The Monarch Machine Tool Co.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Apr 23, 1952

98 N.L.R.B. 1243 (N.L.R.B. 1952)

THE MONARCH MACHINE TOOL CO. 1243
THE MONARCH MACHINE TOOL Co. and UNITED ELECTRICAL, RADIO'&
MACHINE WORKERS OF AMERICA, UE, PETITIONER. Case No.
8-RC-1514. April 23,1952
Decision and Order
Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9 (c) of the National Labor
Relations Act, a hearing was held before John A. Hull, Jr., -hearing
officer. The'hearing officer's rulings made at the hearing are free from
prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed.
Upon the entire record in this case, the Board finds :
1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of the
Act.
2. The labor organization involved claims to represent employees
of the Employer.
3. No question affecting commerce exists concerning the representa-
tion of employees of the Employer within the meaning of Section 9
(c) (1) and Section 2 (6) and (7,) of the Act, for the following
reasons:1
The Petitioner seeks to represent a separate unit composed of all
methods and standards department employees at the Employer's
Sidney, Ohio, plant, excluding all other employees, guards, profes-
sional employees, and supervisors as defined in the Act. The Employer
contends that methods and standards department employees are a
specialized type of managerial or confidential employees, and may not
constitute an appropriate unit because they establish methods and
standards which govern the work of the production and maintenance
employees represented by the Petitioner.
The Employer is engaged in the production of metal lathes and
other machine tools. As noted above, its production and maintenance
employees are now represented by the Petitioner in a separate unit.
No union has ever bargained for the employees here sought, or for the
other employees.
There are 22 employees (15 rate setters, 2 adjusters, a router, and 4
clerical employees) now assigned to the methods and standards depart-
ment. Collectively, these employees determine production standards,
which are necessary to the Employer's wage incentive plan. The rate
1 The Employer claims that the Petitioner has agreed not to represent these employees
by the contract between the Employer and the Petitioner , in effect until May 23, 1953,
and that the petition should be dismissed This contention stems from the specific
exclusion of the employees sought in the present proceeding from the production and
maintenance unit covered by the contract The contract thus does not contain any
provisions concerning the terms and conditions of employment of these employees . Afore.
over, it contains no promise , express or implied, that the Petitioner will refrain from also
seeking to represent these employees We find no merit in the Employer ' s contention
Martin Parry Corporation , 95 NLRB 1506.
9S NLRB No. 196
1244 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
setters work almost exclusively from a book of standards, and make
no time studies at all.; they compute standards for new production
machines from blueprints and engineering figures. Where estab-
lished standards are challenged, time studies are made in the plant by
the adjusters, who spend about 25 percent of their time in production
departments. The router fixes manufacturing schedules for compo-
nents of finished products. The clerical employees perform routine
filing, typing, and other clerical tasks within the department.
The work of the rate setters, adjusters, and the router requires, in
varying degree, some exercise of initiative and discretion, as well as
a facility with figures and drawings. Their chief function, however,
is to provide data for the proper operation of a wage incentive plan
applicable to the Employer's production and maintenance employees.
They do not formulate management policies, nor do they handle labor
relations negotiations or deal with confidential labor relations data.
Accordingly, we do not consider them to be either managerial or
confidential employees.2
The initiative and discretion required of these employees and the
relative complexity of their work, compared with that of the
Employer's clerical force, indicates that methods and standards
department personnel are technical employees. On the other hand,
they have many interests and working conditions in common with
the Employer's clerical employees. However, a determination of
their status as either technical or clerical employees is not necessary
to a resolution of the issues presented in this proceeding. Among the
employees in the Employer's office not now represented by any bar-
gaining agent are an undisclosed number of draftsmen, designing
engineers, and experimental technicians. The Employer denies the
technical status of the first two categories, but concedes it to the
experimental employees. On this state of the record, it is clear that
there are some technical employees now employed by the Employer
outside the methods and standards department. There are also many
clerical employees who are not included in the unit sought.
It appears to us that the interests and duties of the methods and
standards department employees are not so clearly distinguishable
from those of other technical or clerical employees as to warrant the
establishment of a unit limited to the methods and standards depart-
ment alone. Our dissenting colleagues, however, urge us to grant
separate representation to the proposed unit, on the apparent ground
that its members are like time-study employees, who have in some
cases been held a functionally coherent and distinct group. We are
not satisfied that they are like time-study employees, as only 2 of the
18 nonclerical employees in the methods and standards department
2 Minneapolis-Moline Company, 85 NLRB 597.
THE MONARCH MACHINE TOOL CO. 1"245
do time-study work, and even they do it only for about 25 percent
of their work day. In addition, to adopt the reasoning of the dissent
would commit the Board to examine in detail each job within a group
classification, such as technicians, and to sever a part of the group
wherever it performs tasks differing from those of the remaining
employees. The- only case cited by the dissent which severed time-
study employees from other technicals is Westinghouse Electric
Corp., 74 NLRB 94 (1947). Since then, however, the Board has
firmly established and followed the rule of not creating a unit includ-
ing some, but not all, of an employer's technical employees.3
To hold the proposed unit appropriate would require the Board to
accord controlling effect to the Petitioner's extent of organization
among the unorganized employees at the Employer's plant. Section
9 (c) (5) of the amended Act forbids this result. Accordingly, we
find that a unit of methods and standards department employees is
inappropriate for the purposes of collective bargaining.4
As the Petitioner has failed to show that the employees sought in
this proceeding constitute a unit appropriate for the purposes of
collective bargaining, we shall dismiss the petition.
Order
IT Is HEREBY ORDERED that the petition filed herein be, and it
hereby is, dismissed.
MEMBERS HOUSTON and STYLES, dissenting :
We 'do not agree with our colleagues of the majority that to direct
an election here would be to give controlling effect to the Petitioner's
extent of organization.
The employees sought here perform, as a closely knit group, a func-
tion which is typical of time-study personnel and is therefore tech-
nical in nature .-5 The collective function of these employees, as the
majority finds, is to determine production standards' basic to a
proper operation of a wage incentive plan for production and
maintenance employees. In carrying out this collective responsi-
bility the rate setters compute standards for new production machines
from blueprints and engineering figures; 6 the adjusters make time
studies to justify the standards; and the router fixes the manufac-
turing schedules.
8 See, for example, General Motors Corporation , 92 NLRB 1589, 1591.
4 Alpine Metals Manufacturing Company, 95 NLRB 1186; Sperry Gyroscope Company,
94 NLRB 1724.
, Florence Stove Lompany, 94 NLRB 1434. Brown & Sharpe Mfg. Co , 87 NLRB 1031.
Although the majority avoids making a flat finding that these employees are technical
employees, we cannot take seriously their suggestion that they might even be clerical
employees.
Setting rates for the proper operation of an incentive wage plan is, despite the contrary
implication of the majority, an inseparable part of a time-study function. See Brown
& Sharpe Mfg. Co. (footnote 5, supra). The 15 rate setters are thus clearly engaged in
time-study work.
1246 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Despite the patent functional coherence, identity, and distinctness
of these technical employees, the majority would deny them separate
representation because there are at this plant other employees in tech-
nical classifications. They do not suggest how the mere presence
at the plant of draftsmen or other technical employees who perform
work totally different from that of the employees involved impairs
the identity or feasibility of a unit of these employees. In our opinion,
there is no tenable basis for such an exaltation of form over sub-
stance. Indeed, it overlooks the Board's express recognition of the
distinctness and functional homogeneity of employees similar to those
involved here.7
Accordingly, as there is no warrant for dismissing the petition on
the basis of Section 9 (c) (5) of the Act, the Board should direct an
election in the appropriate unit.
7 Chicago Pneumatic Tool Company , 81 NLRB 584 and cases cited therein. In West-
inghouse Electric Corp ., 74 NLRB 94 , the Board commented upon the unit placement of
time-study employees as follows :
Inasmuch as their duties and interests usually differ we have generally excluded
time-study men from units of office and clerical, technical and production employees.
(Emphasis supplied.)
We perceive no basis for concluding , as apparently does the majority , that the General
Motors case ( footnote 3. supra ) has, in effect, overruled these cases.
MANHATTAN COIL CORPORATION AND/OR HOLFAST RUBBER COMPANY
and DISTRICT LODGE No. 46, INTERNATIONAL . ASSOCIATION OF MA-
CHINISTS , AFL, PETITIONER . Case No. 1O-RC-1754. April 23,
1952
Decision and Direction of Election
Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9 (c) of the National
Labor Relations Act, a hearing was held before Paul L. Harper,
hearing officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the hearing are
free from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed.
Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3 (b) of the Act, the Board
has delegated its powers in connection with this case to a three-member
panel [Members Houston, Murdock and Styles].
Upon the entire record in this case, the Board finds :
1. The Employer 1 is engaged in commerce within the meaning of
the Act.
2. The labor organizations involved claim to represent employees
of the Employer.
' The name of the Employer appears as corrected at the hearing.
98 NLRB No. 194.