For the interest of retired and deferred folks, here is the first communication from the UK Employee Forum reps. It will be interesting to see how this develops. Perhaps there is an opportunity to establish a link between AMIPP and the UEF (or whatever it will be abbreviated to) to get retirees/deferreds views communicated to the company.
(NB .. note distrubuted internally as non-confidential)
Dear Colleague
Firstly thank you for taking the time to vote. As your first UK Forum Employee representatives we would like to introduce ourselves and say a few words about the role.
Your Employee Representatives are :-
Phil Atherton - (ISC & Hursley Labs) Sue Babey - (Global Services) Gary Glazerman - (S&D)
Helen Jones - (Global Services ) John Mitchell - (Global Services) Kym Sanderson - (BCS)
On Friday 5th Nov, we met for the first time with the UK Forum Management Reps and the HR team. This was an important session, as it was the opportunity to discuss exactly how the Forum should operate given this is a new initiative within IBM UK. Although legislation around employee forums comes into effect in April 2005, it is by no means prescriptive! One of the activities we will be working on over the next few months is to develop and sign a Forum Agreement document, to describe how the employee forum will operate in IBM UK.
One thing that it is important to clarify at this stage is that the UK Forum exists for the purposes of "Information & Consultation". We have no authority to veto any IBM decision, although we can & will strongly represent your collective views. Equally it is not our role to "negotiate" a solution with IBM UK, either collectively or on an individual basis. We are not union representatives. Our role is to ensure that IBM UK is aware of employee views when considering options, but the final decision rests with IBM UK.
Please continue to use the established processes of communications with your manager, or ASK HR, to address any personal issues. Although we are unable to take up individual issues, if we receive and/or perceive an underlying common concern we can take this back through the UK Forum.
With regards to the breaking news on Pensions - IBM Management Representatives, HR and the UK Employee Representatives are meeting on Wednesday 17th November to start the Consultation process. We will be in touch as soon as we have updates, and we also welcome your feedback to this Lotus Notes id which comes directly to the Employee Representatives only. In addition, we are in the process of setting up a team room for discussions.
UK Forum Employee Representatives