American Broadcasting Companies, Inc.

654 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD American Broadcasting Company, A Division of American Broadcasting Companies, Inc. and Na- tional Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians, AFL-CIO-CLC, Petitioner. Cases 2-RC-16233 and 2-RC-16234 May 17, 1974 DECISION AND ORDER BY CHAIRMAN MILLER AND MEMBERS FANNING AND JENKINS Upon petitions duly filed under Section 9(c) of the National Labor Relations Act, as amended, a hearing was held before Hearing Officer Don T. Carmody. Following the hearing and pursuant to Section 102.67 of the National Labor Relations Board Rules and Regulations and Statements of Procedure, Series 8, as amended, this case was transferred to the National Labor Relations Board for decision. The named Employer and the Petitioner filed briefs. Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3(b) of the National Labor Relations Act, as amended, the National Labor Relations Board has delegated its authority in this proceeding to a three-member panel. The Board has reviewed the Hearing Officer's rulings made at the hearing and finds that they are free from prejudicial error. They are hereby affirmed. Upon the entire record in this case, the National Labor Relations Board finds: 1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of the Act. 2. The Petitioner is an organization claiming to represent certain employees of the Employer. 3. No question concerning commerce exists con- cerning the representation of employees of the Employer within the meaning of Sections 9(c)(1) and 2(6) and (7) of the Act, for the following reasons: The Employer is engaged in radio and television broadcasting and various other related enterprises. The Petitioner seeks to represent two separate units of employees assigned to Broadcasting Operations and Engineering, one of the Employer's four major subdivisions. Broadcasting Operations and Engineer- ing is responsible for the mechanical operation of the Employer's network and local radio and television facilities and employs some 1,900 employees at the Employer's headquarters located at 1330 Avenue of the Americas and at its 66th Street complex in New York City. In Case 2-RC-16233, Petitioner seeks to represent approximately 12 employees engaged in coordinating program and facilities information and scheduling. This unit would include three network (or night) operations supervisors,' three log coordinators, a program coordinator, a supervisor of information services, two day-of-air coordinators, and two facili- ties schedulers. In Case 2-RC-16234, Petitioner seeks to represent approximately nine employees engaged in engineering manpower scheduling. This unit would include five manpower scheduling clerks, a remote coordinator, two video tape schedulers, and a maintenance scheduler. Petitioner also indicated it would accept the inclusion or exclusion of a 10th employee, a scheduler located at the Employer's Lodi, New Jersey, transmitter facilities. There is no history of bargaining with respect to the individuals sought in the instant petitions. The Employer contends that the respective units sought by the Petitioner are inappropriate inasmuch as they constitute a fragmentation of the Employer's clerical work force. Thus, the Employer asserts that the requested units are not based on any administra- tive or functional lines; that the 21 employees covered by the two petitions perform clerical functions and share a broad community of interest with approximately 600 other clerical employees at its New York facilities; and that neither of the two respective groups enjoys interests so separable from those of other clericals to warrant separation from an overall clerical unit. We find merit in the Employer's position. In Case 2-RC-16233 the 12 employees sought are among the 18 employees employed in the Employer's TV network operations group which schedules equipment and facilities and coordinates information on network programs and broadcasts. The "log" group (three log coordinators, a program information coordinator, and a supervisor for information serv- ices) gather information from various sources and coordinate and incorporate this product into a daily listing of programs, advertisements, and other in- formation in chronological order, for each broadcast day. These logs are used in various operational areas outside the proposed unit; i.e., by engineers, associ- ate directors, and others. The two facilities schedu- lers schedule studios, film chains, and video tape machines based on orders received from unit managers outside the proposed unit. The remaining five employees, night operations supervisors and day-of-air coordinators, make last minute changes in the various logs and facilities charts. The record shows that technical training is not a prerequisite to employment for these employees and that basically they learn their duties on the job. It appears that the employees in the proposed unit have as much or more telephone and personal contact with their I The reference to supervisor in this decision, unless otherwise indicated , individuals are supervisors within the meaning of the Act. involves supervisors of activities The parties do not contend that these 210 NLRB No. 67 AMERICAN BROADCASTING CO. various sources of information-employees outside the proposed unit-as or than they do with each other in performing their respective job assignments. Case 2-RC-16234 covers nine employees engaged in scheduling technical manpower.2 Five of these nine employees develop and maintain a "checker- board" which lists technical engineers and their assignments during each 9-day period. The basic input for these checkerboards is transmitted by unit managers outside the proposed unit to a statutory supervisor within the proposed unit who prepares a weekly schedule which is turned over to the technical manpower schedulers. In addition to developing and maintaining the checkerboard, the technical man- power schedulers notify the technical engineers of numerous changes in their schedules. Such changes are made following consultation with published lists and through information exchanged between the supervisor of the technical manpower schedulers and the individual schedulers. To be hired as a scheduler, no special education or technical training or back- ground is necessary; the learning process is achieved through on-the-job experience. The remaining four employees perform similar functions in scheduling video tape operators and television maintenance personnel. As Petitioner acknowledges, the requested employees are not under common supervision. Thus, the technical manpower schedulers and remote coordinators report to one supervisor, the video tape operators to another, and the maintenance scheduler to a third. The record evidence shows that the employees in the respective units sought by the Petitioner share no common work area separate from other employees. Nor do they all share common working hours. In Case 2-RC-16233 the majority of those sought work on the third floor, but others are located on the fourth floor. In Case 2-RC-16234 five of the nine employees work in a sectioned-off area, three work elsewhere on the same floor, and one employee works in the basement. There is even a lack of any physical separateness among the employees in the separately petitioned-for groups. For example, two facilities schedulers in Case 2-RC-16233 are located right next to two video tape schedulers in Case 2-RC-16234 on the fourth floor where they have personal contact daily in making entries on the same chart. Nor is there any common work schedule among the individuals in these groupings. In Case 2-RC-16233 the night operations supervisors work on a 5-day rotating shift basis at night to cover a 7- 2 As mentioned earlier Petitioner would accept the inclusion or exclusion of a tenth employee In view of our decision, herein, we find it unnecessary to determine the unit status of this individual 655 day-a-week operation and the day-of-air coordina- tors, along with other employees, work from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. 5 days a week. In Case 2-RC-16234 the five manpower scheduling clerks work on a 5-day rotating 8-hour shift basis from 5:30 a.m. until midnight to cover a 7-day-a-week operation while the other employees in the unit work a 5-day week from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. The record further shows that for all practical purposes, the employees sought here are treated the same as the Employer's nonexempt3 clerical employ- ees. They are recruited and hired through a central- ized personnel office, the same personnel policies apply to them as do to the clericals in general, and they all share a common wage policy and fringe benefits. A central job-posting system encourages transfer and promotion from within for all nonex- empt employees, including those in that category in the requested units. Seven of twelve employees covered by Case 2-RC-16233 are nonexempt em- ployees and seven of nine employees covered by Case 2-RC-16234 are nonexempt employees. The Employer's exempt employees, including several covered by the respective petitions herein, do not share in common all the policies and benefits of the nonexempt employees. On the basis of the record before us, we find no evidence to support the Petitioner's assertion that the employees sought in the respective units share a separate community of interest from that of the other employees. Although, during the conduct of the hearing, Petitioner indicated a willingness to accept alternative units which would include any additional employees in network or other log preparation functions, we are unable, on the basis of the existing record, to ascertain whether any of these alternative units it thus proposed would be appropriate. In this regard, we would note that Petitioner has neither specifically described what additional employees it is willing to include in its proposed alternative unit nor provided a rationale for the establishment of any alternative unit or units. Thus, we conclude, in the circumstances of this case, that the units requested in Case 2-RC-16233 and Case 2-RC-16234 are inap- propriate for the purposes of collective bargaining. Accordingly, we shall dismiss the petitions herein. ORDER It is hereby ordered that the petitions herein be, and they hereby are, dismissed. 3 Reference to exempt and nonexempt employees herein refers to the use of those terms in the Fair Labor Standards Act