Chrysler Corp.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Dec 2, 1968

173 N.L.R.B. 1046 (N.L.R.B. 1968)

1046 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Chrysler Corporation and International Union , United
Automobile , Aerospace and Agricultural Imple-
ment Workers of America ( UAW), Petitioner. Case
8-RC-6973
December 2, 1968
DECISION AND DIRECTION OF ELECTION
BY CHAIRMAN MCCULLOCH AND MEMBERS
FANNING AND JENKINS
Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9(c) of
the National Labor Relations Act, as amended, a
hearing was held before John Kollar, Hearing Of-
ficer.' Thereafter, the Petitioner and the Employer
filed briefs.
Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3(b) of the
National Labor Relations Act, as amended, the
National Labor Relations Board has delegated its
powers in connection with this case to a three-
member panel.
The Board has reviewed the Hearing Officer's
rulings made at the hearing and finds that they are
free from prejudicial error. They are hereby affirmed.
Upon the entire record in the case,' the Board
finds:
1 The Employer is engaged in commerce within
the meaning of the Act and it will effectuate the
purposes of the Act to assert jurisdiction herein.3
2. The labor organization involved claims to repre-
sent certain employees of the Employer.
3 A question affecting commerce exists con-
cerning the representation of certain employees of the
Employer within the meaning of Section 9(c)(1) and
Section 2(6) and (7) of the Act.
4. The Employer is engaged in the manufacture of
automobiles, trucks and other products in at least 50
plants throughout the United States. The Petitioner
seeks a self-determination election among the fol-
lowing unrepresented employees at the Employer's
'Twinsburg, Ohio, plant, to allow them to express
their desire as to whether they wish to be included in
an existing office clerical unit currently represented
by Petitioner:
All Superintendent's Clerks, Project Authorization
Clerk Leaders and/or Coordinators, Project Author-
ization Clerks, and Clerks-Junior II.
The claim for representation of the employees
designated in the present petition was first raised in
Case 8-RC-6846, wherein the same Petitioner
sought to represent a separate unit of "all salaried
office clerical employees classified as superintendent's
clerks, project authorization clerks, unrepresented
clerks junior, and clerks general, employed at the
Twinsburg plant." As one of its alternative positions
in that case, the Petitioner argued that these em-
ployees are a fringe group entitled to a self-determina-
tion election as to whether they wished to be added
to the existing office clerical unit. The Regional
Director dismissed that petition after a hearing, ruling
as to the self-determination election that the voting
group may not be limited to unrepresented employees
in the designated categories at only one plant, but
must include such employees at all of the Employer's
plants in which office clericals are represented as part
of a multiplant unit.' The Petitioner did not request
review. In support of the present petition, the
Petitioner states that it seeks these employees only as
a fringe group, having abandoned any claim that they
constitute a residual unit or a separate unit. The
Employer argues that the present petition should be
dismissed for the same reasons cited by the Regional
Director in the earlier case; and that in any event the
"Superintendent's Clerks" should be excluded from
the proposed voting group because they are con-
fidential employees.
The first office clerical unit at Chrysler was
certified in 1941, with the Petitioner as bargaining
representative. Beginning in 1943, a series of master
agreements have been negotiated between the parties
covering all certified office clerical units at the various
Chrysler plants. The typical pattern has been that a
separate unit would be certified at a particular plant,
then added to the master agreement, thereby amal-
gamating the single-plant unit into a multiplant unit
by subsequent agreement of the parties. The original
office clerical unit at the Twinsburg plant was
certified on April 1, 1966, excluding the classifica-
tions now sought to be represented. On April 11,
1966, the Twinsburg unit was placed, by agreement,
under the master agreement.
All the classifications involved here were in exist-
ence at the time of the Twinsburg certification. The
Petitioner states that it did not know of the existence
of the "Clerks-Junior II" at that time; the parties
I The hearing was directed by the Board on April 10, 1968, when it
reversed the Regional Director's administrative dismissal of the instant
petition
2 At the hearing , the parties stipulated that the transcript of hearing
and exhibits in Case 8 -RC-6846, involving the same parties, be
incorporated into and made a part of the record in the present
proceeding.
3 The Employer argues that dismissal of the present petition is
required by Section 102 67(b) of the Board 's Rules and Regulations and
Statements of Procedure , Series 8, as amended, in the light of the
Regional Director 's dismissal of an earlier petition in Case 8-RC--6846
seeking the same employees as involved herein and the Petitioner's
failure to request review of that dismissal. We find no merit in this
contention Neither the Act nor the Board's Rules and Regulations
prohibit the repeated filings of representation petitions . Indeed, the
Board has held that a prior dismissal by a Regional Director, where
review was not sought (Manemont Inn, 145 NLRB 79, 80, fn 5), or by
the Board itself (Cement Transport, Inc , 162 NLRB No. 117, in. 11)
does not bar subsequent consideration of a new petition even though
the material facts remain unchanged
4 There are approximately 17 employees in the proposed voting
group as compared with approximately 240 in the multiplant group in
those classifications
173 NLRB No. 160
CHRYSLER CORPORATION 1047
had agreed to exclude the other classifications.
Although the superintendent's clerks were then con-
sidered confidential employees, Petitioner currently
represents superintendent's clerks at one of Chrysler's
plants covered by the current master agreement.5
As evidenced by the master agreement and by
Chrysler's corporate structure, there is a substantial
degree of centralization in the labor relations function
between the Employer and its employees, including
its office clencal employees. With respect to the
unrepresented office clerical employees, the Em-
ployer maintains uniform wages, hours, and other
conditions of employment in the two principal
classifications sought to be represented herein, super-
intendent's clerks and project authorization clerks,
and the employees in these classifications have iden-
tical dutes with their counterparts in all other plants.
On the other hand, the master agreement recognizes a
dichotomy between local and central bargaining
matters, and the former are handled primarily at the
local level. This local bargaining has produced, at the
Twinsburg plant, supplemental seniority agreements,
a shift preference agreement, an equalization of
overtime agreement, and various letters and memo-
randa of understanding between the parties. The
closest plant at which office clericals are represented
is over a hundred miles away, and there is no evidence
of employee interchange.
The classifications sought to be added at the
Twinsburg plant constitute all of the unrepresented
office clerical employees who might have been in-
cluded in the original office clerical unit certified at
that plant
The Regional Director previously found, and the
Employer urges, that the unrepresented office clerical
employees at the Twinsburg plant do not constitute
an appropriate voting group for a self-determination
election. It is argued that the minimum group in
which the self-determination election may be con-
ducted must be coextensive with the existing multi-
plant unit. In the circumstances of this case, we
disagree.
In our opinion the employees sought should be
afforded the opportunity to express their preferences
for or against representation by Petitioner in a voting
group of the same scope as that in which the
represented Twinsburg clericals originally expressed
their choice. The unrepresented Twinsburg clericals
share a basic community of interest with other
Twinsburg clericals by virtue of separate supervision,
the absence of interchange and the distance between
plants, which outweighs whatever interests in com-
mon they may have with their counterparts at other
Chrysler plants. These employees could have ex-
pressed their choice in a unit limited to Twinsburg
clericals if included in the original election which
5 The record does not indicate the circumstances under which the
parties agreed to include superintendent 's clerks at that plant
resulted in the Petitioner's certification. Although it is
clear that the Board would, at that time, have
included them, they were denied the right to partici-
pate in the election without Board consideration of
the issue, because the parties stipulated to a unit
which failed to include them. Furthermore, and
equally clear is the fact that a self-determination
election limited to the unrepresented Twinsburg
clericals could not presently be denied had the parties
not agreed to merge the certified Twinsburg clerical
unit into the multiplant unit. In our opinion, neither
the initial stipulation to their exclusion, nor the
merger of the certified unit, should operate to require
the employees sought to express their choice in an
election which includes like classifications at distant
plants, or not at all. As it would not effectuate
statutory policies to construe the agreements between
the parties in a manner which denies the unrepre-
sented Twinsburg clericals the opportunity to vote
under the same conditions afforded represented cler-
icals, not only at Twinsburg, but at other Chrysler
plants as well, we find that a single plant, residual,
voting group is appropriate for purposes of a self-
determination election herein.
The "Superintendent's Clerks," who the Employer
argues should be excluded as confidential employees,
are assigned to superintendents within various depart-
ments of the plant who supervise foremen and have
control over 150 to 600 production and maintenance
employees but are not the heads of their respective
departments. These superintendents participate in
labor relations policy only in an advisory capacity.
The Employer has a total of about 228 superintend-
ent's clerks in all of its domestic plants, including 200
in the plants covered by the master agreement.
There are 11 superintendent's clerks at the Twins-
burg plant, they work in the manufacturing office in
the middle of the plant in the monitor area, which is a
second floor office area suspended over the produc-
tion floor, except that three work for superintendents
who have offices on the production floor. They do
not take dictation. They do typing and filing for their
respective superintendents and take telephone mes-
sages. They pick up and distribute mail, obtain
employees' checks from payroll and deliver them to
the foremen for distribution. They perform a variety
of detailed clerical work, including setting up produc-
tion count sheets, logging calls from foremen for
oilers, and taking hourly employee attendance for
their respective department areas. They maintain
records of attendance, absenteeism, and vacation time
for salaried employees and prepare a summary record
thereof for the signature of the superintendent, which
report is then forwarded to the personnel department.
They maintain records of discipline, change of status,
and types of grievances of employees. They type
copies of grievances and answers for foremen, distrib-
ute them as required and enter them into a book
1048 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
which is available to the Union steward. There was
testimony that they type recommendations with
respect to promotions of bargaining unit employees,
which information would not be available to the
Union. They type the departmental manpower budget
proposed by the superintendents to support the
production schedule. They attend meetings where
they are informed as to plant reductions in force,
copies of which layoffs are given to Union representa-
tives on all shifts. They attend other meetings where
they are instructed as to the meaning and Employer's
interpretation of new collective-bargaining contracts
with the Union. They sometimes type the super-
intendents' appraisals and recommendations to the
labor relations department with respect to matters
which are the subject of collective bargaining with the
Union. There was testimony that in some instances
the information accessible to them was not available
to Union representatives, but generally most of the
information with which they are concerned is either
available or ultimately made available to Union
representatives.
Since the B F. Goodrich case,' the Board has
consistently held that an employee will not be
regarded as confidential merely by virtue of being a
secretary to a person involved in the handling of
grievances, or of his having access to labor relations
data. We do not regard the kind of labor relations
functions that the superintendents engage in as
placing their clerks in a confidential status with regard
to labor relations. As to the parties' agreement in the
past that these clerks would be excluded as confi-
dential, which in any case would not be binding on
the Board, we note that the pattern of exclusion has
not been consistent, since the Petitioner currently
represents the same classification of employees at one
of the Employer's plants. Accordingly, we shall
include the superintendent's clerks in the voting
group set forth below, which we find appropriate for
purposes of a self-determination election:
All superintendent's clerks, project authorization
clerk leaders and/or coordinators, project authori-
zation clerks, and clerks-Junior II at the Em-
ployer's Twinburg, Ohio, plant, excluding all
others.
If a majority of the employees in the voting group
vote for the Petitioner, they will be taken to have
indicated their desire to be included in the existing
office clerical unit currently represented by Petitioner
and the Regional Director will issue a certification to
that effect.
[Direction of Election omitted from publication.] 7
6 The B. F Goodrich Company, 115 NLRB 722, 724 Cf The
National Cash Register Company , 168 NLRB No 130
7 An election eligibility list, containing the names and addresses of
all the eligible voters, must be filed by the Employer with the Regional
Director for Region 8 within 7 days after the date of this Decision and
Direction of Election . The Regional Director shall make the list
available to all parties to the election No extension of time to file this
list shall be granted by the Regional Director except in extraordinary
circumstances . Failure to comply with this requirement shall be grounds
for setting aside the election whenever proper objections are filed.
Excelsior Underwear Inc , 156 NLRB 1236