Information is Power

In June I was elected as workplace representative for the office and have loved every minute of it.

It is one of the things, apart from my colleagues and projects, that I'm going to miss the most. 

My current workplace is covered by a collective agreement and one of the benefits because of that is that the employees have the right to elect a representative and they chose me. As a representative I got to present to the employer what the employees want and I also have had the right to recieve all information concerning changes to the organisation, changes to the workplace and how the company is going. Shortly, it's meant that I could ask questions and expect answers to most of them which is awesome! I get to be 5 again and ask "why?" "why?" until I annoy everyone. But jokes aside, it does come with an amazing right to actually know what is happening. In a world where a lot of companies make money from selling knowledge it is a rare treat to be able to experience knowledge freely.

For those who do not know the Swedish employment system, the workers union is a very strong force in the politics of workers rights. There is very few laws in Sweden that governs employment rights and instead a lot more power is giver to the unions and their collective agreements. In most cases this has been for the better as the common collective agreements in Sweden are much better for the workers than most law regulation in the rest of Europe.

Of course there is also downside to this set up. Not all companies in Sweden have a collective agreement in place. The latest numbers I could find was 88% of the Swedish workforce is covered by the agreements. This means that 12% risk getting contracts which do not cover rights such as minimum wage, wage development and pensions.

I have also been responsible for making sure that the right information is gathered and sent out to everyone. This has meant both a lot of emails but more importantly, actually talking with as many as possible at the office. During my time as a representative I have actually had an excuse to go up to everyone and just ask them "What do you feel is important here?". It really has given me insight of what make a workplace really work and how different opinions people can have.