SHARE Digest -- Union Elections, Negotiations, Kronos, UBT's, and Juneteenth
Get Ready for Elections
In accordance with our union’s constitution, all SHARE members will soon be sent a mailing to their home addresses with details about the upcoming Rep and Executive Board nomination and election process. Learn about the role of a SHARE Representative here.
The mailing will be sent today, Friday, so you should receive it early next week. Because the election will be electronic this year, please make sure that your personal contact information is up-to-date. And, if you haven’t yet joined SHARE, do so now! Only SHARE members can vote. It’s easy to sign up here with SHARE’s new virtual membership card.
Through a variety of exercises, conversations, and simulations, the teams explored how the different negotiation styles bring about different results.
Contract Negotiations Have Begun
Yesterday, SHARE sat down with UMass Memorial management in our first official negotiations event. The session was facilitated by Brandeis professor Joel Cutcher-Gershenfeld, who taught the teams about Interest Based Bargaining (IBB). Interest-based bargaining differs from traditional negotiations in that both sides work to become joint problem solvers, and recognizes that we can work to maximize our shared interests for mutual gain. Read more about our first session and the IBB principles we will be using over the coming weeks as we work toward an agreement about our new contract policies, raises, and benefits.
Kronos Update
According to UMass Memorial, it has completed roughly three quarters of the 25,000 reported Kronos discrepancies, and expects to complete those corrections in July. Payroll will then run a full audit to capture any unreported discrepancies and correct those before turning full attention to correcting the PTO accruals. In the meanwhile, the accruals will continue to be wrong — and you shouldn’t be denied time off as a result of your current balance. SHARE is urging the hospital to provide individualized information to each member about how Kronos impacted their pay and what corrections have been made. And we’re advocating that overpaid members should have the option to re-pay the hospital using Earned Time rather than cash. Read more . . .
Unit Based Teams Peer-Learning Event
Roughly twenty-five SHARE and management UBT Co-Leads met recently to learn about four different UBT projects and what has made them successful. Teams from Hahnemann Family Health Clinic, Inpatient Pharmacy, Rheumatology, and Respiratory presented at the event. Read more about their projects here. Participants at the event developed a list of worthwhile outcomes that resulted from their projects, including:
Increased caregiver happiness,
Increased productivity,
Decreased wait times,
Removal of waste,
Teamwork & team building, and
Standard work, built by the team who does that work themselves
Honoring Juneteenth
SHARE values the importance that June 19th holds in our national history. The day became a national holiday in 2021. Massachusetts followed to make Juneteenth a state holiday. Institutions including UMass Medical School, officially observe it as a paid day off. The holidays recognized by UMass Memorial are a subject of bargaining, and SHARE’s negotiating team plans to advocate for the day to be recognized as a holiday in our contract as well.
Contract Negotiations Are Underway
On Thursday, June 23rd, SHARE and UMass Memorial officially kicked off negotiations toward our next Contract Bargaining Agreement with a joint-training between the SHARE Team and the Med Center management Team.
Current Highlights
The first two sessions are being facilitated by Joel Cutcher-Gershenfeld, a professor at Brandeis who studies Labor-management partnerships. Joel has worked with unions and management in healthcare and other industries, and has a history of helping SHARE and UMass Memorial work through negotiations. Dr. Cutcher-Gershenfeld is currently teaching both teams about Interest Based Bargaining.
Negotiations are currently scheduled to take place weekly, four hours a day, every Thursday
We heard from staff that the top bargaining priorities are: pay, followed by respect. SHARE members have a variety of other interests, but it’s clear that we need to keep the health insurance and other benefits strong. And it’s clear that SHARE members often feel burned out and unappreciated (see more highlights of the survey here).
SHARE is also paying close attention to what’s happening with other union negotiations, including our sister SHARE Union at Marlborough hospital, as well as our neighboring MNA unions, both at Memorial (which has already reached a Tentative Agreement with the hospital) and University (which has not yet)
About the Teams
SHARE Union Co-Presidents Jay Hagan (Memorial Campus) and Rita Caputo (University Campus) at the table
Roughly forty people attended the Interest Based Bargaining training with Dr. Cutcher-Gershenfeld, including frontline managers, Human Resources Business Partners, representatives from the Partnership Office, the SHARE Executive Board, and the SHARE organizing staff. The lead negotiator for hospital management will be Michael Pacinda, a senior Labor Relations specialist at UMass Memorial; Lead Organizer Janet Wilder will again coordinate the team for SHARE.
Both lead negotiators described the difficulty of negotiating in a moment like this one, when hospitals everywhere are short-handed and caregivers — including SHARE members and managers — are exhausted. And, at the same time, both described the heightened importance of this negotiations to do something good and real and important in the face of that challenge. Janet Wilder encouraged the negotiators to dig into this in a curious way: “We’re more likely to come out with better answers to things if we bring joy and fun to this,” she said.
A History Lesson & Our historical Moment
Joel Cutcher-Gershenfeld has helped to lead large-scale change initiatives in public and private sectors in Australia, Bermuda, Canada, England, Iceland, Jamaica, Japan, New Zealand, Panama, and the United States . . . including at previous negotiations between SHARE and UMass Memorial
Dr. Cutcher-Gershenfeld described that there’s real importance to what we’re doing . . . that SHARE and UMass Memorial are pioneering an uncommon model of partnership, one that has drawn national attention, including from the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Services leadership in Washington, D.C.
Dr. Cutcher-Gershenfeld opened with the story of a pivotal moment when Ford and the United Auto Workers Union met to negotiate and realized they would have to do something untraditional, working together in ways that they never had before, or they would almost certainly face the catastrophic collapse of their company. (They adopted an IBB model for negotiations and came back strong; meanwhile, GM and Chrysler continued as usual and were forced to file for bankruptcy.)
Learning IBB
There was an unprecedented amount of theatrical shouting in the initial session, which was a lot of fun and served its purpose . . . but wasn’t as productive as we expect our actual negotiations to be. Through a variety of exercises, conversations, and simulations, the teams explored how the different negotiation styles bring about different results.
The teams spent most of the session learning about and discussing the differences between traditional bargaining—which typically begins from strongly held positions and involves coercive forms of power, and Interest Based Bargaining — which aims toward mutual gains and win-win solutions. In IBB, teams follow a series of steps to mutually understand the facts of the current situation and understand the other side’s interests before proposing solutions to the problems.
What’s Next
The teams will meet again next Thursday, when each negotiator will introduce themselves individually, and, with Dr. Cutcher-Gershenfeld’s help, we’ll begin to “bargain about how to bargain,” reviewing and revising the agreements we’ve made in the past about ground rules, how we’ll develop consensus, and ways that we expect to discuss differences.
What Does a SHARE Rep Do?
SHARE leaders have a special role in our community. Together, we work to create one of the most important relationship networks in our hospital.
The main role of a SHARE Rep is to aid communication between members and the SHARE leadership. We continually share information to better understand what is happening across our workplaces, and to make our work better.
As a result, SHARE Reps do all kinds of things, depending on the needs and interests of our union and our members. Ultimately, if you become a SHARE Rep, you decide what to take on . . . each Rep has a different level of involvement. In the beginning, you should simply be prepared to meet new people, and to learn a lot of new things from others throughout the UMass Memorial community.
A SHARE Rep always has support. The SHARE organizing staff and experienced Reps are here to help. We provide training and individual coaching to help you develop new skills. Here’s a list of the kinds of projects that some SHARE Reps commonly do:
Meet and develop relationships with every person in their work area
Come to the monthly SHARE Rep Meetings
Provide information to co-workers, and to the EBoard and Organizers
Help other SHARE members to find help when they need it
Improve work processes and solve departmental problems
Lead and participate in Unit Based Teams
Bake for events
Participate in a web of support for other members in the unfortunate event of a layoff
Serve as a “witness” at a disciplinary meeting for a member
Distribute and collect surveys
Sign up new members on membership cards
Negotiate
There’s a whole lot more. The activities that SHARE Reps do are extremely important, and often a lot of fun. When new challenges arise, we figure things out together. And we know that important things get built just like anything else: one little brick at a time.
If you have questions about what SHARE reps do, please contact the SHARE Office (508-929-4020), or talk to a current SHARE rep.
Reminder & Time Change: Information Meeting TODAY
MEMORIAL CAMPUS CONTRACT NEGOTIATIONS INFORMATION MEETING
outside the Memorial Amphitheater
Thursday, June 23
12:30-1:30
Note that, because of a scheduling conflict with our first negotiation session, we have moved the time of this information meeting back slightly.
Join the SHARE organizing staff to discuss the beginning of SHARE’s contract negotiations with UMass Memorial Hospital. We will describe SHARE’s priorities and answer any questions you may have. Also, we will have chocolates. 😎
June Kronos Update
SHARE organizers met recently with UMass Memorial to discuss payroll updates since the international takedown of Kronos in December of last year. (You can find more context and read previous SHARE updates here.) According to Sergio Melgar, UMass Memorial Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer:
Payroll has corrected roughly three quarters of the 25,000 reported discrepancies, and issued 5000 payments. (The average is 4 discrepancies per employee). They are currently resolving roughly 500-750 discrepancies per week. They expect to complete those corrections in July, and will then run a comprehensive computerized audit of the system. That audit should catch any Kronos discrepancies that were not reported by employees. Supervisors will have to double-check numbers against their department schedules.
As predicted, fixing the large, complex set of problems is taking many months. Many other businesses, municipal governments, and other institutions continue to be in the same boat. UMass Memorial’s challenge is heightened by outdated software and multiple sets of rules to follow (based on each union’s negotiated agreement, etc.).
Starting in August, attention will move to correcting the PTO. (In the meanwhile, the numbers in the system continue to be incorrect – your accruals balance should NOT be used to deny a vacation request).
Details about employees repaying the hospital for overpayment have not yet been decided. In general, we’re told that employees who owe money will be able to re-pay over about 10 weeks. Employees who want to pay back what they owe in one lump sum will have that option. Employees who recognize that they’ve been overpaid can volunteer to begin paying before the guidelines are established – contact payroll to discuss options.
Payroll aspires to have all PTO corrections completed and have all systems back to normal by the end of the 2022 calendar year.
Meanwhile, SHARE is advocating for clearer communication. Some SHARE members are having a hard time determining whether Payroll has yet addressed the discrepancies they’ve submitted, or confirm whether they are on the list to get corrected. Some members were surprised to realize that the corrections had been made to their paychecks without their noticing.
SHARE urges UMass Memorial to report out to each employee whether they have been corrected and by how much, so that SHARE members can figure out of it they think it was done correctly.
SHARE supports the idea that SHARE members could repay any money owed through earned time instead of cash.
Unit Based Teams Peer-Learning Event
Heidi Brazeau, SHARE UBT Co-Lead, describes to the virtual crowd how her department improved tracking the many different forms that patients bring for them to process at the Hahnemann Family Health Clinic
Earlier this month, twenty-plus UBT Co-Leads from SHARE and management met online to compare notes about what makes for a successful project. Four teams — Hahnemann Family Health Clinic, Inpatient Pharmacy, Rheumatology, and Respiratory — each presented about a project their team had undertaken. They described how the project made things easier for staff in their department, what it’s done to improve patient care, and why the department is better able to take pride in their work as a result. In each case, these particular teams chose to develop some kind of system for themselves that created standard work that suited the needs of their department.
Congratulations to each team for these successes! Check out the slides below for details about each. . . .
TODAY Virtual Contract Negotiations Information Meeting
Why: To discuss SHARE’s priorities in the upcoming negotiations
When: Thursday, June 16, 2022, 11:30-1pm
Where: Zoom, online (link via red button on your phone or computer, or usE advanced options below)
Please feel free to have lunch during the meeting and bring your questions. If you’ve got a camera, we’d love to see you live. We’ll continue to schedule Information Meetings — in-person and virtual — through the entire negotiation process. If you’d like to set up a meeting at a time and place that works for you and your co-workers, call the SHARE office (508-929-4020, extension 10) and leave a message.
In case you missed it, see also this recent post about Contract Negotiations and Survey Results
Advanced Zoom Login Information
Topic: SHARE Member Info Meeting
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/85084666514?pwd=djF4MWJjOGdRcnh1K2RzR2VtbjlhUT09
Meeting ID: 850 8466 6514
Passcode: 444290
One tap mobile
+13126266799,,85084666514#,,,,*444290# US (Chicago)
+16465588656,,85084666514#,,,,*444290# US (New York)
Dial by your location
+1 312 626 6799 US (Chicago)
+1 646 558 8656 US (New York)
+1 301 715 8592 US (Washington DC)
+1 346 248 7799 US (Houston)
+1 669 900 9128 US (San Jose)
+1 253 215 8782 US (Tacoma)
Meeting ID: 850 8466 6514
Passcode: 444290
Find your local number: https://us02web.zoom.us/u/kBYUHNEmo
SHARE Digest: Keeping in Touch! Elections, UBTs, and more . . .
In Order to Participate, Keep Your Info Up-to-Date
Please help SHARE stay strong by making sure that we have good contact information for you and your co-workers. Elections will be held electronically this year, and we want to make sure everyone can participate (details coming soon). If you don’t get email from SHARE regularly, please provide us with a cell phone number and/or personal email address (and pass along this notice to any co-workers who might not have seen this. Thanks!) Read the full post . . .
Negotiations Update & Survey Results
SHARE and UMass Memorial continue to prepare for Contract Negotiations. We expect to begin sitting down at the table together on June 23rd. In the meanwhile, SHARE’s negotiating team is having lots of important conversations and studying the SHARE Survey results to hone our priorities. Find more here, including a preliminary list of Information Meeting dates. And, check out this summary of the SHARE Survey Results.
A big shout out to one of our newest Unit Based Teams at Barre Family Health Center! Read more about their strong start
What’s New with Unit Based Teams
SHARE and UMass Memorial are very excited about new developments in partnership. We’re welcoming back former SHARE member Crystal Swenson as a UBT Coach. Plus, SHARE and UMass Memorial recently initiated six new Unit-Based Teams and are readying the launch pad for several more this year. Learn more about what’s new with UBTs. . .
How to Get Covid Test Kits . . . Without Paying for Them
In case you haven’t heard, US households are now eligible to receive an additional eight free Covid test kits from the federal government via USPS. Additionally, many health insurance providers offer a test-kit reimbursement program such as this one from Blue Cross Blue Shield. Local drugstores including CVS, Walgreens, and Rite Aid offer direction for other insurance providers and in-store pickup. Walgreens also provides Drive-Thru PCR testing. You can also find Covid testing sites near you through the mass.gov website.
UBT Shout-Outs: Barre
A new Unit Based Team kicked off their first meeting in Barre on April 8th. They have begun meeting every other Friday. They spent their first two meetings brainstorming ideas and have decided to work on creating a standard work process for forms. This will include disability, workers comp, FMLA, etc., with the aim to reduce the number of patient inquiries after dropping the forms off as staff can advise them on timelines, in addition to keeping the paperwork better organized. You’re off to a great start, Barre!
SHARE Contract Negotiations & Survey Results Update
SHARE and UMass Memorial are getting set to begin our next contract negotiations. Our first session is currently scheduled for June 23rd, and we expect to meet on a weekly basis. The first pair of sessions will be held with a trainer, Joel Cutcher-Gershenfeld, who will work with both SHARE and Management about the ideas and skills involved in Interest Based Bargaining. (If you recognize that name, it’s because Joel has participated with us in negotiations before.)
Throughout these negotiations, SHARE will continue to have many one-on-one conversations and hold information meetings (see a preliminary list of sessions below.) We also continue to hone our priorities using the detailed feedback we got from the recent series of SHARE surveys (hit the red button below for a summary). And, of course, we’ll post regular updates to the SHARE website. More to come . . .
SHARE Negotiation Information Meetings
more dates and details to be announced as they become available
including sessions at Hahnemann, Century Drive, etc.
6/16 Virtual Meeting 11:30-1:00 (Zoom link TBA)
6/24 Tri-river Community Room + Webex 11:30-1:00 (link TBA)
6/29 Barre Conference Room + Zoom 11:30-1:00 (link TBA)
7/8 University Information Table 11:30-1:00 (location TBA)
7/15 Memorial Amphitheater 11:30-1:00 (TBA)
Please feel free to bring your lunch and your questions, and to invite your co-workers. At the virtual meetings, if you’ve got a camera, we’d love to see you live. We’ll continue to schedule Information Meetings through the entire negotiation process. If you’d like to set up a meeting at a time and place that works for you and your co-workers, call the SHARE office (508-929-4020, extension 10) and leave a message.
Keep Your Contact Info Updated & Keep Your Union Strong!
Please help SHARE stay strong by making sure that we have good contact information for you and your co-workers. We will soon announce details for the upcoming SHARE elections. Elections will be held electronically this year*, and we want to make sure everyone can participate. If you don’t get email from SHARE regularly, please provide us with a cell phone number and/or personal email address.
The button below will auto-generate an email that simply asks you to fill in your own information.
You may also have your information updated by talking with a SHARE staff organizer, or by calling the SHARE office at 508-929-4020.
SHARE will not share or sell your contact information. Please also help get word out to your co-workers . . . obviously if we don’t have good contact information for them, this message might not reach them. Thank you!
* The 2022 Rep and Executive Board election will be held by electronic ballot, hosted professionally by ElectionBuddy.com, an online voting service that meets the standards set by the U.S. Department of Labor and by our parent union, AFSCME. ElectionBuddy will send a link to your cell phone or email account for you to vote securely online.
Reminder & Location Change: University SHARE Contract Drop-In TODAY
Note that today’s event has moved outside due to the current Omicron surge and hospital policies.
(It has nothing to do with the pleasant Spring weather. Nothing at all 😎)
University Info Table
Thursday, MAY 26 11:30am-1Pm
OUTSIDE, near the Prescription Center (old west entrance)
Don’t forget to join SHARE organizers today to talk about the upcoming negotiations with UMass Memorial. Share what matters most to you, learn how you can help advocate for a strong contract, and pick up a pin to show your support.
UMass Memorial works because you do! SHARE has roughly 3000 members working in 170 different job titles. Pick up a pin today and show SHARE pride!
More Free Covid Test Kits Available
Every home in the U.S. is now eligible to order a 3rd round of free at-home tests from the federal government.
US households are now able to order "an additional eight free at-home tests at COVIDTests.gov—bringing the total number of free tests available to each household since the start of the program to 16," the White House said in a fact sheet on Tuesday.
Learn more in this White House Fact Sheet
Reminder: SHARE Virtual Contract Information Meeting TODAY
Zoom Information Meeting
Thursday 5/19
11:30a-1:00p
Join the SHARE Organizing staff and other SHARE Members to talk about the upcoming negotiations with UMass Memorial. Share what matters most to you and learn how you can help advocate for a strong contract.
— or —
Phone: 1 646 558 8656 // Meeting ID: 850 8466 6514 // Passcode: 444 290
If you’ve got a camera, we’d love to see you live at the virtual meeting. Either way, please feel free to bring your lunch and your questions, and invite your co-workers. This will be a rolling, informal meeting where we’ll repeat the high points throughout and gear the talk toward the group on-hand.
We’ll continue to schedule Information Meetings through the entire negotiation process. If you’d like to set up a meeting at a time and place that works for you and your co-workers, call the SHARE office (508-929-4020, extension 10) and leave a message.
UMass Memorial works because SHARE does!
Reminder: Memorial SHARE Contract Drop-In TODAY
note time change
Memorial Info Table
May 18 (Wednesday), noon-1:30 pm
outside the amphitheater
Don’t forget to join SHARE organizers today to talk about the upcoming negotiations with UMass Memorial. Share what matters most to you, learn how you can help advocate for a strong contract, and pick up a pin to show your support.
Stop by and pick up pins for yourself and your co-workers . . . UMass Memorial works because SHARE Members do!
SHARE Contract Drop-Ins
Join us as we ready for Contract Negotiations!
Stop by and pick up pins for yourself and your co-workers . . . UMass Memorial works because SHARE Members do!
Join us in-person, virtually, or over the phone to talk about the upcoming negotiations with UMass Memorial. Share what matters most to you, learn how you can help advocate for a strong contract, and pick up a pin to show your support.
Memorial info table
May 18 (Wednesday), 11:30a-1p
outside the amphitheater
University info table
May 26th (Friday), 11:30a-1p
hallway by Prescription Center
Zoom Information Meeting
Thurs 5/19, 11:30a-1:00p
— or —
Phone: 1 646 558 8656 // Meeting ID: 850 8466 6514 // Passcode: 444 290
If you’ve got a camera, we’d love to see you live at the virtual meeting. Either way, please feel free to bring your lunch and your questions, and invite your co-workers. This will be a rolling, informal meeting where we’ll repeat the high points throughout and gear the talk toward the group on-hand.
We’ll continue to schedule Information Meetings through the entire negotiation process. If you’d like to set up a meeting at a time and place that works for you and your co-workers, call the SHARE office (508-929-4020, extension 10) and leave a message.
What's New with Unit Based Teams?
SHARE is excited about a number of recent developments involving Unit Based Teams, or UBTs. Our UBTs, and our union’s partnership with UMass Memorial in improvement work, are designed to change SHARE members’ everyday experience of being at work.
Most UBTs had to pause their improvement work during the omicron surge, but are now getting back into a regular cadence of meeting and working on projects selected by members on the front line. Here are some highlights:
If you see her in the halls, be sure to say hi to Crystal . . . you may remember her as a SHARE member and an employee of the Radiology Department
The Partnership Office is growing! We welcome back former SHARE member Crystal Swenson as she re-joins our hospital as a new UBT coach.
UBTs are now tracking their work using UBT Boards on Innovation Station
A new UBT Toolkit is up on the hub
SHARE leaders are helping UBTs find and fund equity work
New UBTs are currently launching in
Pre Surgical Evaluation (Memorial)
Endoscopy Suite (University)
Endoscopy Scheduling (Hahnemann)
Barre
Heart Station
Rheumatology
You can learn more on the UBT page of the SHARE website and in blog posts marked #UBTs.
SHARE Surveys Winding Up! Plus, UMass Memorial Caregiver Survey on the Way
Last call for SHARE Survey responses! Your perspective is really important to help our union prepare for the upcoming contract negotiations. Also, UMass Memorial’s 2022 Caregiver Survey comes out Wednesday, and we want to encourage you to take that, too.
Each of the surveys is quick, and every survey response is anonymous. For our part, SHARE will use the group results for contract negotiations, and share the results with all SHARE members.
WHY DOES SHARE CARE ABOUT the HOSPITAL’S SURVEY?
SHARE encourages you to take the UMass Memorial survey for a few reasons. SHARE leaders will receive the results, and intends to work with hospital leadership to understand what they say about SHARE members' experiences at work. We will compare the results to those of our own surveys, and involve members to make sense of the data.
The more SHARE members fill out the survey, the more useful the results will be. The hospital has hired Press-Ganey, a nationwide firm, to administer the surveys and ensure confidentiality. Your manager should share results, working with your team to figure out what aspects of your experience that you’d most like to improve, and how you will do it.
If you have concerns in your work area about the way that this is discussed—or is not discussed—please let your SHARE organizer know.
REMINDER: We Want Your Feedback! SHARE Surveys Closing Soon
SHARE continues to collect responses in our series of surveys to prioritize and prepare for our upcoming contract negotiations with UMass Memorial. The “Money & Priorities” survey just opened earlier this week.
Each of the surveys is quick, and every survey response is anonymous. SHARE will use the group results for contract negotiations, and share the results with all SHARE members.
Thank you for helping keep our union strong. And, happy World Hand Hygiene Day!
Final SHARE Negotiations Survey & Free College Information Session
SHARE Negotiating Priorities Survey Available Now
The final survey in SHARE’s series of short surveys to prepare for Contract Negotiations is available now. Help keep our union strong and prepare for negotiations by telling us your thoughts about money, your Covid experience, and SHARE’s priorities for the future.
Info Sessions about UnionPlus Free College Benefit
As a SHARE member, you and your family qualify for the UnionPlus Free College Benefit. Many SHARE members have already taken advantage of this opportunity and have great things to say about this no-cost way to take college courses online and earn a degree.
The Union Plus Free College Benefit Team has set up a pair of virtual information sessions in the evening on May 11 & 12. They will answer any questions you may have about eligibility, degrees offered, transfer of credits or enrollment process.