EMPLOYER DETERRENCE OR DISCOURAGEMENT – Contextual Factors

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The sudden participation of principals and assistant principals of the charter schools in the conversation about unionization would tend to influence employee choice. Principals and assistant principals had remained silent during the prior three years of the union’s organizing campaign. Then, just as the campaign was beginning to bear fruit, the principals and assistant principals abruptly decided to e-mail employees regarding unionization and the union. Two of the later e-mails even referenced conditions after the filing of the representation petitions on May 2. (p. 67.) The Board found that receiving such an e-mail from their principal or assistant principal about the union’s organizing campaign, particularly on the heels of four e-mails from the charter management organization about the same subject, would cause a reasonable employee to believe the message was particularly urgent and important. (p. 68.) The Board found this to be another contextual factor that strengthened the e-mails’ tendency to influence employee choice.