ONE MAN’S DELTA JOURNEY

A TESTIMONIAL FROM BRUCE K. CHURCH

Way back in the late seventies I had the pleasure of meeting the right woman and eventually marrying her. A few years later we had an insurmountable marital difficulty and divorced; although she loved me, she just couldn’t stand me! I never married again and have no children. When you have the right woman and screw it up why try again?

Why would I divulge this life story? I tell the truth; a quality that isn’t always well accepted.

I’m about to tell all of you the truth and some of you won’t take it well; you are working for a management team and a philosophy that is not employee friendly. You are toiling for individuals that only care about themselves, their wages and bonuses; their survival, not yours.

My story is simple. I have always advocated for my fellow employees. It is in my nature and that is the only reason I have involved myself in every union organization attempt during my career at Delta Air Lines. I was never looking for union positions or power. I knew that I had a unique situation to risk it all and take them on (being single with no children). I felt a duty to champion good people and our union cause. I also knew that eventually Delta would move against me; an at-will employee in a ‘right to work’ state (right to be fired for no reason!)

Even when there was no union activity I wrote dozens of support letters to management both locally and corporately when employees were being disciplined or terminated. Over the years many employees approached me because they knew I would back them; they knew I had good standing because of my work ethic. They knew of my silent, behind the scenes advocacy for minority and women’s issues in the work place.

Management did not always appreciate my ‘interference’ with what they perceived to be their domain. One director snapped at me while in his office; “what business is this of yours!” My reply was that anything that negatively affected one of our good workers affected all of us collectively.

Delta’s approach is to generally attempt to talk employees away from union efforts by playing the “individuality” card. “Pull yourselves up by your own boot straps” they say; “you don’t need to pay someone else to take care of you.”

It is a lonely feeling to be ‘cut out of the herd’ by Delta and have little or no say in what they plan on doing to you regardless of ones’ guilt or innocence. They rarely differentiate between the two.
Delta attempted to put me through hell during most of 2009; a story that does not need to be told here. Suffice it to say that they used my writings and personal e-mails taking many of them way out of context to attempt to prove a false premise. They did this on purpose trying to intimidate me to stop the writings and the support I gave to other employees. Their intimidation did not work on me and never will.

Some of their efforts were so ridiculous and blatant that one had to wonder of the intellectual capabilities and real motivations of those doing it. I fought back by filing complaints with internal company sources (Equal Opportunity) in Atlanta; this was a mistake. They protect their own. Here’s some advice for all of you without union protection; take your complaints to outside sources, especially the United States Dept. of Labor. Delta abhors having complaints filed officially against them to the government. In past years Delta Air Lines has been ranked as one of the most complained about companies in America by their own employees. (The “Family” is dysfunctional!)

Yes, I made a few minor mistakes and after they fired me on January 12, 2010, they found out just how tough I could get with my writings!

The purpose of this testimonial is not to whine. I am doing just fine and will not return to Delta. I want this airline to succeed. I see our upside and it is in its fine people. The management philosophy is misguided and misdirected. Delta promotions are not based on background, intelligence or abilities but on blind, unquestioned loyalty to the “culture.”

This approach has damaged middle management to the point of incredible incompetency. They view themselves, right down to the PL position, as the chosen few. They regard most of us as an impediment to their success and think of almost all of us as a temporary problem to be removed from time to time.

They want you to be on your own and to think that you are safe within the “family” enjoying their “culture.” They want you to believe that they will be fair in any disciplinary action and that you need no representation when you are alone with them in their office.

This culture is designed to fool you and to use you as their ATM when they make decisions that negatively impact our financial well being. The only way to protect us from their roughshod mistakes is to get a contract that can’t be cherry picked when the going gets tough.

The economy might stay stagnant for quite some time and the happy talk is nothing more than a delaying tactic for when the other ‘shoe’ inevitably drops on all of us should we mistakenly turn our backs on our best salvation; unionization.

I wish all of your success and strength and I will be with you all the way!


Bruce K. Church