Paid Time Off MattersA (slow) progress report

Lionbridge Technologies, Temporary Workers of America and the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB)

Since August 2013, Lionbridge Technologies has been charged by TWA and investigated by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), in four cases concerning violations of the employees rights to organize.

See details below.

Satya Nadella endorses paid leave at the White House event "champions of change"

From the site of the White House, about Satya and the comments by Valerie Jarrett who launched the Administration's campaign LeadonPaidLeave with a very strong message on LinkedIn.

From the official Microsoft blog. The part about paid leave is at the end.

On Thursday April 16,  Satya Nadella participated in the White House “Champions of Change” event, where President Obama honored individuals who have helped bring about change for working families within their companies, communities or organizations. Nadella introduced the President and spoke about the policy Microsoft recently announced to ensure our suppliers provide 15 days of annual paid time off to their U.S. employees who are doing substantial work for Microsoft.

Why this blog?

After Brad Smith's March 26 post on the official Microsoft's blog about Paid Time Off Matters, we were excited and appreciative of this new development but also concerned about when and how it would be implemented: in August 2013 our colleague Marilyse had been fired by Lionbridge, the Microsoft's supplier that employs us, because she had dared asking for benefits, including paid time off. While the NLRB ruled in her favor in January 2014 after she filed a charge for violation of her protected rights to organize, she chose not to return and Lionbridge kept refusing to provide any paid time off.

This negative attitude was our main motivation to organize and push for the creation of an independent union, Temporary Workers of America, as we thought it would be our only chance to try to obtain what we consider basic human rights: paid family leave, paid sick leave, paid vacation and decent wages increases after years of good work without any raise as we explained in the book The Other Microsoft. We won the election on September 11 2014 but we knew, as Lionbridge's representatives had kept repeating during the campaign that  they would not have to give us anything, even if we had a union. They kept their word: at the fifth collective bargaining meeting, on February 27, Lionbridge made its first counterproposal to our demands, without offering any paid leave of any kind and zero pay increase (see the pages 8 and 9 of their contract proposal).

It's in this very antagonistic context that one month later, Microsoft announced its decision that goes contrary to Lionbridge's stand. While Lionbridge has said they would be an 'early adopter' of this new requirement, we remain quite suspicious and wonder how they are going to backtrack, or not.

While we are happy to see Microsoft expressing concerns similar to ours, we have been struggling/working for more than three years without any paid leave and we don't want to keep waiting -for how long?- for an eventual implementation. We want a significant change NOW, including substantial paid family leave, paid sick leave, paid vacation and a well deserved pay raise. 

All this can be afforded by Lionbridge considering the high mark up they have had for all those years but we doubt they'll agree to any of that but for a strong pressure coming from Microsoft and the public opinion.

This blog is the place where we'll collect all the informations and news we want to share so that Lionbridge signs as soon as possible a contract providing its employees with the paid leaves they deserve but they have been denied for so long despite the fact the company has been highly profitable.

How trustworthy is Lionbridge Technologies?

CEO Rory Cowan loves the fact that Lionbridge Technologies has been selected by Forbes magazine to be for the second consecutive year among its list of the 100  most trustworthy companies in America. He says that "For nearly two decades, we've provided our clients, employees, partners and shareholders with the highest level of transparency, integrity and quality." How does he reconcile this glowing statement with his refusal, after we gave more than 3 years of excellent work to Lionbridge and Microsoft, to provide us with any paid time off nor any pay increase? 

Paid Time Off Matters as a Business School Case Study

Business Schools (like Harvard) love case studies. We thought it would be interesting to create a case study about the implementation by Lionbridge Technologies  (whose CEO is Rory Cowan) of Microsoft's requirement to provide paid leaves to its employees. We also included ourselves (Temporary Workers of America) as a party as there is an on going collective bargaining negociation going on. This case study is free. Just contact us to get the word format document with the elements of the case and send us your recommandations. This is part of our effort to crowdsource innovative solutions to this situation. As there is legal component with the writing of the collective bargaining contract this case can also be of interest for Law Schools.

contact: temporaryworkersofamercia at gmail.com

Brad Smith on GeekWire Radio

On saturday April 11, Brad Smith was interviewed by Todd Bishop and John Cook on GeekWire Radio. We have selected below the 4 minute segment devoted to Microsoft's new requirement that it's suppliers provide at least 15 days of paid leave to their employees.

 LISTEN

GeekWire’s weekly radio show airs on KIRO Radio (97.3 FM) in the Seattle region, and reaches a worldwide audience via podcast.
Brad Smith's photo by GeekWire.

Comparing paychecks with CEOs

Comparing paychecks with CEOs is the title of an article by Gretchen Morgenson in this sunday edition of the New York Times. 

We asked what was Rory Cowan's (Lionbridge CEO) annual compensation in one of our 'request for information'. The answer provided in January 2015 was $1.522.275 (for his 2014 cash compensation). Reading this article published on March 24 in the Boston Business Journal it looks like Rory Cowan took home a bit more: $2.89 million. That's $1.36 million more than what we were told. Paid $22 per hour since December 2011, I received from Lionbridge for 2014, a total of $40.810, for a net of $32.618.

If we estimate the maximum aggregated annual income for all 37 Tier 1 employees at the present rate it's less than Rory Cowan's annual compensation: $1.248.960 vs $1.522.275 or $2.89 million.
Rory Cowan's representatives at the bargaining table have (until now) refused any pay raise (there has never been a pay raise since the start of the project in December 2011) and have also rejected any type of paid leave. We are therefore curious to see how they'll respond to Microsoft's new requirement to provide at least 15 days of paid leave.