“Make Them Change or Make Them Leave”
—guest post by Local 328 unit steward Jackie Lombard—
Thank you to our union staff and to the union attorney! Thank you to our union leadership at all levels.To my fellow employees: You may have a “Forbes” or a “Frengle” for a manager or director. You may have a bully for a boss. We all know someone at OHSU who works under a corrupt, negative and abusive individual.We all know.Here’s what you can do to help yourself or a coworker:
Take notes about your boss’s behavior and conversations. Take the notes right in front of them.
Read the Local 328 contract and the OHSU Code of Conduct.
Send an email to your boss after every conversation to document the encounter and the information that was discussed.
Contact our union to help you, and take your notes with you. Our union can help you file a grievance for contract violations, file unfair labor practice complaints with the state and STAND with you, literally, when you talk to HR or you boss or your boss’s boss.
Organize in your work area and collectively KEEP TALKING, KEEP QUESTIONING, KEEP GOING UP THE CHAIN until your boss stops or is removed.
It’s hard. It’s scary. It will take persistence and time. Believe me, I know. But it is the only way to change this organization. It will work. Just ask anyone from Rehabilitation Services.We cannot rely on Dr. Jacobs, the OHSU board, anyone in the executive leadership or many directors or managers to do the right thing and abide by the OHSU’s Code of Conduct. They have at worst created and at best known but done nothing about a workplace culture that promotes and supports “Aanus” and “Pumpkin Eater” and “Vragina” behavior. This can be seen in the results of past and current employee engagement surveys, in OHSU’s bargaining strategies, in the current censorship on OHSU Now, in the continued employment of managers and directors known to their peers and to HR to be “problematic” and in the utterly inadequate apology from Dr. Jacobs for the behavior of Dan Forbes and Patrick Frengle.WE have to make them change or make them leave.Finally, we are not just stronger together — we are unstoppable. Stand up for your coworkers and reject OHSU ‘s lies by voting to strike if OHSU doesn’t show up on August 13 and give us what we ALL need and deserve: RESPECT, by means of not just a fair but a great contract.