Gardner-Denver Co.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Mar 17, 1949

82 N.L.R.B. 201 (N.L.R.B. 1949)

In the Matter of GARDNER-DENVER COMPANY, EMPLOYER and OFFICE
EMPLOYEES INTERNATIONAL UNION, LocAL No. 5, AFL, PETITIONER
Case No. 30-RC-130.-Decided Marclz 17, 1949
DECISION
AND
DIRECTION OF ELECTION
Upon a petition duly filed, a hearing was held before a hearing offi-
cer of the National Labor Relations Board. The hearing officer's rul-
ings made at the hearing are free from prejudicial error and are hereby
affirmed.,
Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3 (b) of the National Labor
Relations Act, the Board has delegated its powers in connection with
this case to a three-man panel.*
Upon the entire record in this case, the Board finds :
1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of
the National Labor Relations Act.
2. The Petitioner and the Intervenor are labor organizations claim-
ing to represent employees of the Employer.
3. A question affecting commerce exists concerning the represen-
tation of employees of the Employer, within the meaning of Section
9 (c) (1) and Section 2 (6) and (7) of the Act.
4. The appropriate unit :
The production and maintenance employees and the plant clericals
at the Employer's Denver, Colorado, plant are represented by the
3 The Petitioner objected to participation in this proceeding by the Intervenor , Inter-
national Union , United Automobile , Aircraft and Agricultural Implement Workers of
America , CIO, on the ground that the latter was "fronting" for United Steel Workers of
America , a labor organization which represents the Employer's production and-
mainte-nance employees, but which is not in compliance with Section 9 (f), (g), and (h) of the
Act. In support of this charge , the Petitioner offered in evidence an affidavit by one of its
organizers to the effect that an official of the Steel Workers had stated that be would
interest either the Intervenor or another CIO union in organizing the employees herein
Involved should non-compliance with Section 9 (f), (g), and ( h) of the Act prevent the
Steel Workers from pressing its demand for recognition . As this was not probative evi-
dence that the Intervenor was acting on behalf of a non -complying organization , we affirm
the hearing officer 's refusal to accept the Petitioner 's affidavit in evidence.
* Chairman Herzog and Members Houston and Murdock.
82 N. L. R. B., No. 23.
201
202 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Steel Workers. Both the Petitioner and the Intervenor herein seek
to represent the office and clerical employees. The parties stipulated
as to the appropriateness of a unit composed of all the employees on
the office pay roll of the Employer, excluding department heads with
supervisory authority, assistants to the personnel director, confidential
secretaries, time-study engineers, rate setters, routing engineers, and
the manager of the employees' credit union. The parties were in
dispute, however, as to the assistant department heads, the labor
organizations seeking their inclusion, and the Employer contending
that they are supervisors within the meaning of Section 2 (11) of the
Act, and must therefore be excluded. The parties were also in dis-
pute as to the chemists, metallographer, designing engineers, me-
chanical engineers, tool designers, and draftsmen, the labor organiza-
tions seeking their inclusion, and the Employer contending that they
are professional employees within the meaning of Section 2 (12) of
the Act, and, therefore, in accordance with Section 9 (b) (1) of the
Act, cannot be included unless a majority of them vote for inclusion
in a unit of non-professional employees. Both the Petitioner and
the Intervenor, while arguing the appropriateness of the more com-
prehensive unit, expressed a willingness to participate in a separate
election among these employees should the Board direct such an
election.
The assistant department heads, according to the Employer's un-
contradicted testimony, have authority to hire and discharge em-
ployees, and spend much of their time supervising employees during
the frequent absences of their respective department heads. There-
fore, although some of the departments seem unusually small to require,
two supervisors, we find that assistant department heads are supervi-
sors within the meaning of Section 2 (11) of the Act.
The chemists make chemical and metallurgical analyses of the
steel used in rock drills manufactured by the Employer, 2 and of the
plating solutions used in the production process. They also do some
experimental work with lubricating oils used on the rock drills. The.
Employer generally requires applicants for jobs as chemists to have
2 years of college training. This requirement can be waived, how-
ever, if the applicant has had sufficient practical experience. All
three chemists now employed by the Employer have had 2 years of
college training, and are acquiring additional education in their free
time although it is not required of them by the Employer.
The chemists are aided in their work by a metallographer, wha
makes micro-analyses of steel with a photo-microscope, and who can
also make a few of the routine chemical analyses. He has had no
2 Some steel analyses are made by the Employer for other companies.
GARDNER-DENVER COMPANY 203;
education beyond high school, and seems to have acquired in the course
of his work the special training required for his job.
The designing engineers and the mechanical engineers make and
improve the designs for the rock drills. The tool designers design the
tools for the production of the drills. They are required to know the
production methods in the plant and to have actual shop experience.
There is also a tool engineer who works with the tool designers as a
consultant, and who purchases tools. The draftsmen prepare the
manufacturing blueprints from the designs produced by the engineers.
The blueprints boy makes and delivers blueprints .3 There is constant
consultation and exchange of ideas between these groups, whose func-
tions, although segregated into separate departments, overlap consid-
erably. Because of the high degree of specialization required of em-
ployees in these categories, the Employer cannot hire individuals
qualified to meet its requirements, but must train them on the job. To
be hired as an apprentice draftsman or as a blueprint boy, an applicant
must have a high school education and a knowledge of trigonometry
and logarithms. After a training course lasting from 3 to 6 years,
depending on his ability, an apprentice becomes a class "B" drafts-
man,4 from which position he may advance to a higher classification.
Although the Employer maintains that education accelerates the rate
at which proficiency in the work is acquired, it does not require such
further education as a prerequisite for promotions, which depend pri-
marily on the "inventive genius" of the individual and his ability to get
along with people. The lack of formal educational requirements is
indicated by the fact that only two of the seven designing and mechan-
ical engineers have college or engineering degrees. On the other hand,
one of the class "B" draftsmen has a Master of Engineering degree.
As stated above, the Employer contends that the employees in the,
disputed categories described above are professional employees. It is
clear, from the description of their training and duties, that they are
at least highly skilled technical employees. The Board has adopted,
the policy of establishing separate units of technical employees and
of office clerical employees where, as here, any party objected to the-
inclusion of these groups in a single Unit .5 It is therefore unnecessary,.
8 The blueprint boy is required to have a high school education , and is given drafting
instruction in his spare time. Eventually he may be promoted to a job as a draftsman.
What connection , if any, exists between his training and that of the apprentices does not
appear from the record.
& It is not clear from the record whether all the Employer 's draftsmen have served as
apprentices , or whether some had been hired as draftsmen . There are at present two
individuals apprenticed to the tool designers who have completed apprenticeships as
draftsmen.
Matter of American Cyanamid Company, 73 N. L. R. B. 144; Matter of The Adams if
Westlake Company, 72 N. L . R. B. 726 ; Matter of American Smelting and Refining Com-
pany, 80 N. L. R. B. 68.
204 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
under the circumstances of this case, to determine whether or not these
employees meet the strict requirements of the definition of professional
employees contained in Section 2 (12) of the Act as they would be
placed in a separate unit in any event. Inasmuch, however, as neither
the Petitioner nor the Intervenor has presented any evidence of interest
among the employees in the disputed categories, we shall direct no
election involving them .6
Accordingly, we find that all employees on the office pay roll of the
Employer at its Denver, Colorado, plant, excluding all production'&nd
maintenance employees, plant clericals, assistants to the personnel
director, confidential secretaries,' time-study engineers, rate setters,
routing engineers, the manager of the employees' credit union, tech-
nical employees,8 department heads and assistant department heads
with supervisory authority, and all other supervisors within the mean-
ing of the Act, constitute a unit appropriate for the purposes of collec-
tive bargaining within the meaning of Section 9 (b) of the Act.
DIRECTION OF ELECTION 9
As part of the investigation to ascertain representatives for the pur-
poses of collective bargaining with the Employer, an election by secret
ballot shall be conducted as early as possible, but not later than 30 days
from the date of this Direction, under the direction and supervision
of the Regional Director for the Region in which this case was heard,
and subject to Sections 203.61 and 203.62 of National Labor Relations
Board Rules and Regulations-Series 5, as amended, among the em-
ployees in the unit found appropriate in paragraph numbered 4, above,
who were employed during the pay-roll period immediately preceding
the date of this Direction of Election, including employees who did
not work during said pay-roll period because they were ill or on vaca-
tion or temporarily laid off, but excluding those employees who have
since quit or been discharged for cause and have not been rehired or
reinstated prior to the date of the election, and also excluding em-
ployees on strike who are not entitled to reinstatement, to determine
whether they desire to be represented, for purposes of collective bar-
gaining, by Office Employees International Union, Local No. 5, AFL,
or by International Union, United Automobile, Aircraft and Agricul-
tural Implement Workers of America, CIO, or by neither.
9 Matter of Sigmund Cohn Mfg. Co ., Inc., 75 N. L. R. B. 177.
T This category includes the secretaries to the vice -president in charge of operations, to
the head of the legal department , and to the personnel department.
8 Excluded from the unit as technical employees are the chemists , metallographer, de-
signing engineers , mechanical engineers , tool designer , tool engineer , draftsmen, their
apprentices , and the blueprint boy.
Any participant in the election directed herein may, upon its prompt request to and
approval thereof by the Regional Director , have its name removed from the ballot.