Channels of communication

You have worked for your present firm for three years and have been promoted to supervisor. The firm has recently decided to introduce a ‘harmonization programme’. Under this scheme, everyone in the firm, from the managing director to the odd-job man, will have similar conditions of work and fringe benefits (though not the same salary). They will all clock on and clock off work, eat in the same canteen, have the same holidays, pension scheme and so on. The unions support the scheme although obviously there are many people who are unhappy about it — mainly because they are unsure of exactly what to expect, and because they see it as a threat to their hard-won privileges.