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Workplace maps, worker lists and assessments identify where workers are located, how to gain access to them and ways to track the workers’ level of involvement.
Mapping identifies where workers are located and helps visualize power dynamics within the workplace. To create a map, first draw a physical layout of where the workers are. Include information about the location of management offices, briefing rooms, staff rooms, customer areas, hotels, cafeterias, lounges, parking and transport areas and rest areas – anywhere workers may gather or work.
Add relevant information about additional non-union, union, subcontracted and informal workers. Pay special attention to the types of roles often filled by women or gender-diverse workers, which may be more isolated or informal, such as caregiving or cleaning roles.
Add any relevant workplaces in other regions and countries. Draw your map on whatever scale is useful. It can be focused on your workplace, company or industry and can include regional, national, or international operations.
Digital tools can make workplace mapping more dynamic, accessible, and data-rich. Here are ways to incorporate them effectively:
Digital Mapping Platforms
Visualization Tools
WhatsApp Groups
Ensure data privacy by anonymizing worker information when mapping.
Keep the map accessible to workers through shared links or mobile-friendly versions.
Continuously update the digital map as workplace conditions change.
We need to keep lists of workers regularly updated. We need to reach them respecting their needs and specific situations, who knows whom and whom workers rely on if there is a problem. It is usually easier to collect names and contact details in the beginning of an organising campaign, as the employer may start pressuring workers specially women and vulnerable groups such us informal workers who need desperately their jobs and cannot assume the risks, to not interact with union supporters.
In order to gather information, the best source of information is the workers themselves. You might visit workers, workplaces and places workers gather. Look for workplace emergency preparedness lists of workers with contact information, search the Internet, and ask other unions, community organisations, or regulatory agencies. Ask the employer directly for information if it will not endanger your work. The section Participatory Action Research will help you as well.
Begin with a list of those workers that you know about.
Ensure that all voices, particularly those often marginalized, are invited into discussions.
Decide what information you want to include on your list:
☐ Names
☐ Contact details (work and home)
☐ Attendance at union events and actions
☐ Type of work they do
☐ Length of time at the workplace or industry
☐ Why they do this work
☐ Direct employer, contractor, self-employed and do they have others working for them?
☐ Work shift
☐ What other workers do they know and communicate with?
☐ Collective agreements or contracts coverage
☐ Physical work locations
☐ Social media use
☐ Age
☐ Gender
☐ Social and community interests
☐ Problems/concerns
☐ Union membership
☐ Attendance at key events
☐ Leadership or delegate positions
☐ Assessment of union involvement
☐ Workplace and community problems they are facing
☐ Any obvious units of organisation (e.g. by street, by parking area, petrol station, church, catchment area, product sale collection or production, social groupings, transport…)
☐ When and where is the best place to meet?
☐ Involvement with other unions or other social organisations
☐ …
How will you keep the list? On the computer, individual cards, chart paper…?
Discuss how can you build on your list? Can you access workers at the worksite, in the community, at transit stops, social media? Who else might have contact with workers
You may want to include an assessment of each worker’s level of union involvement on your list of workers. These assessments are not based on stereotypes, assumptions or judgements, but on worker’s actions. Base the assessments on what workers do, rather than what they say about the union. Do not include gossip.
Pay attention to how people's involvement may vary based on gender, migration or other factors such as caring for others, language/cultural barriers, or social roles at work. Ensure that assessments capture different forms of engagement, recognising that less visible contributions.
Only keep information that you would feel comfortable sharing openly, if needed. Always be respectful and keep information safe, especially information that may affect women, LGBTQ+ workers, or other groups that are treated unfairly.
You can give each worker a number so that you can quickly see and analyse your level of support for the union campaign. The use of a common code helps to build a single common language across the union work locally and expand it in a shared organising culture.
Below is an example of how number assessments can be used.
Assessments will change. Workers will increase and decrease their involvement in the union as the organising campaign moves forward. Assessments need to be constantly updated.
Assessments help us keep our focus on undecided and unknown workers. Because we are likely to be talking most often to union supporters, we may feel that we are stronger than we are. Keeping accurate numbers and assessments will help us know where and how strong the collective is and when we have reached our benchmarks. Assessments will help us decide when there are a sufficient number of workers involved to begin to take collective action publicly.
If you do your number assessments regularly, you will be able to see how workers are becoming more or less involved both individually and collectively.
At first, worker assessments might seem overwhelming. Start by simply recording the information that you have, ensuring that data collection considers diverse worker experiences, including those of women, gender-diverse, migrant and other invisible workers`groups.
Worker assessments have been proven in practice to be critical to all organising campaigns large and small. Without a worker assessment system, we are guessing at levels of worker involvement based on the workers we last spoke to. Decisions about which tactics to use when are best when based on accurate and detailed assessments.
Below is an example from cabin crew organising in Argentina:
Discuss whether you will use worker assessment numbers and, if so, what your assessment system will look like.
