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New research suggests that both employees and employers benefit from having a trade union representative in the workplace. Many employers consider a shop steward a crucial sparring partner for everyday negotiations and value their work in filtering employee requests. Most employees claim that having a shop steward ensures higher wages and improved working conditions. One in three union members with no shop steward believes their pay and conditions would be better with one.
One in two workplaces covered by a collective agreement in the private sector has a shop steward (workplace union members’ representative) – a number that is significantly higher in the public sector (91%).
A new study by the Employment Relations Research Centre (FAOS) at the University of Copenhagen examines, among other topics, the benefits of having a shop steward at the workplace. The study, Shop stewards and the workplace 2010 (Fokus på tillidsrepræsentanterne 2010), is based on survey data from 7,877 representatives of the Danish Confederation of Trade Unions (LO), 1,618 managers from randomly selected Danish workplaces and 1,465 randomly selected employees. The surveys were conducted in spring 2010 (DK1010029I).
The part of the study dealing with views on employee representation reveals that both management and employees (including those who are members of trade unions as well as those who are not) are generally speaking satisfied with the work and services provided by their shop steward. Among LO members, 62% said that overall they are satisfied with the services provided by their shop stewards. The share of those satisfied was lower among the non-union members (35%).
The majority of employers (75%) were also generally satisfied with the work of the shop stewards. The presence of a shop steward seems beneficial to both management and employees.
Union and non-union members often benefit in different ways from the presence of a shop steward at their workplace. Over two thirds (69%) of union members and one in three non-union members reported that having a shop steward makes a difference when it comes to their wages and working conditions. In addition, one in three union members at workplaces without a shop steward stated that their wage and working conditions would be better if they had a union representative. However, this number is significantly lower when asking non-union members at workplaces without a shop steward (15%).
Besides having a seemingly positive effect on wage levels and working conditions, shop stewards also appear to be useful in providing answers and assistance to colleagues who experience problems or have questions related to their wages and working conditions. Many of the LO members surveyed (79%) had contacted their shop steward within the last year, and 70% of people among this group received the help they needed. Among the non-union members this number is slightly lower; only one in three non-union employees had contacted the shop steward at their workplace within the last year and only one in two had been satisfied with the assistance they received.
The questions and problems addressed by the union members to their shop stewards covered a wide range of subjects and the satisfaction with their answers was generally high, regardless of the topic.
Many union and non-union members claimed the presence of a shop steward made them feel ‘safe’ when it came to negotiating individual pay increases with the management. Many union members (37%) also view the shop steward as a powerful figure at the workplace, but this view is shared by only one in five non-union members.
In general, it appears that a majority of employees find that:
The presence of a shop steward was also viewed relatively positively by most managers in workplaces with union representation. Besides being satisfied with the work of the shop stewards, the majority of managers (77%) considered the shop steward as an important sparring partner when having to discuss and communicate organisational changes within the workplace. In addition, one in two local managers reported that the shop stewards act as a kind of filter, ensuring that only the most important employee requests reach management.
However, managers in the public sector seem to have a higher opinion of shop stewards than those in the private sector, and find them more useful in negotiating organisational changes. While 87% of managers in the public sector rely on shop stewards to implement organisational changes, only 63% of managers in the private sector do so.
Although both managers and employees appear to benefit from the presence of a shop steward, it is striking that the share of employers who are satisfied with the work of shop stewards is much higher than that of employees, even when controlling for union membership.
Trine P. Larsen and Steen E. Navrbjerg, FAOS