Dear HR Colleagues,
As the current upsurge in worker organizing and collective action began to gain momentum, a group of colleagues from different universities decided that this is a "teachable moment" for highlighting the range of activities occurring across the US and to hopefully start broad based discussions with multiple stakeholders over what this activism might mean for shaping better-more equitable, productive, inclusive, and resilient--employment relationships. We call our group the "Worker Empowerment Research Network" (WERN).
I attach the first product of WERN, a "Landscape Review of current developments. It is being is being released today. You can also find it on our IWER website at: https://iwer.mit.edu/2022/06/report-on-u-s-workers-organizing-efforts-and-collective-actions/
The document puts the current upsurge in worker activism in a historical (brief) context, describes the wide range of different organizing and collective actions occurring across the country, and then raises a series of questions (posed at the end of the report) for broad based public discussions. We hope to host some of these discussions with key stakeholders as the work of WERN moves forward. Feel free to share the Review and/or the link with anyone you think might have an interest in these issues. We hope it provides useful information as you each continue your efforts to promote good work-today and maybe even as we hope it might be in the future!
We welcome comments and suggestions for how we can all move discussion of these issues forward.
All the best,
Tom Kochan (for Kate Bronfenbrenner, Suresh Naidu, Janice Fine and our student co-authors)
Thomas A. Kochan
George M. Bunker Professor, Emeritus
MIT Sloan School of Management
Institute for Work and Employment Research
100 Main St
Cambridge, MA 02142
617 253 6689 (o) 617 872 0608 (c)
Co-author: Shaping the Future of Work: A Handbook for Action and a New Social Contract