This week we negotiated on Tuesday instead of Thursday. We have agreed to extend the contract again, this time through our next negotiating session. Next week we will be back to Thursday. For more general information about how negotiations works, check out these answers to Frequently Asked Questions.
In Negotiations, the SHARE Team has worked hard to depict what it’s like to work on the front lines and why members need good raises. It’s been meaningful to convey these messages directly from you. For a bigger sample of what we’ve presented to management, check out the “Always Essential" Gallery online . . .
Hanging the SHARE signature poster helps demonstrate how far and wide SHARE’s 3000 members work across UMass Memorial, and how much we do to support it. In the Emergency Department (seen above) they’re also describing why a good raise is so important.
“I need a good raise because”
At last week’s contract negotiations, photos of SHARE members — as well as “I need a good raise because . . .” signs — wallpapered the room around the negotiating table. The SHARE Negotiating Team continues to present the ideas and experiences of SHARE members to management — last week in pictures as well as the usual stories, numbers, charts, and graphs. SHARE members’ support matters both inside the negotiating room and outside in the departments. Standing up to support contract negotiations makes a real difference in our ability to negotiate a strong contract — we can tell that your efforts are being noticed by management. Thanks to you, we are getting very close — read on for details.
Raises – Getting Closer
Again, the majority of our discussion was about raises. The SHARE Negotiating Team put a creative package together in response to management’s proposal last week. We continue to talk about raises to address inflation, that are good for both high-paid SHARE members and for members in the less well-paid grades. We are getting closer and closer…
We are also discussing how many years the new contract should be for. The SHARE Negotiating Team says, “It all depends on the numbers.” Whether we lock in a shorter contract or a longer one, there are potential risks and rewards, depending on what the future brings. We could lock in a raise in times of high inflation that turns out to be great in a future year of low inflation. Or, it could turn out that inflation is high again that year. Two advantages of a longer contract: it locks in our health insurance and pension benefits, and it gives SHARE members predictability. One advantage of a shorter contract: we have the flexibility to address new issues as they arise.
Health Insurance & Pension
The SHARE Negotiating Team wants to protect the good health insurance benefits we have. Good news: the hospital is not proposing any cuts to these benefits. (The cost of health insurance will go up in January, but the premium split is defined our contract: SHARE members pay 15% of the total cost, while the hospital pays 85% of the cost.)
Promotion Increase, Bridging
We are talking about two more parts of the contract that have to do with pay rates: how much a SHARE member gets when they transfer or get promoted to a higher grade, and how much a re-hire gets offered for pay if they come back in less than 3 years.
Absenteeism & Leaves-of-Absence
We’ve mostly wrapped up this part of the negotiations. The state of Massachusetts now provides protections that duplicate protections we had negotiated in previous contracts. So, we’re working with UMass Memorial to make the system easier for members to use, removing Leaves that are now redundant. Beyond that, general attendance is as important as ever, given the tight staffing levels, and SHARE is carefully considering management’s concern that there may be overuse and abuse of time off in some areas, while advocating that SHARE members need to be able take time off from work, now more than ever.
Career Training
SHARE would like to create a state of the art training program so that SHARE members can get help to learn new skills and grow their careers at UMass Memorial. We think that hospital would like that too – but we are still working on what we can agree to going forward.
