“We had a number of healthcare professionals who had been with us for 20 or 30 years and then they retired,” says Kelsey. As a result, Kelsey, president of the Milwaukee (Wis.) County Local 5001, which represents 350 health professionals who work for the county, faced a huge group of employees who did not know what a union was.

Although new employees pay dues to the union whether they are members or not, Kelsey is not satisfied with just having them on the union roster.

“We needed to be more focused on the people coming through the door. They pay dues but it doesn’t mean we don’t have to organize them,” says Kelsey, a registered nurse.

The solution came last fall when Kelsey attended a presentation on the AFT’s membership consolidation and internal organizing (MC/IO) project. MC/IO is a cooperative effort of the AFT national, locals and state federations to help locals reach out to potential members and make union membership meaningful.

One thing mentioned during the presentation stood out for Kelsey: First Friends, a mentoring program that uses a team of union volunteers to connect with new hires regularly to help them get acclimated to the workplace and the union.

“It was exactly what we needed,” says Kelsey. “Mentoring is vital to the health of the organization. If new employees do not understand the history of the union and its struggles, you won’t maintain the union.”

She shared the idea with her union officers and board, who loved it. Recently, the group put together a plan to engage new members with incentives like social events and educational opportunities. They also are connecting stewards and union activists to act as “first friends” with new employees. To track their success, each friend keeps a log of how many contacts they make with new workers.

“We have been doing this kind of thing informally for years but we are making it more formal by being a visible, ongoing presence,” says Kelsey. “We are really moving on this initiative. I’m amazed at how well this is working. I’m hopeful that this program will work and will contribute to building a strong, cohesive union.”

The nurses in the Federation of Nurses/Jewish Home and Health Care in New York City take a more informal approach in reaching out to new workers.

“We have established an unofficial buddy system,” says union chapter leader Cynthia McDaniel. New hires spend a day with an experienced nurse and go out on home visits to observe.

“We want them to stay because if they leave, we have to start all over with someone new,” says McDaniel. “So we help them to get comfortable in their jobs and encourage them to ask questions. Most importantly, we let them know that they are not alone.”

In between learning how to assess patients, new nurses also learn about the union. “We explain the contract in depth and what they are entitled to through the union,” says McDaniel. Initially, most new hires are not very active in the union: “They don’t want to rock the boat.”

But the union uses informal socialization, such as inviting new members to conferences, to get them involved.

“The more they get exposed to the union, the more active they become and the more they understand what the union does,” says McDaniel.

Taking the lead
“Hospitals are extremely stressful environments,” notes Suzanne Gordon, who wrote the book Nursing Against the Odds: How Health Care Cost Cutting, Media Stereotypes and Medical Hubris Undermine Nurses and Patient Care, which takes a critical look at the profession. Gordon writes that “on crowded, understaffed wards, younger and less experienced nurses have too many patients and not enough mentoring or support … ”

“The high demand, low control and low support sets up less experienced nurses for failure,” Gordon says. “It’s critical for more experienced nurses to welcome the newer nurses and help them adjust.”

That helping hand is where unions can make a difference, says Gordon: “Unions have a great opportunity to take the lead on this. The union can be there from the minute new workers come into the hospital.”

The tendency is to put new people “in their place” as opposed to welcoming them, but if workers try hard to be welcoming, it creates positive energy, says Gordon. “That energy can be used constructively to confront workplace challenges.”

Gordon suggests that unions take advantage of the fact that they know about each new hire: “Every new nurse should be assigned to be a union mentor to welcome them and to act as a guide to the institution.”

A mentoring program can be set up immediately, adds Gordon. “You can’t change staffing or mandatory overtime overnight, but mentoring is something you can do tomorrow.”

Bringing together generations
“Each day on the job is a teaching opportunity. As a union, you can offer them a different perspective on the job,” says Carolyn Martin, an expert on mentoring and generational issues and a trainer for the New Haven, Conn.-based Rainmaker Thinking. “Older workers have to look for those opportunities to teach the younger generation.” And she adds, “Mentoring is a wonderful way to bring together generations.”

In many facilities, at least three generations work side by side. Each generation, whether it’s the baby boomers, Generation X or Y, brings its own set of skills and expectations.

“Mentoring means establishing and building a relationship, but it doesn’t have to last forever. You need to have mutual goals so that mentors don’t feel overwhelmed and they benefit from the partnership, too.”

Thomas Stinson and his mentor Jeanne Sedgwick understand the mutual benefits mentoring can bring. When Stinson, a school nurse in St. Paul, Minn., started working in the St. Paul schools nine years ago, he was assigned to five different schools without any orientation or guidance.

“It was terrible and overwhelming,” says Stinson. “In a school setting, no one understands nursing. There is no other resource.”

He found an invaluable resource in Sedgwick, a veteran school nurse and member of AFT Healthcare’s program and policy council.

“She took me under her wing right away,” Stinson says of Sedgwick.

“I have mentored many nurses over the years and I guess one of the pieces that I take from those experiences is the realization that it is I who benefit the most,” says Sedgwick. “It has made me a stronger nurse because mentoring demands that you recognize your own skills and strengths as well as giving you a unique opportunity to learn from those that you mentor.”

Sedgwick has also encouraged Stinson to become more active in his union, the St. Paul Federation of Teachers. In January, at Sedgwick’s invitation, Stinston attended the 2006 School Nurse Leadership Development conference. The conference prepares school nurses to become leaders in their community and to advocate for school health legislation.

“Tom has an energy and enthusiasm that is refreshing. He brings a different perspective to his practice and challenges the stereotype of an all female workforce,” Sedgwick says of Stinson.

“I’m learning more about the union and I’m spreading the word about what the union is doing for members,” says Stinson.

Inspired by his own experience, Stinson is now a mentor to other school nurses through the district’s five-year-old mentoring program.

“It’s hard enough to do your job, but to do it without guidance or help is worse,” says Stinson. “I don’t want anyone to go through what I did. Everyone has questions when they are just starting out. It’s not that you don’t know what to do but that you need a sense of direction.”