UpstateNYUPSer(Ret)
Well-Known Member
One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter.
Nice catch phrase--how does it apply to this thread or my post?
One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter.
Nice catch phrase--how does it apply to this thread or my post?
I'm sorry, I may be way out of line for saying this, but how can anyone with even an ounce of self-respect knowingly sabotage the operations of their employer?
If you worked here, you'd understand. But you don't, so you're talking nonsense. If UPS played the same kind of games with you, if you had even an ounce of self-respect, you would also try to fight back. We don't have a union to call BS on management, and they do whatever they want whenever they want to, and we are just supposed to take it.
You have no idea how coddled and pampered you are in terms of the management/labor relationsip, so put a sock in it until you have a clue, which you don't.
It would be one thing if you were doing the job to the best of your ability and had lates due to being overdispatched or delays on road beyond your control but to leave the building with the full intent of sabotaging the operation by purposely having lates is something I simply cannot comprehend.
I work there and understand what you're saying. But, as UPSTATE said, to actively condone sabotage I would have thought to be even beneath you. Guess I was wrong. If you have lates and hit your SPH, so be it. But, to sit on a corner for 5, 6, 7 minutes just to prove a point is wrong no matter how you look at it and in the long run will accomplish nothing. This company has gotten away from the 2 things that got it where it is today....service and customer service, this I agree with. But, if you keep it up and your 'exit strategy' will come sooner than you think.I know you can't comprehend it. As someone else said, FedEx management sabotages us every day. In FedEx speak, it's called "Set-up to Fail". They fully expect you to work for free during your "breaks", and then discipline you when you bring back freight or have lates. It's every day, and it's planned. Like I said, you don't understand, because you have a union between you and abusive management. We don't, and they take full advantage of the situation. You're obviously an intelligent person, but it's equally obvious that you don't understand the way FedEx operates.
We're like Palestinians throwing rocks at the Israelis, because the only "weapon" we have is to make management look bad when they jerk us around. No steward, no grievance process, and no other options. You have no idea how good you've got it.
I'd just plug in a 28/29 around 1018-1028.
I take a lot of breaks before my 1200 P1 commit time.
I work there and understand what you're saying. But, as UPSTATE said, to actively condone sabotage I would have thought to be even beneath you. Guess I was wrong. If you have lates and hit your SPH, so be it. But, to sit on a corner for 5, 6, 7 minutes just to prove a point is wrong no matter how you look at it and in the long run will accomplish nothing. This company has gotten away from the 2 things that got it where it is today....service and customer service, this I agree with. But, if you keep it up and your 'exit strategy' will come sooner than you think.
Yup,
2 guys in my loop have been with the company for a long time.
Any time they take vacation the swings crush their routes.
Does anything ever change, nope.
Meanwhile I'm busting my butt at ~15-17 sph. for much less pay.
If one looks at the history of organized labor and attempts to organize labor, there has always been a form of push back by labor against the employer - especially when that employer is being abusive towards its employees.
No one can honestly state that during a strike, that no "sabotage" of company processes or assets takes place.
It is all part of the reality of labor struggling against corporations who continually push and push for greater productivity while simultaneously dropping compensation bit by bit.
If volume gets delivered a bit late, a message is being sent. All the UPSers have constantly stated that the Express employees are going to have to pull their own weight when it comes to organizing and getting union representation certified - well, what do you think is part of the process?
When corporations push labor, labor has to push back.
Express employess have absolutely NO PROTECTION regarding their jobs, so they are at the mercy of Express for any little thing Express chooses to use against them.
So how do you "fight the machine"?
So if missorts go up, committment times begin to slip - its all part of the push back by the labor of Express against the abusive demands of the company.
When Express Couriers are constantly being threatened with their jobs being placed into jeopardy if they don't hit a productivity requirement which necessitates them speeding, working through unpaid breaks and being absolutely perfect in their execution of the job (robotic) over a very long day (hit one railroad crossing signal and you're cooked) - what do you expect?
In an environment where the employer RESPECTS their employees (not through just words but through rational work practices, compensation levels and productivity expectations), then there are no issues between management and labor.
Most UPSers have heard the phrase, "bleeds purple". It refers to employees of Express who believe that their treatment by the company (work expectations, compensation levels and ability to perform with a degree of creative expression) is so above par, that the employee will go the extra mile as a matter of reflex to further the performance of FedEx Express as a result of a feeling of intense personal loyalty being created by the employee-employer relationship.
Things have deteriorated so much within Express that individuals that are said to "bleed purple" are no longer held in high esteem by the rest of Express employees - they are viewed as having some form of mental illness, incapable of seeing what is going on around them. A "FedEx-er" is someone in the past who bled purple and "made things happen", but now is seen as someone who follows the company line so feverently, that they are blinded to how Express has changed and will actively engage in the process of employee abuse, just to maintain their own employment.
This is part of the issue that UPSers that haven't worked in a non-union environment will never understand - and why I'm still taking time even after having left Express to attempt to change things there.
There is no process to "grieve" a work requirement. Express determines what the expectation is and employees have three choices, do it, be disciplined for not doing it (leading to termination), or quitting. The work expectation can change at ANY TIME - at the whim of corporate management, or even station level management. There is no negotiation, no stopping to think about it, no nothing. Here's the expectation -meet it or else...
There is a process which Express holds so highly - the Guaranteed Fair Treatment process for it employees which have been subject to discipline. It is something that George Orwell had to have named for all the good it does the employee.
The "guarantee" is that Express HR and legal will review an disciplinary action (Warning letters only, OLCCs, and other "minor" changes in work requirements AREN'T subject to review) to ensure that Express won't be subject to any adverse legal action if the discipline is to stand. The "Fair Treatment" part of GFT is more a less a euphuism for "the management team which issued the Warning Letter has been cleared of any potential abuse of authority, and the issuance of said discipline is indeed "fair" to Express' interest". If an employee's receiving discipline does open Express to legal consequences, then Express will make the decision to either mitigate or recind the Warning Letter. There is no "steward" that can stand beside the employee when they are going through the process - they are against the machine, standing solo.
So what are employees of Express supposed to do, accept getting pushed under the bus further and further until they qualify for food stamps and public housing - or do something to push back against the abuse.
The smart Express employees look over to how FedEx compensates the delivery drivers of Ground, and don't want to end up there. There has to be push back. In the end, the only real solution is unionization - the road to get there will be very bumpy and unpleasant. Corporate America doesn't act responsibly unless there is a real threat of them losing profits, this is where labor starts to push back - unions help to keep corporations honest in their dealiings with labor.