So who will take the place of these management employees that are being riffed and lined up to do Emergency Work Assignments incase of a union strike ? Everyone assumed that there will not be any layoffs until Verizon and Unions sign a contract. This makes no sense !!!
15 replies (most recent on top)
What is that silver bullet? How do Lowell and Mudge plan to handle the strike after laying off the trained wireline mgmt employees? Can we assume that mgmt employees trained to replace union workers, will be spared for this year?
With Frontier getting Florida, Texas, and California, the only RTW state left in the VZ wireline footprint is Virginia. In other words, the well is dry for out of area talent.
You could start bringing Wireless into the training fold, but the fear from management is that tearing down that particular silo will go both ways, and the CWA and IBEW will become agressive in organizing wireless call centers and wireless cell techs. That's a headache that the company wants to avoid at all costs.
VZ will most likely fly in union employees from "Right to work states . who WILL know the job. Also they can bring in Rif'd managers from 2013-2014 (just need to be have been off the payroll for 6 months) and hire them as Temps. Believe me, the bean counters have already planned for a strike ...VZ needs the money saved. Who cares about Customer Service? Customers have other options these days. If customers leave VZ, less workers are needed, creating more RIFs and the selling price for VZ-Wireline will become attractive to some company.
People who are not protected by having a union should reach out to the union now. Or atleast visit. www.facebook.com/vzwrising
Putting a H1B visa employee into the field with a drill and other power tools scares the living crap out of me. These folks have some IT skills, but from what I have seen, their total amount of common sense could fit in a thimble. They are not as bright as portrayed. Virtually every group leader (actual, not mgmt lapdog) I have seen are American, some are employees and some contractors. These folks are super valuable to the company, but mgmt does not always value them as they tend to question poor decisions from upper management and have a hard time implementing stupid when stupid is handed to them. The bright and gifted should be leading us, but we know that this is not the VZ way.
Strike is the union's most powerful weapon. I doubt they will squander it, by striking prematurely.
In my office the people who are not going out on EWA assignments are asked to work the same kind of hours 12 on 12 off six days a week that the people who are going out on strike assignments are. Even with riffs having people work these kind of crazy hours will allow work to get done.
I don't see the union prematurely striking when we still, although we are in disarray, can cover the work. My thoughts are the strike will be around Christmas so that the union people can spend time with their families and it will be most disruptive to management but it will be least disruptive to the customers. Who are the people who both the union and management don't want terribly angry with us. This strike will eventually be settled and we want those customers still being our customers
I am thinking that an agreement with the Union will be announced in the new few weeks. AT&T just signed a preliminary agreement with the Unions, so I would expect Verizon would follow suit. And then sell wireline next year.
Why would anyone in their right state of mind bail out the company that doesn't give a shi$ about them and perform EWA, especially after being notified that no longer have a job.
I don't think you are required to work once you are given a notice. Wireline emp gets 4 weeks notice. They are not required to work during that 4 weeks. They can search for jobs in the company.
If union walks between now and 12/31 those that were let go will have to do as mngt says to get their comp since they are still employees so they can be deployed.Don't think most would say no on those terms
hindsight is 20/20 but keeping these H1B folks will burn them if the union walks. Catch is that it can happen at any time with no warning
Just to add to my previous post.. Most of the cuts so far are wireless employees are they are not trained to replace union workers in case of a strike. If VZ wireline chooses to cut non-citizen management employees then there will be no impact to emergency preparedness, because these Visa employees are not eligible to be deployed to do union workers job- federal law.
There are two possibilities 1. VZ and the union leadership have a secret nexus 2. VZ thinks union is a lame duck
I am thinking it is mostly the 2nd..
Unless a behind the scenes agreement has been reached and it's not being announce until the dust settles. Imagine if the headline reads "CWA and IBEW reached an agreement and Verizon (NYSE: VZ) plans to cut management positions by 5,000 to 6,000"
No one will. Vz execs are banking on no strike so no loss no foul