* Is unionization the way to go in the face of outsourcing?
At the end of last month, I wrote about IT career survival in the face of offshoring. My overriding suggestion was for IT workers to get closer to the core business and use their IT skills, language skills and cultural affinity in ways that made them necessary. Essentially, accept offshoring and outsourcing and adapt. I have recently read of other suggestions, including the unionization of IT workers.
I generally do not like the concept of unions. I tend more towards free market capitalism and survival of the fittest. I think most IT folks come from a strong-minded, problem solving, can-do attitude. The IT crowd does not immediately look like a crowd ripe for unions. The fact that there are currently no strong union footholds in the IT space would support this viewpoint.
Unions became necessary following the industrial revolution, when radical changes in commerce created a major void between labor laws and ethical labor practices. The laws eventually caught up. Looking at the past 20 years it seems as if unions are past their prime. Research by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor shows a decline in union membership from a high in 1983 of 20.1% of the American workforce to 12.5% in 2004.
In late July 2005, two of the largest unions in country, the Service Employees International Union and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, withdrew from the AFL-CIO, a 50-year-old federation of unions. Others are expected to follow. One of the main reasons for the split centers around whether to focus on expansion of worker membership or the continued focus of the AFL-CIO on political lobbying. Expectations are that the unions leaving the AFL-CIO will increase membership efforts to increase their span of influence. One target audience for this membership drive is the IT workforce, a group of workers seriously impacted by the burst of the Internet bubble and the growth of offshore IT outsourcing.
The growth in offshoring has been possible because of megatrends in the globalization of business and technological advances in telecommunications and remote computing. A major shift has occurred in the available labor market. In some ways, the digital revolution has created a major shift in commerce, not unlike the industrial revolution, that has changed how companies use labor to get work done. Do these conditions set the stage for the next wave of growth for unions as they begin to focus on white-collar workers?
Some IT workers have had enough of downsizing and offshoring, forming WashTech/CWA, a national union for high-tech workers. This group backed a recent survey showing that only 54% of the 369 tech workers surveyed said they believed that there would be increased demand for tech workers compared to 65% two years ago. Another group, Alliance@IBM, is an affiliate of the Communications Workers of America union and has existed for several years, representing workers in addressing pension changes and other labor polices at IBM. Clearly there is concern among the IT workforce and traction for the idea of unionizing IT workers.
What all this means to me is that the large employers of IT workers had better balance the needs and concerns of the domestic workforce as it relates to long-term shareholder value while considering short-term cost savings and more immediate share price benefit. However, I still hold to my thought from last month. Individual IT professionals need to make themselves key to the business because this storm will not pass soon.
