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Resolving an Office Scheduling Issue


Guest Jimm

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44 minutes ago, Gary c Tesser said:

Would the four members, especially 2 and 3, be willing to actually have a meeting at this point ...)?

This is important because, at a meeting, #2 and #3 (as well as #1 and #2) would be presented with the question, "Do you favor this proposed schedule change? Say  Aye, or no [or abstain]"? 

What you have now is tail-chasing, trying to determine what the specific, actual meanings are of the two (actually reasonable, given the men's overt indifference to the result) wishy-washy responses.

Sure, you could try to pull out an answer from #2 and #3 over an interminable number of phone calls, pointing out to them that their ambivalent responses don't help make a determination and that we do need to make a determination.  But a meeting will probably be more determinative, and even almost certainly take less time in the aggregate.  And incidentally we could actually discuss applying RONR (always salubrious on the world's premiere Internet parliamentary website) to your issues.

Oh, and to pull out another absurdity, perhaps the most flagrant is the idiotic (or daffy, I can't tell which applies more, or whether they are both apropos) suggestion that the requirement to use Robert's Rules is not applicable because your four guys "made" a "determination" outside of a meeting.  It's bloody well intrinsically implicit that the union rules assume, and probably intrinsically require, that group decisions be made at a meeting, not by two haphazard phone calls.

__________

N. B.  I'm uncomfortable with "intrinsically implicit":  suggestions welcome; no, implored.

 

Edited by Gary c Tesser
Inserted the "that" into " and that we do need to make a determination".
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I agree that the question here is not "Have they done this in accordance with the rules in RONR?" The real question is "Did they have to do this in accordance with the rules in RONR?"

The answer to the first question is easy. No, of course they haven't done any of this in accordance with the rules in RONR. I'm quite sure that no one thinks that they have. 

The real question being asked is one which we are not in a position to answer. We certainly won't find the answer by looking at anything in RONR.

 

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50 minutes ago, Daniel H. Honemann said:

The real question being asked is one which we are not in a position to answer. We certainly won't find the answer by looking at anything in RONR.

Yes.  That's why I'm trying to get up a meeting.  That's when application of RONR -- aside, preliminarily, from applying the principles, which should apply to any meeting, even a tete-a-tete -- would (thankfully! at last!) come into play.

(You know I haven't even got my $4.50 for the first hour, long past.  Great Steaming Cobnuts.)

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Daniel and Gary,

Thank you for your comments.   

2 hours ago, Daniel H. Honemann said:

The real question being asked is one which we are not in a position to answer. We certainly won't find the answer by looking at anything in RONR.

 

Again, as I said earlier, I was not looking that RONR necessarily be deemed to follow strictly.   However, I'm trying to establish that the principle of fundamental parliamentary protocols between the four individuals were not follow.

Reading the very first few lines in RNOR 11th edition (a book bearing Daniel's name, I noted), I read:

This book embodies a codification of the present-day general parliamentary law....  The book is also designed a a manual to be adopted by organizations or assemblies as their parliamentary authority.  When the manual has been thus adopted, the rules within it, together with any special rules of procedure that may also be adopted, are binding upon the body and constitute that body's rules of order. [p. xxix]

It's from the notion that RONR "embodies the present-day general parliamentary law" here that this  important general question is being asked about this body of office workers.   It is not necessarily a study of all the detail of RONR, but of the general rules that would apply to any parliamentary body.

The question now is whether the four at the shop are a deliberative body.   I understand that what they did thus far was not actions of a deliberative assembly.  I think that was also established early on, that because they didn't hold a meeting, put a question, debate, and vote, that their overall actions were anything but that of a legitimate deliberative assembly.   But, are they, the four of them as a whole, a deliberative body?

I noted reading (1) of RONR, [pp 1-3] that the authors made a very strong attempt to describe the difference of a deliberative assembly, and a deliberative body.   The parliamentary assembly being the "kind of gathering to which parliamentary law is generally understood or apply....", and where the assembly is made up of a body of people who assemble. [underline added], i.e,, the assembly is made up of body of members

Further, it RONR explains:

A member of an assembly, in the parliamentary sense, as mentioned above, is a person entitled to full participation in its proceedings, that is... the right to attend meetings, to make motions, to speak in debate, and to vote.  No member can be individually deprived of these basic rights of membership--or any basic rights concomitant to them,..."

Again, to reiterate the very in the opening sentence, the authors of RONR states that RONR "embodies present-day general (basic) parliamentary law."  [underline added]

So, if a member of the body is purposefully excluded, and no meeting has occurred, and individuals denied participation in debate,  has general (basic) parliamentary law been followed?   

So, what is a member of a body of office workers?     Is #4 a member of the of the body of office workers who's contractual workrules that read:

The workers at each base [shop] shall determine the appropriate schedules of service consistent with Company and customer service requirements. They shall forward their schedule to the appropriate Company official. A normal schedule shift shall not exceed twelve (12) hours. [underlining added]

 

deliberative. adj. 1'. of or for deliberating. 2. characterized by or resulting from deliberations.  [Websters NewWorld Dictionary, 2nd college ed]

deliberation. 1. a considering carefully. 2. consideration and discussion of alternatives before reaching a decision.  [Websters NewWorld Dictionary, 2nd college ed]

 

"The workers at each base" establishes that they are a body as a whole, not as individuals, but as an inclusive body who must determine the a collective outcome.   Are they deliberative??   They must be by definition, because it is the workers at each shop (i.e., the body) "shall determine [deliberate] the appropriate schedule of service...."  According to the workrules, yes they are deliberative since it is this body that considers and determines the schedule.  Nothing above omits anyone from the body, and nobody has a greater weight than the other in that body.  The body consists of each member of that shop.   They are all equals deciding/determining a schedule.   Maybe not in accordiance with strict RONR, but certainly using general principles of parliamentary law apply.   And, according to the opening line in the introduction, RONR embodies that law.   The body here should have at least acted in accordance with general principles to achieve its goal, and failure to do so would indicate that a proper decision has not been made by the body.

In addition to this being a RONR specific forum discussing the finer details of RONR, it is also a general parliamentary forum since RONR "embodies the codification of general parliamentary law', making this forum an acceptable place to discuss general parliamentary principles.

 

I think we have established, clearly, that the body of workers in that shop have not followed any general parliamentary protocol since they have excluded one member of the deliberative body, and did not offer opportunity for any open face-to-face debate.   And, since their workrules call for them to collectively ("the workers at each shop"), and not independently or partially (i.e, "some workers at each shop",) decide their schedule, it seems rational to conclude that the method they used so far has been anything but fair to the body itself, if you accept the fact that it is the body as a whole that should have decided to make a change in their schedule, regardless of whether it complies with any of the stricter requirements of RONR that maybe differ from other particular parliamentary authority.  It is the of the common principles (fundamental) of a group with each member owning equally shared decision rights that were of concern here.

 

I'm not concerned that the decision itself is fair to everyone, but I am concerned in the process used to derive the decision was fair to each person in the shop if all are supposed to be equal partners in the decision of that shop.

 

Thanks again.

 

Jimm

 

 

 

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1 hour ago, Daniel H. Honemann said:

The question as to whether or not they had to (or now have to) make their decisions in accordance with the rules in RONR (which is, as noted, a codification of present day general parliamentary law), or any other rules, is one which we are not in a position to answer.

I accept that the "we" you mention are not in a position to answer.   That responsibility would fall on the collective "we" who work together as the brotherhood making up all the shops in this company.   However, the "we" on this forum can comment on whether they believe a fair process occurred given the general parliamentary principals if this were, in essence, a parliamentary body under general parliamentary principals.

Whether or not they should have is (will be) a determination of their peers and coworkers (ie, the members) of the Union who will eventually elect officers and board members to take us into the future.   But, the question as to whether they followed general parliamentary procedures so far is an academic one, and the consensus seems to indicate that they did not.  We have some in our organization claiming they did followed general parliamentary protocols in how they handled it so far....  I think you agree that they have not, regardless of whether they should have.

Thank you for your comments

 

Unless there is an specific questions of me here, I'll not comment any further.

 

Jimm

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