Off-shoring is becoming passé
That's according to this Business Week article flagged up to me by Dave Whalin who is based in the US.
The article looks at the rise of so called 'Home-shoring'; people (mainly women) working from home covering call-centre style functions.
Of course homeworking is nothing new in the UK. According to the National Group on Homeworking (NGH) there are over 1m industrial homeworkers in the UK already, and their isolation, uncertain employment status and reliance on 'middle-men' mean they are often vulnerable to exploitation and abuse from employers.
As a trade unionist my first reaction is to cry foul and bemoan the rise of home-working and home-shoring; but my experience of working with the NGH a couple of years ago made me realise that as uncomfortable a truth as it may be, some women -particularly those with caring responsibilities - see this sort of pattern of working as a godsend. The problem isn't homeworking itself, the problem is that employment and health and safety legislation (in both the US and UK) just isn't robust enough to protect these workers.
Unions too have struggled (for good reason - its not an easy or straightforward task) to organise these workers, or more to the point, to help these workers organise themselves. However according to the NGH four out of ten 10 homeworkers would actively welcome some sort of trade union involvement, with only 5% of those surveyed feeling that unions have nothing to offer them. Indeed, there is some international experience, most notably that of TCFUA in Australia, which shows that unions can effectively organise and represent this group of workers.
These sort of trends pose a lot of hard questions for unions. Can we stand Canute-like and try to reverse these sorts of trends in employment, or do we instead try and develop flexible models of trade unionism which ensure that workers, wherever or however they are employed get respect at work. On the other hand is this sort of approach the thin end of dangerous wedge?
Any thoughts or opinions on this?
posted by Paul @ Thursday, January 19, 2006
4 Comments:
Connect has had National Agreements on 'Teleworking' (Homeworking) for many years and they represent quite a few people. I used to know quite a few of these homeworkers and they loved it.
you sound like one of those guys whose philosphy on employee relations is do as i say not as i do. all uk trade union's think that technical change and advancement is something that will disappear so why get too involved. if that is the outlook they have for their own organisations how can trade unions ever hope to get a grip of the social impact of tech change either inside the workplace or at home.
ps mrs k. when was the last time connect updated their agreements - teleworking is a phrase that comes straight out of the 80's just like cottaging.
this is exactly my point - british TU's dont know their arses from their elbows.
to them someone like you paul who comes along (claiming to be soooo net savvy) would have my union officials turning in their executive council seats.
next time you blah on to a union talk to them about blogging-stand back and watch. i know my tu dont even let their officials open their own emails. (another example of not coming to terms - how long have emails been around?)
Can't remember that I've ever claimed or tried to be perceived as being 'soooo net savvy', but leaving that aside...
Think you are underestimating unions and union activists anon. Yes there are problems with unions using the web and ICT effectively but, for example:
Over 8,500 lay union reps in the UK subscribe to www.unionreps.org.uk and nearly 90% of these use the internet every day
1/3 of all union reps use the internet on a regular basis to support their reps role
And there’s lots of evidence that unions are beginning to think about how they use the web creatively (see http://www.iir.berkeley.edu/events/fall04/seminars/freeman/freeman.pdf ,for more info)
PS re Mrs K's point. Whatever you call it (teleworking, home-shoring, home-working) doesn't this point show precisely that some unions were thinking long term about how to face up the challenge posed by new tech?
Anonymous
OK, so you have a new name for it - but I have been retired for some time now and the 'agreements' I referred to where negotiated in the early 80'.
Not so surprising as I started on WPs and then basic office computers in early 81 and that was in a Trade Union Office.
By the way, Connect is a telecommunications union and has one of the most active and high tech office and network with its members.
Check it out.
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