Panel Sees Progress In Labor Relations

Harvard has made considerable progress in the workplace since the pre-Harvard Union of Clerical and Technical Workers era, but the University still needs to work on labor relations, according to a panel who spoke to an audience of approximately 150 at Longfellow Hall last night.

Speakers at "Harvard at a Cross-roads: Negotiations With the Harvard Union of Clerical and Technical Workers" agreed that the most recent contract negotiations between the union and the administration were much rougher than the negotiations of the original contract in 1989.

John Hoerr, a freelance journalist who wrote about the union for the summer 1993 issue of the American Prospect, said he was surprised that the University had appointed negotiators who were not experience with union relations in the second negotiations.

"This contentions project did not comport with the cooperative relations management and labor had developed three years ago," he said.

Diane Patrick, the current manager of human resources who was a management negotiator in the 1992 negotiations, was scheduled to be on the panel but did not attend because of illness, the moderator said.

Hoerr said he had been very impressed by the willingness of both sides in 1989 and 1992 to forego detailed rules concerning management behavior and employee-management relations and to work together to from a mutually beneficial agreement.

Kristine Rondeau, lead organizer for the union, said that none of the original union members felt as though the managers were the enemy. "We actually organized out of some sort of affection for the place," she said.

Rondeau said she felt a transition period where the union and management could discuss their experiences, as was set up by Lamont University Professor Emeritus John T. Dunlop, then the chief University negotiator, in 1989, would have helped the process run more smoothly the second time

Rondeau said she felt a transition period where the union and management could discuss their experiences, as was set up by Lamont University Professor Emeritus John T. Dunlop, then the chief University negotiator, in 1989, would have helped the process run more smoothly the second time