4/17/01 Respectful, Fair Treatment

April 17, 2001

Sharon Hayden
Office of Labor Relations
University of California Office of the President
300 Lakeside Dr 4thFl
Oakland, CA 94612

Re: RESPECTFUL/FAIR TREATMENT

Dear Sharon:

Here is a recap of CUE’s presentation on April 5, 2001, concerning the meaning and implementation of the Respectful/Fair Treatment article.

First we view the purpose of this article is to achieve a level of civility in the workplace which allows employees to do a good job and to institutionalize the notion of respect. We discussed the meaning of the words and posit that respect means: high regard, esteem, deference, and honor; fair means: just, equitable, impartial, unbiased, free from favor, free from prejudice, right and proper. We believe that the issues which will be grieved under this article are issues which cannot be grieved under other language in the contract.

We propose that the grievance official (who will be a member of the Labor Relations staff on each campus and whose orientation therefore will be to defend the department and other University officials who will be charged with disrespectful and unfair treatment) should be given a check list by which to measure the allegations by the grievant. The following list is certainly not necessarily complete and is not intended to be exhaustive:

• Is this how you would treat the Chancellor?
• Is this how you would like to be treated?
• Did the person you interacted with think it was respectful/fair?
• Is what you said something you would be willing to put in writing?
• Is it favoritism? Is it inclusive or isolating?
• Is it a public reprimand or a disciplinary action which should have been done in private?
• Is it degrading or insulting?
• Is the tone and manner of communication out of the ordinary for day to day interactions in the workplace?
• Were “fighting” words used?
• Did the communication include a personal characterization? (i.e. You are stupid vs. You did a stupid thing)
• Was the communication civil and responsible or purposely ignoring or dismissing?
• Did the communication include sarcasm, parody or mocking?

In addition CUE presented a list of suggested remedies. For the records we want to make it clear that we do not believe that this article can be effectively enforced without at least several of the remedies proposed below being available to the grievance officer:

• Transfer of either party at the party’s request.
• An apology
• Required supervisory training
• Counseling
• Workshops with required attendance
• Anger management training
• An agreement between the parties
• When a supervisor has been found guilty in two or more incidents of disrespectful/unfair treatment, the supervisor shall be placed on a performance track.
• If the communication was discriminatory in nature, that fact should influence the remedy.

We are concerned that this article will be rendered meaningless, unless there are effective remedies in place. This is a new kind of contract provision which requires new thinking. We have provided above a list of the kinds of remedies that we think should be considered. Please give us yours.

We know that we cannot necessarily control what people think, but we hope that we can effect how they behave.

We look forward to continued discussion of these issues.

If you have any questions, please let me know.

Thanks.

Sincerely,

Margy Wilkinson
CUE Chief Negotiator

:mlw