Strike?
 

After the complete winter meltdown that we have been having, when will we decide to actually threaten to strike? SWA has become so embarrassing that I think a strike from all employees is necessary at this point. We need to fire all of management and get a fresh start. The operation is beyond ridiculous at this point.

I'm not sure to what degree you're intending to be hyperbolic, but "a strike from all employees" isn't something that is legally possible right now at SWA. I'm not certain how many of our employee groups are even in negotiations at the moment, let alone in mediation, which is a necessary prequisite for the credible threat of a strike to even begin to become possible sometime down the road under the RLA.

Employee groups can't legally just walk off the job in response to an event or series of events. The proven surest way to strip a union of leverage at the bargaining table is for it's members to engage in an illegal job action by doing something like you possibly seem to be proposing.

Take the case of the ABX pilots. In 2016, they engaged in what the the court determined was an illegal job action. They ended up spending 2,342 days in mediation before settling their contract in 2021. The average number of days spent in mediation of NMB dispute cases closed from 2017 through 2022? 611, or 562 if adjusted for the pause in negotiations during the pandemic. An illegal job action gives a mediator lots of ammunition to keep a case in mediation far beyond the average length of time in mediation.

Employee unions have to methodically walk down the RLA path if they want to be able to wave the strength of the strongest economic weapon available to labor in the face of management. They can't go wildcat.

If they're able to exhibit the patience to play the RLA game as it's required to be played, though, and not balk as their leverage is just beginning to ramp up the way that the Alaska and Delta pilots balked over the last few months, the amount of pressure that can be brought to bear on management can exceed by orders of magnitude the pressure created by any other tool available to them.

I appreciate the response Lew…while I don’t mean literally everyone strike it’s more of a mindset. In order to make change we have to be willing to walk. Look at Delta…their pilot group did it. Enough is enough.

Right around Spring Break or Summer would be perfect for a SAV. SWA cannot afforded another black eye . This Christmas meltdown is going to really hurt WN when the truth gets out .

Let’s hope so. There needs to be a major shake up in management. Of course, I give that slim to none odds as I’ve been witnessing the “We’re the best and do everything the best” mindset for over a decade now. Sorry, but that’s not changing.

Southwest exceptionalism. Yeah right.

Our meltdowns are the biggest and the best. Everyone agrees. Yugely successful at failing epically.

The Delta pilot group did it right, IMO, up until they agreed to an AIP that was far short of the "generational" improvement that had been rumored. They folfded just as their leverage was beginning to accelerate.

A SAV isn't the end of the RLA path (just for clarification, a SAV is required by the SWAPA Constitution, not by the RLA, before going on strike). A SAV ratchets up the pressure on management by helping to establish the credibility of the strike threat posed by a work group. But there's far more pressure available to labor under the RLA beyond a successful SAV.

Pressure on management increases even more as a release from mediation becomes realistic because of what management knows is coming if the dispute is released from mediation.. Following a release from mediation, pressure on management dramatically amps up as passengers begin booking away from an airline that might soon go on strike. Then, in the extremely unlikely event that management is foolish enough to allow a dispute to go all the way to a strike, the pressure upon them goes stratospheric as they contend with losing more than $60 million dollars per day in revenue, not to mention the intangible hit to the value of the "luv" brand that would compound each day they allowed a strike to drag on.

In broad terms, we'd be foolish to ratify what management offers after a SAV but before the pressure on them truly starts revving up unless a TA satisfies every single one of our demands and then some.

I don’t disagree…honestly after this meltdown it’s more leverage if we use it correctly. And we can also draw in potential public support since a lot of passengers felt the sting of SWA incompetent management this Christmas. If SWAPA is wise they could really capitalize on this situation going forward.

Maybe a SAV now while everyone is ****ed off? I know after that mess I went through there is probably nothing I'd vote yes for now..
and it would show the public it wasnt us when mgmt uses suck calls and unwillingness to work overtime next week as an excuse.

This meltdown is one reason why it would've been better to have filed for mediation earlier. Based on typical times in mediation, there's very little chance that we'll be released from mediation anytime in the next year. Of course, the railroads proved that the average time in mediation isn't always a good guide when they were released after only 134 days in mediation. But that was an extraordinarily short amount of time to attain a release.

Anyhow, had we been in mediation longer right now, the chances of us actually being released sometime in the next six months would also be higher. That would've allowed us to more effectively capitalize on the meltdown if there was a realistic possibility that we might be released sometime fairly soon. I doubt that management would want to follow up this debacle in quick succession with another debacle in the form of a real chance that pilots might shut the place down for any length of time.

I hope that SWAPA doesn't commit any more similar major unforced errors this contract cycle like, say, putting out a milquetoast Alaska-esque or Delta-esque TA after a SAV and before a release from mediation.

Well they entertained a holiday pay MOU, so there's that. I thought we all said no more until we get a contract. This is exactly what we were thinking would happen and they entertained bailing them out again. Smh

They entertained it with Contract 2020 asks being incorporated. Just doing due diligence. I have no problem with that…

With a mediator watching you think SWAPA should have turned their backs?

idk the inner workings of that, but it was pretty clear no more MOUs till we get a contract. If we could've got a big ask, maybe.
do you think the moderator cares when more grievances stack up in mediition?
genuine question idk how it works

This ^^^^. I talked to one of the MDW reps during the meltdown and that’s exactly what she told me.

that's what they put out, but my question is... is this what the membership asked for?
Im pretty sure the majority said no MOUs till we get a contract. That should be it, full stop!
this is how we get flight plan 2020 - a billion.
seriously why do we shoot ourselves in the foot?

The SAV needs to happen now. There's no better time.

they had me at hello

I agree that a SAV should occur in the coming days. We need to as a pilot group highlight that we do not stand for this disaster. Publicly, we would show our disapproval for what just occurred, stand with our passengers, while subtly reminding management of what a strike could cause on its operation. It would also make it more difficult for them to sweep this away under the rug and out of media reporting.

I think the irony of all this is that management brought onto itself the equivalent of a strike all on its own. I really hope they open their eyes to what an epic failure this last week was, and continues to be.

I fully support a SAV, however, there are risks right now. It risks getting “lost” in the wave of bad news. It also can make the pilot’s look unsympathetic to the recovery plight of both SWA and our pax (I know that’s not true, but the entire premise of a SAV is perception).

Poopoo out.

You may be correct in your assessment. On the contrary however, if the general public could be given a SAV against SWA I believe anyone affected by this would vote yes in a heart beat. (No LUV intented). I can't imagine the public seeing a pilot SAV as anything other than us standing up for them and voicing what they probably are feeling themselves right about now. Who knows? I just don't want this to be explained away and forgotten about in 3 weeks and no actual urgent changes made. Somthing needs to change ASAP.

Yep. This is the time for SWAPA to quietly offer vocal support, and team buy in, from the pilot group in exchange for a great deal getting done quickly. BJ can Herb this moment…

The company would take the help and then continue to drag their feet on a new contract. My nephew is a dispatcher for SWA and that is exactly what has happened to their group after they voluntarily voted in pay cuts during COVID. I believe they are now entering their 5th year of stalled negotiations.

SWAPA has to do their job correctly, for sure…but if there was ever a moment to reverse trends on all fronts, this is it.

Can all of the union heads get together or is that against the rules?

Can they join forces and go offer to BJ to work together publicly to save the place after deals get done…or go on a media tour togetherif they don’t?

I don’t know what’s legal, but if I were BJ I’d grab hold of this moment with everything I had. Malcom Gladwell could add a chapter for this one…

I disagree. The time for an SAV is while
this mess is relatively fresh in the mind of the traveling public. Hold one before spring break and get the headlines out there. If enough people read ‘Southwest pilots vote to authorize strike,’ they’ll recall the meltdown and wonder ‘wtf is going on at SWA?’ Their next thought will be to book their tickets on any other airline for spring break.

When revenue misses, the big time shareholders might start asking some pointed questions. Questions like “is the ill will of protracted negotiations a distraction we can afford right now?’ ‘Why are these contracts still open?,’ and ‘Do you like your job on the board?’

I’m betting that if we SAV now, we get 62% based off the guy I just flew with. He thinks we should hold off on the contract all together.

I have flown with that guy…or one of the countless others with that mindset😒

How is he going to pay for his new boat and airpark house to annoy his FO with pictures of then? Nothing says you gotta publish the exact percentages.

Sure, 99% would be nice. But all you need is 50% +1 to start running the campaign and pushing the bookaway effect. It’s also a notification to the mediator that we are ready for self-help should be decide to release us. If this past week has taught us anything, it’s that even if we did strike and 40% scabbed off the bat, the subsequent meltdown would be catastrophic and would quickly bring the company to the table.

Past two guys I flew with were utterly clueless regarding the RLA and the status of negotiations. Both were more concerned about the possibility of a recession coming than they were about obtaining an industry-leading contract.

But they were wearing lanyards!

I’d say a little less than half the guys I’ve flown with in the last several months have been in the mostly clueless category. We’ve got a long ways to go in terms of education.

I do agree that a 51%+ SAV gives us quite a bit of leverage, but it would certainly be better with a higher percentage vote. The way I look at is the first 51% of the vote gives us something like 80% of the leverage we could get out of a SAV. The next 49% of the vote would give us another 20% leverage.

With SWAPA’s megaphone, if they wanted to, and if they learned how to innovatively communicate to the legions of checked-out koolies and ostriches, then we could win many of them over.

The barometer for where we stand with respect to a SAV and our readiness to pose the credible threat of a strike should not be how many lanyards the MCO BOD rep sees on our guys when he’s out in the system. IMO, the lanyard means almost nothing.

The barometer should be based on polling around those issues. Or maybe if the lanyard said something like, “I’M READY TO STRIKE!”, it might mean something.

Spot on. As usual. But at this point I'd like SNAPA to go to the company and explain to them privately how they're going to pile on as hard as possible in the media if the company wants to still play games. Even if 49 percent of the kernals aren't ready to be hard. We don't need them to play this card. Look at all the media attention SNAPA got in the last few days. They could EASILY and PUBLICLY throw out the concept of strike and bring GK to heel. This is a game of brinkmanship and the events of the last week have offered a golden opportunity. TAKE IT! Or continue down the road of milquetoast and 150 open grievances. (Not directed at you Lew.)

Anything less than a high 90s percentile in both participation & YES vote would be weak historically speaking. That said, I think that’s going to be a tough goal to reach given what pilot group we’re dealing with.

It will be interesting to see a SAV. I have to think that SWA is anticipating this and has a plan for it. Especially after Delta and Alaska. I also get the feeling that we believe this is the magic bullet. I think the truth will be somewhere in between. If we issue a SAV, we shouldn’t be surprised if it has less affect than we’re hyping it. Maybe I’m wrong, maybe a SAV will be the card that wins the game but I guarantee they’ve war gamed that scenario and already have a response and plan in place. Their response won’t be reactionary to a SAV, they’ll just play whatever card they have ready for that scenario. I don’t have a good gauge on where we’d fall on that but if we think it’s going to be a 60/40 SAV, we should hold onto that card IMO because the threat of the vote would carry more weight than the vote itself if it has weak support.

The GO is almost completely detached from the front line employees. Winter storms and fog in San Diego happen every year but they didn’t have an adequate plan for that. The C suite did major damage to the brand with this meltdown debacle and no one is buying “it’s the storms fault” argument.

The value in a SAV will be the words “strike” and “Southwest” together on the news and the general public won’t give a lick about the vote percentage. They will book away as they are already doing.

This group is still too apathetic. Flew with a senior FO this week, passing on upgrade for QOL, absolutely nothing wrong with that. Only once the parking brake was set on the last day did he ask why SWAPA/Reps are so angry with the kompany.
I tried to convey he needed to be a little more engaged with the real world. But, the fact that that is when he asked the question made me question whether he really wanted an answer. I didn't think anything i said would move the needle so I didn't put too much energy into it. And I wanted to go home so it wasn't worth my time.

Maybe. Better pray for a slow news cycle. I’m not knocking the effort but I am trying to be realistic. UAL ran a plane off the runway a few years ago and it was on every channel for about 5 mins. Right up to when Michael Jackson died and you never heard about it again. I just have very little faith in the attention span of the media or it’s viewers. Our SAV could take back page behind the funnies to a new TikTok dance in the world we live in.

This first sentence says it all. BJ sees no problem, do not forget he loves you . He says says so in every writing .

I always say, “PT Barnum was right.”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/There'...n_every_minute