Hawking

Workers at A.E. Staley Manufacturing Co., a corn-processing plant in Decatur, Illinois, executed a work-to-rule campaign to near perfection for nine months in 1992-93. The members of Allied Industrial Workers (AIW) Local 837, who averaged 21 years in the plant, cut production in half. Then, upon being locked out in June 1993, they mobilized nationwide support for an aggressive corporate campaign. Despite their ultimate defeat in December 1995, the Staley workers achieved remarkable success during their work-to-rule campaign.

Preparing the Ground

When the British multinational Tate & Lyle bought Staley in 1988, nearly 80 years of peaceful labor-management relations were ended. The new owners hired union-busting experts as top managers in Decatur. During 1992 contract talks, these managers attacked seniority and the grievance procedure, and they sought to impose 12-hour shifts, with workers switching between nights and days every 30 days. The proposed to strip the existing 116-page contract down to 17 pages.

Local 837 first responded by hiring university-based labor educators for advice. The educators debunked the company’s claim that the plant was “uncompetitive” by demonstrating that the value-added per worker was $467,000. They also confirmed workers’ suspicions that the company wanted to provoke a strike, replace workers with scabs, and bust the union. The Staley workers had just seen UAW members in their town abandon a five-month strike when Caterpillar threatened to permanently replace them. Mike Griffin, a 27-year union activist, recalled that workers “wanted to do something, but the overwhelming majority were not comfortable with a strike.”

One month before the contract expired, Local 837 contacted Jerry Tucker, head of the New Directions Workers Education Center in St. Louis. Tucker, a former UAW regional director, had led several locals of auto and aerospace workers in work-to-rule campaigns.

Tucker sent the AIW 837 leaders material on work-to-rule campaigns, including a chapter from the first edition of A Troublemaker’s Handbook. At his first meeting with the executive board, bargaining committee, and stewards, Tucker explained that the goal of a work-to-rule campaign is to show that the plant cannot be run successfully without the knowledge and skills of the workers; that the union membership is a unified and determined force; and that if management refuses to bargain reasonably, production and profits will suffer.

In a work-to-rule campaign, said Tucker, workers strictly follow company rules and the contract, and do only what they are told to do. They “leave their brains at the gate” and make no extra efforts. They ask their supervisors how to solve problems rather than solving them themselves. They forget the shortcuts they have developed to speed production. They ask managers for help with every job. They perform every task meticulously. They follow all safety procedures to the letter. They do not start work a second before they must and they do not work a second longer than required. They refuse voluntary overtime and take every minute of every break. They grieve every dispute, no matter how trivial. In short, they use management’s rules against the company.

Tucker then spoke to the membership, explaining that a work-to-rule campaign would require heightened rank-and-file involvement. “The word ‘leadership’ means something entirely different in a work-to-rule campaign,” Tucker told the members. “The top officers remain the officers. But you’re going to have a whole lot of people working with you now. You’re going to have a whole lot of hands on the oars.

“You can’t manage an effective in-plant strategy from the union hall. I like to use a phrase I heard [African American civil rights leader] Ron Daniels use: ‘You are the leaders you’ve been looking for.’”

Tucker also explained the risks of working to rule. Workers could get fired. Under the National Labor Relations Act, workers have the right to engage in “concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection”; nevertheless, employers illegally fire thousands of workers every year. Tucker cautioned that the company could also lock them out.

The membership agreed to launch the in-plant campaign and hired Tucker to guide them.

Leave Your Brains at the Gate

In early October 1992, Local 837 members rejected the company’s proposed contract by 96 percent. In response, management declared a bargaining impasse and within ten days imposed most of its demands. The company also evicted the union from its in-plant office, abolished “excused union business” for union officers to handle grievances, and eliminated dues check-off, which forced the union to collect dues by hand.

“Ending dues check-off was one of Staley’s major threats that they thought would be our demise,” said AIW 837 President Dave Watts. “They thought it would tear us down, but it built us up.” During the nine months they worked without a contract, 97 percent of the local’s members voluntarily paid their dues. Most paid at union meetings, now held weekly and including family members. The rest were collected by hand in the plant.

The in-plant campaign began as soon as the union voted to reject the contract. The first step was establishing a “Solidarity Team” that would meet with Tucker weekly. Seventy workers attended the first meeting. It was a good start, but a successful campaign could not be built with only 10 percent of the workforce. “We didn’t have a critical mass,” noted Tucker. “It would be mythical to say the rank and file were ready to go. They needed guidance.”

The Solidarity Team started by conducting one-on-one meetings with each worker to explain the company’s proposed contract, line by line. Dan Lane, an early member of the Solidarity Team, recalled, “Part of this is from my military training. You don’t send green troops to fight battles. You have to create a mind-set. So I would go through the contract with people, right in the plant.”

The Solidarity Team explained everything the union faced, and went over the nuts and bolts of a work-to-rule campaign. Richard Brummett, one of the strongest supporters of work-to-rule, explained that when there is a problem in your area, “you call up the boss and say, ‘This piece of equipment is doing such and such,’ and he says, ‘What do you think we ought to do?’ And you tell him, ‘You come up here and you tell me what to do. That’s what they pay you for.’ And if he tells you to do something and you know it’s wrong, you do it anyway.”

For years, said Dave Watts, “we had helped to manage mismanagement. Whenever management made a decision and it was passed down through supervision and we knew it was wrong, we did the right thing on the line anyway. But with work-to-rule, that day was done. No more correcting management’s mistakes.”

To increase participation, in November Tucker began to hold departmental meetings on every shift, a time-consuming process that helped build a critical mass in support of working to rule. “People relate to those closest to them,” says Tucker. “Tell them to come to a plant-wide meeting and they don’t think it relates to them. Tell them to come to a meeting to discuss a problem in their department and everyone shows up. After a week of departmental meetings the solidarity committee grew from 60 to 350.” Tucker’s major purpose was to hear from the workers. “You don’t get up and have big speeches or have the president harangue people. You ask people what’s going on. You get them to convey the information. You get them talking, listening.”

The department meetings were vital to solidifying support. After the contract was rejected, some members had been skeptical of the decision not to strike. The meetings helped convince them that an in-plant campaign was a militant alternative to a strike.

The Solidarity Team determined that there were four key departments—the refinery, dry starch, the mill, and co-generation—plus the maintenance department, whose members worked throughout the plant. The team tracked each worker’s involvement. Who was participating fully, who was partially in, and who was not yet involved? Where was the union strong and where was it weak? Was the company harassing or disciplining workers? How was each department responding to intimidation? Which workers were emerging as leaders?

Daily Confrontations

In many ways the Staley plant, with 110 buildings spread over 440 acres, was ideal for a work-to-rule. It was an old plant—much of the machinery was decades old—run by experienced workers. “Everybody knows you got to kick a Model A to get it to start,” said Brummett, “but it takes 20 years to know where to kick it.”

It helped, too, that after the 1988 takeover, Tate & Lyle had fired about half the white-collar workforce, including the experienced supervisors. Jeanette Hawkins, one of the first African American women workers hired, explained how the new supervisors inadvertently contributed to the work-to-rule campaign: “They didn’t know what was going on, and if you tried to explain to them, well, they thought they can’t trust the union people. So you just did what they said and it screwed [things] up. But it was on them, because that’s what they told us to do.”

While the Staley workers left their brains at the gate, they did not leave their common sense. They remained extremely cautious inside the volatile chemical plant, careful not to put themselves or the Decatur community at risk.

During the weekly union meetings, workers shared stories, laughed at tales of management’s ineptness, discussed successes and setbacks, and built up each other’s determination to escalate the fight. At the meetings, recalled Tucker, “a worker would get up and give a report on their area to 400-500 people. They were not leaders, not used to giving speeches. Then when they sat down they would feel a little more powerful, feel a sense of satisfaction. The idea is to pull people out, get them to convey information, get them talking.”

Hearing about the successful efforts of other departments, workers adapted the tactics to their own situations. The meetings always ended with the question, “What creative actions could the union take next?” Workers began to meet informally inside the plant, at lunch, on breaks, and at shift changes.

The in-plant campaign also involved actions that did not impact production but nevertheless mobilized members to confront management on a daily basis. Workers regularly wore red union shirts, union caps, and an extensive array of union buttons. They honked their car horns in the plant parking lot. They held demonstrations at the plant gate before marching together into work.

Half the workers carried company-furnished radios, and they turned them into weapons of solidarity. Recalled Emery Schrimpsher, “You started hearing ‘Solidarity Forever’ [being sung on the radios]. There was a [worker] preacher that came on and preached sermons [calling on the company to repent]. There were whistles being blown on the radio.… A lot of these supervisors did nothing but run around trying to find these radios.”

The radios unified the membership, said Dan Lane. “There had been divisions between process workers and the [higher-paid] mechanics, between the older and younger workers, men and women, black and white. So when the radio use was broadened, people read things like Martin Luther King’s ‘I Have a Dream’ speech. It brought people together.”

Two additional methods of communication united workers: the local’s monthly newsletter and Midnight Express. Members Jerry Dilbeck and Robert Luka, Jr. edited and mailed the two-page Local 837 News to every member. It publicized union rallies and related progress on the corporate campaign against Tate & Lyle that was simultaneously under way. Midnight Express was an underground weekly newspaper written by members. It detailed the errors and accidents of the non-union contract workers, management’s harassment of union activists, and the blunders of Staley supervisors and top management.

Workers replaced Staley’s grievance procedure with their own system for disputing unsafe or unfair company practices. Some carried laminated copies of “Weingarten rights” inside their hard hats, and if a supervisor reprimanded them they would read, “If the discussion I am being asked to enter could in any way lead to my discipline or termination or impact on my personal working conditions, I ask that a union steward, representative or officer be present. Unless I have this union representation I respectfully choose not to participate in this discussion.”

Local 837 News reminded members, “Remember, you have the right to have as many union people present as you feel comfortable with when confronting a company or salaried person with any issue or dispute. Never go in one-on-one. You will lose!!!” Large groups of workers began to hold on-the-spot grievance hearings with lone supervisors. They used whistles to signal when such participation was needed. At one meeting with management, the group wore Groucho Marx glasses and moustaches and carried cigars.

Varying Levels of Participation

Many Staley workers speak of their nine-month work-to-rule campaign as one of the most liberating times of their lives. “It galvanized the membership,” recalled Mike Griffin, “and gave them courage and faith and hope.”

However, not all of the union’s 762 members participated, and some were involved more deeply than others. One difficulty was that it ran counter to the workers’ natural work ethic. Many were afraid they would lose their jobs, even though the union set up a Solidarity Fund to provide full pay to anyone fired because of union activity.

Art Dhermy estimated that about one-third of the plant was aggressively working to rule, while many others were supportive but not taking the lead. “My department [the boiler room] was like everybody else’s. You had the ones that were going to grab the bull by the horns. You had the ones that might grab the tail and be drug along. And then you had the ones on the other side of the fence, to make sure the bull wasn’t going to get them. I had no animosity to the ones not grabbing the horns. We needed some standing out in the pasture watching our backs. But the ones on the other side of the fence often came to the union meeting—at least they were in the pasture.”

Added Dhermy, as time passed “that fence got expanded some,” and more people stepped up their participation.

Success! Production Down

By early 1993, five months into the campaign, the number of workers participating in the work-to-rule had reached critical mass and their efforts were having a tremendous impact. Union members at Staley’s customers told Staley workers that deliveries were often late, had insufficient quantity, and lacked the usual quality, resulting in a steady stream of customer complaints and returns. The workers could see the company’s desperate measures to fill orders. Management scrambled to turn out product, regardless of quality. Machinery once masterfully operated by the workers now baffled the supervisors.

The company took heavy losses in December 1992 and January 1993. “Production was down from 140,000 bushels [of ground corn] a day to 80-90,000,” said bargaining committee member “Dike” Ferris. By spring, the union estimated that production had fallen 50 percent. Tate & Lyle insisted that the drop was only 32 percent—still a remarkable figure.

Nine months after the workers rejected Staley’s contract, management locked them out. That ended the work-to-rule campaign, but it did not end the fight. The solidarity built by nine months of working to rule together helped the Staley workers struggle for another 30 months.

Telephone Workers Pressure Verizon from Within
by Pam Galpern

Verizon, the largest telephone company in the United States, was itching for a strike when its contracts with the Communications Workers of America (CWA) and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) expired on August 3, 2003. Management thought it could outlast the unions in a strike, impose its concession demands, raise health co-pays for workers, and eliminate strong job security language that was limiting its ability to move jobs to lower-cost states or overseas.

Workers, too, expected a strike, a long one. They cleared out their desks, emptied their lockers, and turned in their tools. They removed the batteries from their equipment and got rid of anything that might make it easier for managers and scabs to do their work.

But just hours before the deadline, the unions announced that they would work without a new contract and keep negotiating. The next day, defying their tradition of “no contract, no work,” more than 78,000 union members in 13 states from Maine to Virginia returned to Verizon for their regularly scheduled shifts, working under the old, expired contract, which remained in effect as long as bargaining continued.

The Strategy

“I’ve got 35 years on the job,” says Steve Carney, a field technician in Westchester, New York and a steward in CWA Local 1103. “At first I thought, ‘hey, no contract, no work.’ But different times require different strategies.”

The union chose the inside strategy for several reasons.

Verizon is the largest local phone company, largest wireless company, and third-largest long distance company in the country. With deep pockets, a highly automated work process, and virulently anti-union management, it represented a more formidable foe than the regional phone companies of the past. The company had lined up 30,000 managers and scabs, many of them flown in from around the country, to work as soon as the union walked. Management had made arrangements with non-union call centers to take over customer service work. It had hired extra security to monitor strikers and had reportedly reserved eight months’ worth of hotel rooms to house the scabs. These preparations cost Verizon millions each day.

Based on its experience during a four-and-a-half month strike in 1989, the CWA estimated it would take more than two months for the company to feel the economic effects of a strike. While the unions had been mobilizing, they weren’t nearly as prepared as the company was for such a long strike. The level of member mobilization was uneven; in some areas workers engaged in extensive work-to-rule activities prior to contract expiration, while other areas remained quiet. The economic hardship of a long strike would be severe in some places, since the IBEW had no strike fund and workers outside New York state would not have been eligible for unemployment benefits.

Staying inside reversed the balance of power, in a way. Without a walkout, the company’s strike preparations became a big financial burden. But since the threat of a strike was still real and could happen at any moment of the union’s choosing, Verizon had to keep its expensive strike contingency plan in place. Meanwhile, the unions could pressure the company from inside, mount a public pressure campaign from the outside, and extend their strike preparation efforts at the same time.

Job security, along with health care, was a key issue in negotiations, and the inside strategy preserved jobs. The existing contract had unusually strong language that prohibited Verizon from moving more than 0.7 percent of the bargaining unit work out of state or overseas and defined the circumstances under which workers could be laid off. An arbitrator had recently upheld this contract language, ordering the company to rehire 3,400 improperly laid-off workers with full back pay. A strike would void the contract and allow the company to move work at will.

“All of the jobs in my local would be at risk if we went on strike,” says Don Trementozzi, president of CWA Local 1400, representing service reps in New England. “All the inside jobs period would be at risk. The company has the technology to flip a switch and move those jobs somewhere else.”

Protesting on the Job

Many members weren’t happy with the inside strategy. No one wanted a strike, but workers knew the company wasn’t going to back down without a major fight. As the unions got information out about the strategy, the mood shifted.

“The company wanted us to strike,” says Jim Zanfardino, a service rep in Massachusetts and a member of CWA Local 1400. “When we didn’t, that threw a monkey wrench in their plans.”

“By staying on the jobs we won customers’ support,” says Keith Cofresi, a field technician in Staten Island and a member of CWA Local 1102. “Every customer I saw was behind us 100 percent in fighting corporate greed.”

A CWA fact sheet told workers how to work to rule, including, “Never go by memory, check your reference material” and “Never use your own judgment—ask!” The tactic was a powerful weapon for “outside” workers, the ones who install and repair telephone lines and equipment. These technicians have leeway to determine how best to complete a job. During regular times they often disregard bothersome company rules to get a job done quickly. But during the work-to-rule campaign, they followed Department of Transportation regulations, for example, to the letter.

Technicians delayed the start of their days with a 20-minute truck safety check each morning. The check involved two technicians, one to operate the truck and another to inspect such things as turn signals, brake lights, and hydraulic lifts. “Some mornings at the Watertown garage, you’d see 100 bucket trucks with their lifts spinning in the air,” says Dave Reardon, business agent for IBEW Local 2222. “It drove managers crazy.”

“State and federal regulations require that we put out the proper signage—signs, cones, flags—when we work in manholes and near highways,” says Carney. “We refused to take trucks out that did not have the right signage.

“And the company wants us to make ‘five points of contact,’ with customers. We’re supposed to call them before we come, introduce ourselves when we arrive, update them during the job, say goodbye, and then call the next day to make sure everything works. Sometimes, the actual problem is far from the customer’s location, but we made sure to get in the truck, drive to the customer, update them, and then drive back to the job site. And we’d do it again at the end of the day. Then we’d do the paperwork in detail, which took more time away from the job.”

Following company rules, technicians refused to use fire escapes, which forced management to find other ways to gain access to phone boxes. Nor would they use a customer’s ladder, which, for technicians without trucks, meant waiting for a ladder to be delivered. And they refused to work in dimly lit areas, which meant extra time running a light.

Out in the streets, they spent extra time looking for legal parking places, no easy task in big cities where workers usually park in loading zones and parking tickets are an everyday occurrence.

Technicians also tried to do every job just right. When running cables up the outside of a building, the company suggests technicians install D-rings every 18 inches to keep the cable straight and close to the wall. Technicians often skip this step when the wall is brick, but during the work-to-rule they went to their trucks or back to the garage, got the special hammer, and took the extra time to pound the rings into the brick.

For slightly tricky jobs, technicians called their managers and waited for them to come out to the job to tell them what to do.

The downside of working to rule for the outside workers was that they had little contact with co-workers, making it difficult to build a sense of collective action. No one knew for certain what other workers were doing. It also allowed management to harass workers out of sight of co-workers and stewards.

To counter the isolation, rank-and-file and official mobilization coordinators brought workers together before work, at lunch, or after work to share stories and float ideas, months before the contract expired. “Each month we’d discuss a different aspect of working safely,” says Reardon. “One month, we’d explain all the details of manhole safety—putting out two signs on each side of the road, testing for gas before removing the cover, setting up a blower to vent the hole, and checking for gas every few hours. The next month, we’d talk about electrical testing—in manholes, on poles, in climbing spaces.”

Working to rule was harder for inside workers at Verizon, since every minute of their time is scheduled and supervised. They relied instead on tactics designed to keep management guessing. Leading up to contract expiration and then after, call center workers brought picket signs to work and leaned them against their desks, “just in case” they needed to walk out. They wore red on Thursdays as a show of unity. “We kept our picket signs on our desks,” says Zanfardino. “When we went home, we took them with us. When we went to lunch we took them and practiced picketing. It drove management crazy.”

Working without a contract was stressful. “The company was cracking down,” says Carney. “There was a lot of fear and intimidation.” Verizon put its extra managers to work following members around, looking to get people in trouble. Tensions were high as members dealt with the surveillance and the uncertainty of not knowing whether a strike would be called.

The unions maintained support for the work-to-rule and the contract campaign through a structure of “mobilization coordinators” that mirrored the steward structure. Coordinators were rank-and-file volunteers who took responsibility for getting 10 to 15 co-workers involved. They met regularly with each other and with a chief coordinator for each local. Chief coordinators also met with each other and with union officials. This structure helped disseminate ideas around a local, across locals, across regions, and throughout the unions.

Mobilizing Outside Support

Essential to the inside strategy was a campaign to build public support, pressure the company, and demonstrate workers’ solidarity. The effort highlighted Verizon’s greed and its threat to “hometown jobs” and quality service.

Just prior to contract expiration CWA stepped up its web-based version of the newsletter Unity@Verizon, with almost daily updates on bargaining and mobilization activities. The union estimated that Unity@Verizon reached 18,000 members. This was critical in a fight that covered 78,000 workers in 13 states. The unions also launched a campaign, with AFL-CIO help, to collect pledges of support from Verizon customers. See Chapter 20 for details on this aspect of the campaign.

In the weeks before and after contract expiration, workers held dozens of pre-work and lunchtime rallies, joined by local politicians, Jobs with Justice activists, and other supporters. “We had pre-work rallies before we went in,” says Cofresi. “Everyone lined up and went in together. We wore red [the union color] every day. On Thursdays we had 100 percent of the people in red; on other days 75-80 percent.”

Members from both unions leafleted company-sponsored public events.

At a sold-out Yankees-Red Sox game in Boston’s Fenway Park, where it was Verizon Visor Night, they passed out stickers that said, “Yankees suck and so does Verizon.” CWA members teamed up with United Students Against Sweatshops and picketed a Verizon Wireless store in New York City. IBEW and CWA members and Jobs with Justice activists held multiple protests at Verizon Vice-Chairman Larry Babbio’s New Jersey mansion.

Members leafleted on city streets to tell the public about the connection between quality phone service and good union jobs. Union reps took legislators on tours to see dilapidated telephone facilities in need of repair. Members rallied outside public service regulators’ meetings and protested recently relaxed regulations. Retirees held rallies protesting the company’s proposal to increase their health care costs.

Several actions focused on Verizon Wireless, Verizon’s non-union mobile phone subsidiary. The union set up informational pickets exposing the company’s anti-union drive, which violated its pledge to remain neutral in the CWA’s organizing campaign. On several occasions, the union held “store invasions,” in which dozens or even hundreds of members walked into a store, leafleted customers and workers, chanted, and listened to speeches.

The unions ran newspaper ads that exposed the astronomical salaries of Verizon executives, contrasting their obscene gains with their attempt to make retirees pay for health care. The ads also countered the company’s own publicity campaign, pointing out Verizon’s hypocrisy in claiming it was an excellent place to work while trying to cut jobs and slash benefits. The same logic, along with the union’s focus on hometown jobs and quality service, helped the union win support from many state and local politicians, who then spoke out publicly.

he combined pressure of working to rule, informational pickets, community-supported demonstrations, the arbitrator’s ruling upholding the job security language, and the expense of the company’s unused contingency plan led Verizon to abandon two of its most important concession demands: the right to eliminate jobs and that workers pay health care premiums. A month after expiration, the two sides settled. A month after expiration, the two sides settled. The unions did not win everything they wanted. They agreed to a five-year contract and accepted a lump sum instead of a wage increase for the first year. They let the company introduce a second tier on job security, with fewer protections against layoffs for new hires. Still, given the balance of power, the contract represented a "defensive victory," said one CWA official.

Flight Attendants Wreak Havoc
by David Borer and Joe Burns

Flight attendants at Midwest Express Airlines voted to join the Association of Flight Attendants (AFA) in May 1999, but by the spring of 2002 management had still refused to sign a decent first contract. Under the Railway Labor Act, which governs labor relations at the airlines, negotiations routinely drag on for two years or more. The flight attendants turned to CHAOS.1

The AFA first developed CHAOS, or Create Havoc Around Our System, at Alaska Airlines in 1993. Flight attendants promised random, unannounced strikes against individual Alaska Airlines flights, cities, or aircraft. Potential passengers were told that-without warning-CHAOS might leave them stranded. CHAOS resulted in a 20 percent drop in passenger traffic at Alaska Airlines even before a single flight was struck. After striking just seven flights over a period of nine months, the union won an industry-leading contract without losing a dime of lost wages. Management settled when a federal court ruled that intermittent CHAOS strikes are legal under the Railway Labor Act.
To implement CHAOS at Midwest Express, the AFA built upon the organization created to win the representation election. Out of 465 flight attendants, all but a handful had signed union cards. The union set up phone trees and an informational representative structure, so flight attendants would have accurate and up-to-date information throughout the campaign.

To activate the membership and demonstrate unity, flight attendants wore color-coded ribbons (such as yellow for approaching CHAOS, blue for cooling off, and dark green for money), circulated petitions, and ran letter-writing campaigns. Over 100 flight attendants picketed on St. Patrick's Day at the Midwest Express Center in downtown Milwaukee, wearing Astrobright green CHAOS T-shirts. In May, a large group of flight attendants and union allies converged on the Midwest Express board of directors meeting, demanding a fair contract and threatening CHAOS.

The Milwaukee Central Labor Council actively supported the flight attendants, mobilizing other union members to AFA events, providing logistics and sound for rallies, and garnering political support. The Ironworkers donated a large billboard near the airport that warned the flying public that CHAOS strikes could occur.

Before the threat of CHAOS strikes could carry any weight, however, the union had to be released from mediation by the National Mediation Board (NMB). Under the Railway Labor Act such a release triggers the start of a 30-day cooling-off period and additional mediation. Only after the cooling-off period expires without an agreement may airline workers legally strike. By spring 2002, the union could see that a release would be coming in the summer and kicked into CHAOS mode.

Wearing CHAOS T-shirts, flight attendants picketed and leafleted airports, informing passengers of possible unannounced strikes after the cooling-off period. They encouraged passengers to fill out cards so the union could email them CHAOS updates.

In May 2002, over 95 percent of AFA members authorized their leadership to call a strike. Flight attendants switched their color-coded ribbons to CHAOS green, signaling their readiness for the coming confrontation. They wrote company reports in green ink. When management dictated that all reports be done in black ink, a rank-and-filer came up with the idea to seal their reports with green dots.

The union made the traditional preparations for a strike. It opened a strike headquarters staffed by international officers (who are working flight attendants) and by rank-and-file flight attendants on their days off. Rank-and-filers also organized a series of fundraising events, including bake sales, car washes, and parties.

The union asked flight attendants to sign a GUTS (Geared Up To Strike) list. While all flight attendants were expected to strike if called, GUTS volunteers would be called first when CHAOS strikes began, allowing the union to target flights staffed by committed GUTS volunteers.

The NMB released the parties from mediation in late July, setting the cooling-off period to expire on August 30, 2002. As the date approached, activity and media attention reached a crescendo. Solidarity and information actions were held daily, sometimes twice daily, including a constant stream of news releases and leaflets to warn passengers of potential CHAOS at the airline, mass rallies, and picketing at company headquarters.

CHAOS instilled paranoia in management. A company vice-president launched a useless investigation when a supervisor mistook a flight attendant's cigarette break for a CHAOS strike. When a union news release stated "CHAOS is coming to Los Angeles and New York" and solidarity pickets marched at those airports, management thought a strike had begun and called in reserve flight attendants. Management sent extra supervisors to watch the flight attendants and take over if a work action began. This was all wasted time, money, and effort, because the union could target individual flights wherever management's tactics provided an opening.

"CHAOS drove the company crazy," said Toni Phillips, a flight attendant and AFA Master Executive Council Chair at Midwest Express. "They spent tons of money trying to figure out our strategy. That's why it was so successful. It was actually fun to watch."

CHAOS also raised anxiety among flight attendants. Unlike a traditional strike, where everyone is in it together, the strategy called for attendants in crews as small as three to take on the company. Plus, to maximize the surprise, local and international leaders would pick strikers without notice. "In CHAOS, the flight attendants never knew if their flight would be picked that day," noted Phillips. "They were always on edge." That's why CHAOS requires more discipline and education than a regular strike.

Flight attendants debated the CHAOS strategy at membership meetings. The majority decided that, given the ability of management to permanently replace strikers, walking out in small groups allowed greater protection. The Alaska flight attendants had struck for just 20 to 30 minutes at a time, making it virtually impossible for the company to deploy its scabs.

Media coverage of potential CHAOS strikes drove away passengers. The AFA estimated a 20-25 percent drop in passengers during the CHAOS activities, even before a single strike. Still, flight attendants knew they would have to make good on their threat. While they were fine-tuning specific flight targets for maximum impact and minimum risk, management called to request a resumption of negotiations. The company then offered significant movement on the major issues and on September 20, 2002 the flight attendants won a solid first contract.

The key to CHAOS was membership mobilization. Flight attendants had to keep up constant public pressure on the airline with daily airport pickets and major rallies several times a week at company headquarters, plus all the strike preparation. And, unlike a traditional strike, they had to keep working while doing it.

Working Safe on the Docks

When the Pacific Maritime Association (PMA) threatened to eliminate union jobs in the summer of 2002, West Coast dockworkers fought back. Knowing the Bush administration would secure a Taft-Hartley injunction against any strike, dockworkers in the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) stayed on the job after their contract expired and cut production by "working safe."

"It wasn't a slowdown," says Vance Lelli, a member of ILWU Local 23 in Tacoma, Washington. "Five members had died on the job in the six months leading up to negotiations. With the PMA taking a hard line in negotiations and threatening to lock us out, our elected safety officers reminded us of OSHA rules and of the safety provisions in the contract. They pointed out the stop signs and the 15 mph speed limit on the docks."

The union could point to other reasons that production was slow. Leading up to the contract expiration on September 1, ports in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Portland, Tacoma, Seattle, and 24 other West Coast ports were extremely busy because shippers, worried about a strike or lockout, were trying to move as much cargo as possible for the Christmas season. The crush of ships, trains, containers, trucks, and cargo slowed operations. So did the hiring of inexperienced dockworkers to handle the rush.

"That was a safety issue," Lelli points out. "When the employers couldn't get enough people to handle the load, they would hire people from the unemployment office. They had no training. They would hurt themselves, or someone else. So we stopped that, which did put a crimp in the works."

Dockworkers' insistence on safe operations affected productivity. "When you are lashing containers to the deck of a ship, you should have a railing around you," says Lelli. "We made sure we had railings. We asked for earplugs and dust masks for some jobs. When you are in a container crane 105 feet above a truck and you are in a rush, you pick the can [container] off the truck and hoist it toward the ship before the truck moves off. That's not safe. Instead, you should lift the can from the truck, let the truck move safely away, and then begin hoisting the can toward the ship.

"Vehicles were key," notes Lelli. "If all the hustler trucks obey the stop signs and the speed limit, everything takes a little longer, the trains back up, and the just-in-time operations get out of whack. Of course, the companies put up the signs, and they put them up for a reason. In Tacoma, we have straddle carriers that take containers from the staging area to the train. They have eight wheels and straddle the containers. The cab is 45 feet off the ground. Some drivers would blow through stop signs and scream around corners. But we reminded them that several people had died when one of the carriers tipped over."

The union got the work safe message out informally. "The ILWU is a rank-and-file union," says Lelli. "Experienced workers are the leaders on the dock. We talked to each other and to the younger workers every morning at the dispatch hall. On a bad day, there are 200 dockworkers there and usually 300 or 400 show up. We talked at the hall and then we talked on the ship. We were trying to look out for each other more."

Claiming the union was engaged in a deliberate slowdown and refusing to "pay dockworkers for being on strike," the PMA locked out the ILWU for three shifts starting the evening of September 27. When the ports reopened on September 29, productivity dropped 60 percent, according to the PMA, prompting the employers to lock out the workers indefinitely. On October 9, the Bush administration sought and received a temporary restraining order under the Taft-Hartley Act from a federal judge. He ordered the employers and the union to stop interfering with "the orderly continuance of work in the maritime industry, at a normal rate of speed." But when the workers returned to work, a normal rate of speed was impossible under the crush of backed-up cargo.

The union continued to "work safe," noting in a press release, "safety regulations are a part of [the] contract. In compliance with the court order, the ILWU has instructed its members to obey the letter of those regulations and to follow all mandated procedures."

In the first week after the lockout, the PMA claimed the union was still slowing down. According to some PMA employers, union gangs would arrive at work missing a skilled worker or two, such as a hook checker, who tracks cargo on and off a ship, or a clerk supervisor, who oversees the movement of cargo throughout the docks.

Productivity dropped 34 percent in Oakland, 29 percent in Portland, 27 percent in Seattle, 19 percent in Tacoma, and nine percent in Los Angeles/Long Beach, the PMA claimed. In Tacoma, productivity dropped only 10 percent on the first two days after the lockout, but fell precipitously on the third and fourth days, which happened to follow a local union meeting. "That was a coincidence," says Lelli.

The chaos on the docks after the lockout provided cover for the dockworkers' work-safe efforts. When the PMA sought to hold the union in contempt of court for its supposed slowdown, the union was able to point to the disorder caused by the backlog of work. The Department of Justice refused to prosecute the union, blaming both sides for the drop in productivity.

The settlement, which came by the end of November, was a victory for the ILWU given the weight of government support for the employers. "lthough the contract was too long-six years-the union preserved no-cost health insurance and won a pay raise and better pensions. On the main issue-whether dock jobs using new technologies would be done by ILWU members-the PMA agreed that, "Technologies shall not be used to shift traditional union jurisdiction to non-bargaining unit employees or facilities."

The Legal Limits of Working to Rule
by Ellis Boal

Workers often follow two sets of rules: the official company or government rules and the unofficial, unwritten shop floor practices established over time. The two often conflict, but supervisors wink at rule violations in the interest of productivity by ignoring, say, paperwork or health and safety requirements. Eventually, the unwritten norms become "past practices" of an unusual sort, in that they are past practices that benefit the company.

Workers can exploit the inconsistency between official and unwritten rules by "working to rule"-collectively following a company's written rules and regulations to the letter.2 Working to rule rests on the idea that management must make instructions clear. If there are, in effect, two sets of instructions, workers cannot be faulted for following those rules from which they benefit.3

Working to rule is used for four reasons:

(a) as an economic weapon to support the union's bargaining position on grievances or during contract negotiations,
(b) as a means of protest,
(c) to ease the burdens and risks of high-intensity work, or
(d) to produce a high-quality product.

Courts are skeptical of reasons (c) and (d).4

If working to rule were protected, employers could not legally discipline workers for doing it. If it were unprotected, the employer could impose discipline, possibly including dismissal. Remarkably, there is no general rule on whether or not working to rule is protected. In decisions of 1996, 1997, and 1998 the NLRB noted the "difficult issues raised by work-to-rule" and bypassed them. The Supreme Court did the same in 1960 and 1976.5

The law does not protect insubordination. But properly executed, working to rule for all reasons except (d) ought to be protected. Why is reason (d) different? Because the law only protects concerted activities undertaken "for [workers'] mutual aid or protection." Courts consider product quality a management prerogative outside the realm of legitimate union or worker concern.6

Of course, even activities protected by law can be risky due to the government's slow and uncertain enforcement. The greatest protection is still the solidarity of a well-organized union membership.7

Without a Contract

Working to rule occurs in two different legal contexts. The first is where there is no contract in place, and the union is negotiating for the first one or a new one.
The NLRB and the courts have reasoned that if a contract were in place, it would provide a mechanism for working out conflicts, and there would be no need for working to rule. But without a contract, working to rule can be a legitimate response to conflicting management expectations.

One frequent tactic in a work-to-rule is refusing overtime. If accepting work assignments such as overtime is voluntary, the NLRB says that workers may collectively refuse to perform them.8 The NLRB treats such concerted refusals as legal strikes.9

It may seem odd, but without a contract, partial strikes, intermittent strikes, and most slowdowns are not protected.10 On the other hand, a spontaneous full walkout in the middle of a shift to protest a particular situation is protected, even if the workers' demands are disorganized or unclear11, or if the strike lasts only briefly.12

Even though slowdowns and partial strikes are unprotected by the law, the Supreme Court has said that such actions are nonetheless part and parcel of collective bargaining.13 This means an employer can discipline workers for the slowdown, but it cannot refuse to bargain just because they are slowing down. Thus, if workers think they can get away with it, they can use slowdowns to pressure the employer to bargain.14

Intermittent strikes are generally unprotected, but the company must prove a pattern of strikes if it wants the NLRB to uphold its discipline of workers for striking intermittently. That means that workers may be able to get away with random strikes, such as a short walkout at the end of the regular workday to protest overtime.15

With a Contract

Work-to-rule participants are at greater risk in the second context, where there is a contract with a no-strike/no-slowdown clause and a regular grievance procedure. Then the grievance procedure applies instead of the law. Not only are partial and intermittent strikes unprotected. All strikes are,16 with the exception of some sympathy strikes.17 As a case in point, an organized sickout is considered a strike.18 Working to rule is still an option. Management must still make its instructions clear and members may still interpret instructions to their benefit. They just have to be sure not to violate the letter of the contract if they want to avoid discipline.

Employers may go to a judge for an injunction against any action that violates the contract. Employers try to argue, often with success, that a work-to-rule is a violation of the contract.19 Production statistics are often part of a company's case against working to rule, although alone they do not suffice for an injunction.20

Any contractual protection for working to rule would depend on the particular contract language and the particular arbitrator. The General Motors-UAW contract, for instance, specifies that certain overtime is voluntary on an individual basis, but concerted refusals of overtime can be disciplined.21 Arbitrators at other companies have held that slowdowns to the standard production rate are protected if done individually or to make work easier (reason c), but not if done as a group or to extract a concession from management (reason a).22

In the 1989 Paperworkers case, New York locals instructed members under threat of fines not to help the company brainstorm quality improvements or do other non-unit work. The instruction was to remain in effect until the dispute of a locked-out sister local in Alabama was resolved. The company went to the NLRB and claimed this violated the no-strike clause, and was coercion by the locals. The NLRB disagreed. It emphasized that non-unit work was voluntary at this company, and rejected an employer claim that the union's self-help should await the outcome of grievances.23

Will it Work?

Unions do not always get to choose which forum-courts, NLRB, arbitrator-will hear a case about working to rule. If possible, unions unsure of their arbitrators should try to get before the NLRB. Though susceptible to political influence,24 currently it seems to have a better overall view of working to rule than courts or arbitrators. In court, NLRB precedents can be presented, but a judge is not bound to follow them.25

Whether you are before a court, an arbitrator, or the NLRB, expect hostility from the decision maker:

• In one amazing case, a union of federal professional employees proposed in bargaining that members be insulated from adverse evaluations insofar as they had followed written procedures or orders. The Federal Labor Relations Authority held that management did not even have to bargain over the union's proposal: "[I]t is unreasonable to expect [from management] the total elimination of conflicts and deficiencies." The court of appeals agreed: "[T]he result could be similar to what British labor unions achieve by 'working to rule,' namely the tangle that inevitably occurs when a bureaucracy is bound and gagged with red tape-no matter that the tape is of its own making."26
  
• In a Caterpillar case, an administrative law judge (ALJ) held a member's requests for a safety rep and a steward were unprotected where the requests were just to harass management and where there was no actual contract violation to grieve.27 This decision was not appealed to the NLRB, is non-binding, and is contrary to precedent. Grievance filing is protected even if it exceeds the actual contract language, unless the excess is extraordinary, obnoxious, unjustified, and departs from the grievance procedure.28 But the ALJ's attitude is typical of decision makers confronted with work-to-rule.
  
• In a 2001 dispute between United Airlines and the Machinists, the court of appeals enjoined a union work-safe campaign. This contradicted the legal doctrine that says an employer must have "clean hands" before seeking legal relief. That is, the employer must "make every reasonable effort to settle" a dispute before filing a lawsuit against the union. The court granted the injunction against the union even though it accepted the unchallenged finding that the airline could have stopped the slowdown through individual disciplinary action.29 In justifying its decision, the court gave credit to testimony of company officials that union calls to work safe and to work by the book are "commonly recognized signals ... for a work slowdown."30

Despite this last case, courts, the NLRB, and arbitrators often look more favorably on working to rule for safety reasons (reason c). In one case, the union ran a work-to-rule contract campaign; simultaneously the health and safety committee posted leaflets that urged members to "work to the safety rule." The board ruled that this phrase did not encourage "unprotected activity." That is, the flier advocated that the workers engage in protected activity "in accordance with the rules of safety that have been established for their benefit." Moreover, the board refused to rule on the legality of working to rule. Instead, it found that even if working to rule were unprotected, working to safety rule is protected.31

Management can always deal with a work-to-rule campaign by changing ambiguous instructions to clear ones, or by giving a direct order to do something in a certain way or at a certain speed. In that case working to rule may be as unprotected as any other slowdown.32 Though there are limited exceptions33, "obeying now and grieving later" would be the risk-free course.

Workers might have some protection for working to rule if the employer ever condones such activity. In one case, a UPS worker refused for safety reasons to perform his job and his immediate supervisor went along with his decision. Later the worker received a disciplinary letter for his refusal, which the NLRB ruled was illegal because the supervisor had condoned the worker's action.34

Even if working to rule is protected, an employer who has otherwise bargained in good faith can lock out a union that is using the tactic for reason (a). The NLRB has not addressed a lockout in response to working to rule for reasons (b), (c), or (d).35

Action Questions

Working to rule is nothing new. It rarely catches large companies by surprise. Therefore, those considering an inside strategy must prepare for the harshest treatment after the contract expires and the work-to-rule begins, including buyoffs, distraction, harassment, discipline, dismissal, and lockout. Preparation includes a creative understanding of the company's vulnerabilities: how to hurt production and profits within the bounds of management's rules, the contract, and the law. And it requires a keen assessment of the membership's potential for solidarity.

The questions below will help you decide whether or not working to rule is a viable strategy. For that decision, they should be discussed discreetly, among a few trusted members. Once you decide that working to rule might fit your situation, you should discuss them with the rest of the membership, who will have many good ideas.

1. What is the economic situation of your company? Of your plant? Do you have a trusted friend in management or an office worker who can get you information about management's plans for the future? Who are its suppliers? Who are its customers? What shape are they in? Where do your company's orders stand? Who has power in the corporation and at your location?

2. Why are you thinking of using an inside strategy? How will the members relate to the idea of an inside strategy instead of a strike? Is there a history of work-to-rules or slowdowns? How successful have strikes been?

3. Where will your core group come from? The executive board? The stewards? A committee created for this purpose? Who are the members who can be developed as leaders in a new situation? Who are the two or three key people you must talk to? Who are the next five people you must talk to? Who are the next five? Who should talk to whom?

4. How's your timing? Get out a calendar and check the vacation schedule. Will all your key people be there when you need them? Looking at management's production schedule for crunch times, when can you hurt them most?

5. What is the production process? You might want to make a map. What are the most crucial operations? What are the key departments? What are the key operations in those departments? What would it take to stop them? Who fixes them? What are the key links between departments? Where are the potential bottlenecks? Which workers have jobs that allow them to travel around from one department to another? Is there one group of workers that is particularly powerful if they impede production? Is there any group of workers who because of their skills or experience are difficult to replace? Which workers are most vulnerable and need most protection?

6. How can you use the work rules against the company? What shortcuts does the company encourage? What does the contract allow? Which rules are vague? Which managers are unclear in their instructions? Which managers are vulnerable to aggravation? Which have the power and will to discipline workers?

7. Do you have ties to unions at your company's suppliers or customers? Would they be willing to raise their quality standards or shorten their delivery times for your company's product? Do you have ties to the unions of the truck drivers, railroad workers, or others who move your parts or finished products? Can you establish ties with those workers that can make life more difficult for your company? How does it affect production if raw materials or parts arrive late? How do your customers react if your production schedules or quality requirements are not met?

8. What will you ask people to do? What level of commitment is needed? How will you establish your solidarity committee? Where will you get your "intelligence" about what's happening at the workplace? How will you recruit people to activity?

9. What activities should you begin with? Meetings? Group grievances? Work to rule? Slowdown? What about lunchtime meetings or rallies? Will you have buttons? Leaflets? Newsletters? What actions will come later?

10. What kind of support can you expect from the union's district or regional office? How will the international react? What funds do you have? What can you raise?

11. Can you mobilize community support? Are your co-workers in community groups that might offer support? Do members have connections to other local unions? Churches? Politicians?

Notes

1. AFA requests: "CHAOS and the CHAOS logo are trademarks of the AFA. We encourage others to use some or all of the CHAOS tactics, but please do not use the term CHAOS or the CHAOS logo without the AFA's written permission. Thanks."
2. The legal citations for this section, numbered 2-35, can be found on the Troublemaker's website.

Authors

Steven Ashby and C.J. Hawking organized solidarity efforts with the Staley workers. Ashby, now a Professor of Labor Studies at Indiana University at Bloomington, was co-chair of the local's flagship support group in Chicago. Hawking, a United Methodist pastor, moved to Decatur during the lockout to assist the local in its outreach to the community. This section is based on Ashby and Hawking's forthcoming book on the Staley workers, to be published by the University of Illinois Press.

Ellis Boal is a labor lawyer and the websteward for Labor Notes. He has written manuals about legal and union rights for Teamster and UAW members.

David Borer is general counsel for the Association of Flight Attendants, AFL-CIO, and

Joe Burns is former staff attorney for AFA and staff negotiator of the Midwest Express Airlines contract.

Aaron Brenner is a labor historian, researcher, writer, and editor in New York City. He has written about international labor solidarity, union reform movements, and rank and file rebellions by Teamsters, telephone workers, and postal workers, and is the editor of The Encyclopedia of Strikes in American History.

Pam Galpern is a telephone repair and installation technician at Verizon.
Troublemaker's on the Web

For more on inside strategies, see:

• Washington Post Byline Strikes
• Key Elements of Inside Strategies
• Legal Notes, the case citations for "The Legal Limits of Working to Rule"