Intrigued, I checked out the link I found and noted that the course was created to help bosses of various kinds to deal with angry employees, customers, citizens and their advocates. To manage their rage at corporate, military and governmental malfeasance, corruption and criminality. To channel public demands for justice into endless mediation aimed at maintaining the status quo. To ultimately dampen the force of democratic public action into irrelevance and quiescence of the type that makes more militant workers the world over laugh at Americans.
The course description pretty makes my point for me, claiming as it does to make use of a new and exciting negotiation approach called "mutual gains." Naturally this approach is nothing new, merely warmed over "team management" pablum of the type that drove many once powerful unions into the ground over the last 20 years. Of course, pro-labor folks already took it apart a few years ago in a paper by the U Iowa Labor Center called "The New Model of Bargaining: 'Mutual Gain' or Unilateral Loss? A critical view of 'win-win' bargaining." (click the link to download in PDF)
In any case, it's a sign of the times that the rest of us can check out the way elites organize themselves to screw over working families. And, one shouldn't imagine, it's perfectly possible for union activists to sign up for this "Dealing with an Angry Public" seminar and mess with it from within - or just show up and protest it from without. But I suppose it would be indecorous of me to call for such moves against such the nice academics that run this ruling class training ground; so viewers will have to make their own decisions about what course of action to take against such people and institutions.
Anyhow, for every event the powers-that-be run that we see, there are hundreds we don't see. And this speaks to a point I've made in earlier posts here at Communicate or Die - that unions need to put serious effort into organizing a strategic web presence and modern communications "war rooms" that can take best advantage of information freely available on the web to the benefit of working families.
I'll leave you all with the "what you will learn list" from the course website in question (just in case you're too lazy to click the link above). I republish it here for purely educational purposes.
Check it out (and seriously, go check out the whole course site - it's worth it just to read the glowing course recommendations from the kinds of people unions are generally at odds with):
AT THIS PROGRAM YOU WILL LEARN . . .
. . . how to employ a mutual gains approach to resolving important differences with angry publics, whether they are:
Customers who are angry because you’ve let them down:
* your product doesn’t work, or it’s perceived as unsafe
* you said something that wasn’t true
* you failed to live up to a promise
Advocacy groups who want to sue you . . .
* claiming malpractice
* citing unfair employment and hiring practices
* demanding product-related liability
Neighbors and abutters up in arms over:
* the siting of a new facility
* perceived health risks posed by experimental production techniques
* changes you are bringing to their town or neighborhood
Environmental groups threatening you over:
* the use and disposal of toxic materials
* packaging, manufacturing or recycling practices
* land use changes
Regulators who are being pressured by others to:
* deny you a permit
* turn down your request for a rate increase
* pass rules that will restrict or change your operation
Those affected by an accident which could lead to:
* a threat of catastrophe
* demands for restitution
* boycotts of a company’s products
