Is it a fourth time lucky? Delta Air Lines has a mostly non-union workforce and Sara Nelson is trying to organize flight attendants. Nelson will win if the Pandemic happens.
The person is Cameron Sperance.
One of the least-unionized airlines has rejected three attempts by labor unions to organize its flight attendants.
The head of the largest cabin crew union in the U.S. says that the Pandemic is a different game.
Management said to give them a year after the Northwest-Delta merger. Trust us. Sara Nelson, president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, said at the Skift Aviation Forum that she was going to like this better. People said that they gave you a year. It didn't work, and now you're asking us to do more with less.
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Delta is an evasive target for union leaders, as flight attendants have voted down previous attempts at organizing. The vote was called off due to fraud.
The merger of Northwest and Delta flight attendants resulted in a vote in 2010 but there is growing optimism that the labor pool would be more receptive to unionizing. Northwest was more pro-union than Delta.
The pilots were the major organized labor group at Delta, with less than 20 percent of the workforce unionized.
Nelson believes the way the airline handled itself during the Pandemic is likely to fuel more votes for it.
The AFA website is targeting Delta flight attendants to organize notes so that United can pay more for their labor.
The flight attendants are watching this. Nelson said that there is a general trend in labor organizing. I think this is the time that this will get done. It is very exciting.
Nelson said that an organizing campaign takes about a year and that a vote among Delta flight attendants might take place in the near future. The AFA started a campaign aimed at Delta in late 2019.
Delta leadership worked to cut costs and reduce staff counts. The process of getting more senior staffers to retire and take buyouts is one that helped cut costs on the benefits front and now has a younger team with juniority benefits.
Nelson doesn't like that.
She said it was offensive. Flight attendants worked hard to turn their job into a career. It was over 100 years of experience in the cabin that got all, when [Captain] Sully [Sullenberger] managed to land on the Hudson. There is a lot to be said for experience in this industry and talking about the benefits of seniority is like throwing people out the door.
What are the next steps?
Nelson has become a labor hero in recent years with regular media appearances and high-profile features written about her in publications like the New York Times. She is unlikely to stop her ascent within the labor ranks, so speculation is rife about her next steps.
The AFA is a part of the AFL-CIO. Nelson gave a bit of clarity on where she sees her career going next.
She said that it was exciting that flight attendants had power when they were people who had traditionally been objectified and cast aside. I have to consider running for the president of the union. I haven't made up my mind yet, but that is on the table.
