Usdaw’s Organising Academy gives experienced
Reps the chance to take a six month secondment to develop their
organising skills in a range of different workplaces. For the first
time last year, a lifelong learning project was added to the
organisers’ brief. The results were so impressive that lifelong
learning was again part of the Academy programme in 2011.
This year’s results confirmed that learning is
a powerful organising tool, especially in the hands of trained and
committed Organisers. “Our figures show that the Organising
Officers are a real bonus to our Check Out Learning Campaigns”
says Ann Murphy, Usdaw’s Lifelong Learning Project Manager. “They
bring new ideas, improve recruitment, develop Reps and boost
learning. That’s a pretty impressive contribution”
The Organising Officers' knowledge of
learning varies. Some are experienced ULRs who have set up learning
in their own workplace – others have no experience of lifelong
learning at all. “We run a one day briefing programme on our
learning campaign to get them up to scratch” explains Phil Gander,
ex Academy Organiser and now Usdaw’s Project Worker in the Eastern
Division. “Then we take them out to their campaign store and get
them to work with the Reps to organise their Check Out Learning
Campaign.”
William Waite, one of the Eastern Division
Organising Officers was pleased to use learning as part of his
campaign. “This particular campaign is one I hold very close as it
relates personally to me on so many levels” he said. “It helps
older people keep active and gets parents and grandparents
supporting their children with their reading and maths. Mind you,
it’s a good organising tool as well. We recruited 10 new members
and 3 new Reps in our store campaign. My message is join a Union
and keep on learning.
“The Organising Officers work really well
with the store Reps” adds Midlands’s Project Worker Neil Chapman.
“They attend the Reps meeting and involve all Reps in the Check Out
Learning Campaign. They encourage ULRs to attend the meetings and
support them to get involved and work with the Reps to identify
candidates in stores where we don’t have ULRs. It’s the one
team approach and it leaves solid organisation in place when the
campaign is over.”
In the North East, Organising
Officer Angelique Audas set up an ambitious project to develop
a more integrated and long term approach to campaigning. “We wanted
to try out a week long campaign to raise awareness of Usdaw across
the store – to make sure that existing members were getting the
most out of their Union and to let non-members know what they were
missing out on” explains Angelique.
Working closely with Mobile Union Learning
Representative Tracy White, Angelique and the store Reps at
the Seacroft store in Leeds, set up three interlinked campaigns, -
Parents and Carers, Checkout Learning and Professional Drivers - to
run all week. The store Rep’s updated their Union noticeboard with
promotional materials on the three campaigns and also organised
team 5 briefings and hand-outs on the events.
The added benefits of running a longer
campaign were clear from the level of membership involvement during
the week. “Although store density was around 50%, many members had
the 'Union doesn’t do anything for me' approach” explains Martyn
Warwick, the Divisional Project Worker, “but by talking to and
engaging the members in the campaign across the whole week, Reps
were able to highlight the range of benefits Usdaw offers
members”.
And as the week went on, it became clear that
people saw the wide range of positive things that Usdaw does for
its members. “Many members don’t realise what they are missing out
on“, observes Angelique “so as well as getting 28 new members,
loads of existing members realised that they are getting great
value for their Union subscriptions”.
Angelique is now a Stand Down Rep and is
determined to use learning as part of her work. “Learning fits with
so many of our campaigns” she says, “Just look at Parents and
Carers, many people need a confidence boost when they come back to
work and learning is such a positive way of providing it and it’s
through their Union. Perfect”
“We’ve only just finished this year’s Academy
programme and need to look at it in detail to identify the good
practice.” explains Ann. “But already it’s pretty clear that
our involvement in the Academy is helping to mainstream learning
across the Divisions. Deputy Divisional Officers and Area
Organisers are closely involved in campaigns and the work done
by the Organising Officers shows just how well learning
can help to build the Union team, revitalise and involve existing
members and bring in new ones.”