Union rules: Dot-com staff lose start-up mentality

Amazon.com faces a massive culture shock as its workforce loses the start-up mentality and turns to trade unions for representation.

US Trade unions promise that 5,000 distribution and warehouse workers in the country will vote for unionisation by Christmas. Amazon insists that trade union representation is unnecessary, and it is far from certain that US workers will vote in favour of the change. The UK Trades Union Congress (TUC) and industry analysts say that dot-coms need to change their working practices as they mature into established businesses.
Amazon.com is one of the first e-tailers to face down a move towards organised labour. The TUC's head of communications, Nigel Stanley, said dot-coms must realise that a start-up mentality can't last forever. He said: "You can't keep the excitement of a start-up going for years and years. And you can't build an economy simply by employing 25-year-olds and expecting them to burn out by the time they're 30." Richard Sykes, chairman of Morgan Chambers, said dot-com management teams often lack the experience necessary to handle labour relations in a large, successful company. He said: "Entrepreneurs who are good with people are a rare breed. The kind of people who drive forward dot-coms are probably very tough on their people." Clive Pinder, CEO of Metrius Europe, a KPMG consultancy, agreed that many dot-coms haven't built a meaningful culture for their employees. He said: "You can't hang your company culture on one issue. Dot-coms hang their culture on being new and trendy and telling employees they'll get rich quick. You can't build a long-standing business on that." Amazon's UK operation claimed no moves toward unionisation have happened here, although the French office reports that French postal union, Sud PTT, has been handing out pro-union leaflets outside Amazon's single distribution centre, which houses approximately 50 employees. The company's German workforce already has union representation. Sykes concluded that Amazon may want to take the union move as a compliment. After all, he said, most dot-coms have not yet reached been successful enough for this to be a problem.