There are synchronicities! Very often we find that the same
thought[s] occur to different people at the same time for the same goal.
Mr. Sharad Patil, the erstwhile Secretary General of
Employers Federation of India spoke to me [and two others] recently. His
message was that the days of antagonism in employee relations are over. It was
time to actively catalyse collaboration between Employers, Unions and
Government too for better employee relations. So we organised a meeting of a
small group of HR honchos.
Mr Jayasri Priyalal [he is a Sri Lankan based in Singapore]
invited me to the Seminar. [More about it later]. He explained that UNI Apro was organising a
sub-regional seminar in Kathmandu, targeting the Professionals and Managers.
The theme was “Multi-stakeholder’s Collaboration: way forward for mutual
adjustment to stimulate sustainable growth for just transition in South Asia.”
[UNI Global Union, based in Nyon, Switzerland, represents
more than 20 million workers from over 900 trade unions in the fastest growing
sectors in the world – skills and services. A total of 90% of new jobs are
expected to be in these sectors in the next decade. UNI and our affiliates in
all regions are driven by the responsibility to ensure these jobs are decent
and workers’ rights are protected, including the right to join a union and
collective bargaining.
Through its Sector Global Unions, UNI represents workers in
Cleaning and Security, Commerce, Finance, Gaming, Graphical and Packaging, Hair
and Beauty, Information, Communication, Technology and Services Industry
(ICTS), Media, Entertainment and Arts, Post and Logistics, Social Insurance,
Sport, Temp and Agency workers, and Tourism industries as well as Professionals
and Managers, Women and Youth.
UNI’s Breaking Through strategy is about changing the rules
of the game in the global labour market and ensuring justice and equality for
working people. UNI is working with its affiliates to organise the global
service sector workforce at a time of unprecedented precarious work, and record
youth unemployment.]
Mr Priyalal’s thoughts, I recognised, matched ours. Yes, synchronicity! Mr
Priyalal is the Director, Finance Sector, Professionals & Managers Group
Activities of UNI Asia & Pacific. I requested him to permit me to record
his thoughts on a video; he readily obliged.
So here it is: he calls it ‘Union Social Responsibility.’ Business Organisations should, with their Corporate Social Responsibility' should work hand in hand. The two concepts, Union Social Responsibility and Corporate Social Responsibility are indeed same or similar. Is that another evidence of synchronicity?