HANDLING EMPLOYEE

COMPLAINTS AND STRIKE

How to Handle it Effectively

B.M. Suryanto Sinurat, SH

Head Of Information and Member Service Affair
The Employers’ Association of Indonesia (APINDO)

GUEST LECTURE ON BINUS INTERNATIONAL PROGRAM

BINA NUSANTARA UNIVERSITY
Jakarta, 23 May 2007

LABOR RELATION (LR)-TYPE 1

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LABOR
RELATION

OWNER MANAGEMENT EMPLOYEE

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 LABOR RELATION (LR)-TYPE 2

NON LABOR LABOR

RELATION RELATION

EMPLOYEE AND
OWNER MANAGEMENT
UNION

CORE ATTENTION OF EACH PARTIES

WITHIN COMPANY

OWNER MANAGEMENT EMPLOYEE

• Return on • Company • Job security

Investment Sustainability • Income
• High Value • Company security
Asset ability to pay • Social security
• Productivity

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 The law of nature:

Man always wants what he has not

When it’s raining, he asks for sun

When it’s shining, he asks for rain

"Complaint" can be defined as a condition of

employment or practice of a policy that is perceived
as unfair or inequitable by the employee.

Majors reasons that cause employee’s complaints:

1. Compensation & Benefit (wages, merit raises etc)

2. Working System (hours of work, performance
evaluations, job assignments etc)
3. Working Conditions (safety and health,discrimination
etc)

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 Why should we care?

Management’s perspective:
- uncomfortable conditions among other employees

- effects working performance

At the end of the day, will effect the company’s

performance

Law’s perspective:
- will lead to disputes that will cost the company’s a
bundle, in terms of image, time, energy, and money

How do we handle complaints properly?

The Basic Thought

Complaint classifications:
1. Grievance:

Any complaint arising as a result of different
implementation or interpretation toward the company’s
regulation or labor law;

Any complaint alleging a violation of the terms of a
company’s regulation or labor law
2. Gripes: any complaint arising from any dissatisfaction
that is not against company’s regulation nor labor law

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What’s our next step?
Grievance:
Grievance: No choice nor compromise, adjustment
to comply with the law. But be careful when
grievance comes out as a result of different
implementation or interpretation toward the
company’s regulation or labor law.

Gripes:
Gripes: Create understandings within the employee.

STRATEGY:
MANAGE GRIEVANCE OR GRIPES
BY ACTIVE LISTENING

Active Listening

A good listener tries to understand

thoroughly what the other person is
saying.
In the end he may disagree sharply, but
before he disagrees, he wants to know
exactly what it is...
Kenneth A. Wells

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 Active Listening… .cont’d

Subject Speaker
Complexity

Active
Listening

Environment

Active Listening… Cont’d

 Focus your attention on the subject

 Avoid distractions
 Control your emotions
 Set aside your prejudices and opinions
 Focus on the person communicating
 Listen not only with your ears, but also with
your eyes and heart
 Be aware with your nonverbal gestures
 Be involved by actively responding to questions

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 Active Listening… Cont’d

 Express appreciation for the sharing to

encourage dialogue
 Restate and summarize key points to affirm
your understandings
 Give sufficient time and space for the
employee before inviting him back to further
discussion. This will also to let him aware that
we need time to seriously review his
complaints
 On the next session, give understanding
about the company’s policy without
threatening

Samples of Handling Complaints Procedure

1. Grievance means the presence of a different

interpretation or misunderstanding toward the
Company’s Regulations and conditions between
Employee and Board of Directors and/or
his/her supervisor;
2. The company always tries to handle internally
and immediately and settle fairly any grievance
as the Company realize that it can create
unsatisfactory performance and frustration and
may end with disharmony among Employees;

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 Samples of Handling… Cont’d

3. The employee shall informally present

the complaint to his or her superior or
administrative equivalent for discussion
in order to gain considerations and
resolutions within 5 working days from
the date of the action which is subject of
the complaint. If the supervisor is the
subject of the complaint, the employee
may address the complaint to the
appropriate department head or
administrative equivalent.

Samples of Handling … Cont’d

4. If the previous procedure does not

satisfactorily resolve the problem, within
the set period of time, the employee
may present the complaint by writing
within 5 working days to the appropriate
department head or administrative
equivalent for further consideration and
action. A written decision will be sent to
the employee within 5 working days of
receipt of the complaint.

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 Samples of Handling… Cont’d

5. If the employee is not satisfied with the

decision of the department head or
administrative equivalent, a written appeal
stating why the appealed decision is incorrect
may be made to the President Director
equivalent within five (5) working days of the
date of the appealed decision. Within a
reasonable time, not to exceed thirty (30) days
following receipt of the appeal, a written
decision shall be sent to the employee. This
decision is final.
6. The written complaint and all decisions or
responses regarding such complaint shall be a
part of the personnel file of the employee.

Strikes

A basic right of workers/laborers and labor

unions that be staged legally, orderly
and peacefully as a result of failed
negotiation

Strike is an action that is planned and performed together by

workers/laborers and/or by trade unions in order to stop or
decelerate work, usually takes place in response to
employee grievances.

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 STRIKE IN INDONESIA 2001-2006

Strike Involved Lost Working

Year
Cases Worker Hour
2001 174 109,845 1,165,032

2002 220 97.325 769.142

2003 161 68,114 648,253

2004 112 48,092 497,780

2005 96 56,082 766,463

2006 282 586,830 4,665,685

Ministry of Manpower & Transmigration, DG of Industrial Relation 2007

A strike can take on a multitude of forms:

 “Sit-
Sit-Down Strike”
Strike”, workers may occupy the workplace,
but refuse either to do their jobs or to leave.
 “Wildcat Strikes”
Strikes”, strikes without formal union
authorization.
 “Work to Rule/Italian Strike”
Strike”, workers perform their
tasks exactly as they are required to but no better or they
refuse to work overtime
 It may or may not be accompanied by picketing.
Strikers picket by gathering outside of the workplace to
discourage others—
others—both employees and customers--
customers-- from
going in
 It can be a full work stoppage or a “slowdown”
slowdown”
 It may or may not inspire a boycott. In a boycott,
people stop buying the goods or services produced by a
company as a means of protest.

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 failed negotiation…

Whether as a result of the meeting ending in a
deadlock OR the employer is unwilling to
continue negotiations, even though
workers/laborers or labor unions has submitted a
written request for negotiation twice within 14
workdays.

orderly and peacefully…

The strike must not disrupt security and public
order and/or threaten the life safety and
property of the company, entrepreneur, other
people or other members of the general public

Labor Strike Procedure

1. At least within 7 (seven) days prior to

the strike, labor or its union must
notify, in written, the company and
government agency (responsible for
manpower affairs). A representative of
the government agency and the
management who receives the letter of
notifying the intention to stage a strike
are obligated to give a receipt.

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 Labor Strikes Procedure… Cont’d

2. The notification must contain at least (a)

timing (day, date, and hours) where the
strike begins and will end, (b) the venue
of the strike, (c) reasons of the strike; and
(d) signature of the chairperson and
secretary and/or each of chairpersons
persons and secretaries of the union
participating in the strike, who shall be
held responsible for the strike.

Labor Strikes Procedure… Cont’d

3. Prior to and during the strike, the

government agency is under an
obligation to solve problems that
leads to the emergence of strike by
arranging meeting and negotiate
between the disputing parties.

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 Labor Strikes Procedure… Cont’d
4. The implementation of strike staged by the
workers/laborers of enterprises that serve the
public interest and/or enterprises whose types
of activities, will lead to the endangerment of
human lives ( such as hospitals, fire
department, those providing railway service,
those in charge of regulating air traffic or sea
traffic), shall be arranged in “such a way “ so
as not to disrupt public interest and/or
endanger the safety of other people.

“Such a way” means that the strike shall be carried

out by workers/laborers who are not on duty.

Strikes become illegal if it is…

a. Not as a result of failed negotiations;
b. Without any notification given to the
employer and the government agency;
c. With notification but the notification is
given less then 7 days prior to the
strike;
d. With a notification but the content of
the notification is not complete;

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 If it is an illegal strike…
a. The Employer may take temporary action by:
prohibiting striking workers/laborers from being
present at locations where production processes
normally take place OR at the enterprise’s
premise if necessary
b. The employer may stage a “lockout”;
c. A strike that is performed illegally shall be
classified under the ‘absent’ category;
d. Within a period of 7 days the employer shall
make a proper and written call twice
successively to workers/laborers participating in
the illegal strike. Workers who do not respond
shall be considered to have resigned.

If it is a legal strike…
 The employer is prohibited from:
a. Replacing striking workers/laborers with other
workers/laborers from outside of the enterprise ;or
b. Imposing sanctions on or taking retaliatory actions in
whatever form against striking workers/laborers and
union officials during and after the strike is
performed.

 Workers/laborers who stage a strike legally in

order to demand the fulfillment of their normative
rights, which the employer has indeed violated,
then they shall have their wages.

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 How to handle strike..
 Before the strike: proactive. Avoiding a
circumstance where a strike action becomes
necessary is the optimum for all concerned. A
negotiated good faith agreement normally
resolves workplace issues from both employer
and unions perspectives.
 During the strike: be ready to provide support.
 After the strike: Bring Everyone together again.
Whether the strike is perceived as a ‘win’ or
‘lose’, by either management or the union, both
managers and employees will still need to work
together.

Lockout
Lockout is a fundamental right of employers
to reject the workers/laborers either in part
or in whole from performing work as a result
from failed negotiation

 An Employer who intends to perform a lockout is under an

obligation to give a written notification (contain: a) the time
(day, date and hour) and b) The reasons and cause for the
lockout) of the lockout to workers/laborers and/or labor union
and the local government agency of no less 7 days workdays
before the lockouts takes place.
 The notification is not needed if: a) The workers/laborers or
labor union violate the strike procedure or b) The
workers/laborers or labor union violate the normative provisions
stipulated under the work agreements, company regulations,
collective labor agreements or prevailing laws and regulations.

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 Lockout…Cont’d
 A lockout is temporary in nature and can
be ended when the dispute has been
resolved, or an agreement has been
reached to stop the lockout.
 Refusing entry to workers/laborers does
not constitute or is meant as an action to
terminate the work relationship.
 In the case of lockouts that are out
legally, wages are not required to be paid.

FINAL WORD…

"Carpe Diem! Seize the day,

lads! Make your lives
extraordinary!“
(Dead Poet Society)

Good Luck
And
THANK YOU

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 CURRICULUM VITAE
PERSONAL DETAILS:

 Name : Benediktus Marojahan Suryanto Sinurat

Sinurat
 Place/Date of birth : Yogyakarta / 30 October
October 1978
 E-mail : suryanto.sinurat@gmail.com
 Formal Education : Bachelor of Law, Gadjah Mada University,
University, 2001

WORKING EXPERIENCE:

 Legal Staff, Indonesian Consumer Organization-

Organization-Yogyakarta/YLKI
Yogyakarta/YLKI--
Yogyakarta, 1998-
1998-2001.
 Legal And Industrial Relation Staff, PT. Kompas Media Nusantara (KOMPAS
(KOMPAS
Daily News),
News), 2002
2002-2004
 Head of Information And Member Service Affair The Employers Association
Association
of Indonesia (APINDO), 2004-
2004-now
 Special Assistant to The Director, PT. Kalindo Irama Griya (Indorama
Group), 2005-
2005-now
 Member of Advocacy Team APINDO, 2006- 2006-now

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