ATTACK OF THE BORG

INDIVIDUALS DO NOT MATTER TO DELTA
ONLY THE ‘COLLECTIVE’ SHOULD PROSPER

Most of us grew up enjoying fictional movie and T.V. characters by following their exploits and filling our lives with entertainment and water cooler conversation about the latest happenings of our villains and heroes that we all follow in make believe land.

Who doesn’t remember the Star Trek created evil empire known as the Borg. This was a more recent creation of the reincarnation of the original Star Trek series. These evil people-like droids or machines wandered the universe and galaxies destroying worlds and people because that was their only mission. Only the collective mattered, not individuals and destruction and assimilation was their only mission.

How to stop them? They could adapt and counter most moves by mere mortals in minutes if not seconds and suck the individuality out of humanoids. Even the great Captian of the Enterprise fell victim for a time to the needs and wants of the consuming and all world destroying Borg.

Where am I going with this?

Have you read the latest statistics concerning legacy carriers? Northwest was again named the best of them all for 2008. Congratulations to our new partners. Where was Delta ranked? You don’t want to know!

I remember a time during my Western Air Lines day when just before the merger Western had become one of the most effective and efficient airlines in the world. We were known as the fastest hub in the west with 30 minute turn times and baggage connection numbers that were the envy of the world; 2 to 3 miss-handled bags per 3000!

No wonder Delta wanted us. Oh how things have changed. We were a collection of individuals who were motivated to excel and perform. We were union and were competent; much like Northwest. Delta management couldn’t stand our demeanor and quite frankly the way we looked; Long hair, beards and an attitude. We were good and we knew it.


Much like the Borg, with Delta only the collective matters; individuals are sacrificed for the good of the whole. Delta must survive by wandering the airline world consuming and assimilating healthy parts to keep the machine moving forward.

Our rankings and quality assurance numbers over the years have fallen to pathetic lows but we survive by grabbing other airlines and consuming their good works and living off the good health of them until we use them up and move on.

Look at the way individual employees are treated by Human Resources, Sedgwick CMS, ESIS and management. Nothing comes easy to individuals suffering from health issues, OJI claims and personal problems when presented to Delta and Delta’s surrogates. Almost all claims are originally denied in order to keep the whole of Delta financially healthy all the while allowing our employees to individually suffer.

It is an age old debate. Do individuals who are competent, well trained, financially taken care of make for a more successful company than corporations that deny, delay, and cause frequent employee turn over?

Delta has chosen the latter course and we as employees are individually suffering. Unions act as protectors of the individual in workers rights issues as well as quality of life and health. We must all choose; do we make Delta temporarily healthy by denying ourselves good health and a fair wage by voting down the union efforts or do we cause success by giving ourselves an individual quality life; being happy in our work and transferring that happiness onto our customers through the negotiations of the IAM. We will all choose soon enough.