Labor
Lake Research Partners has conducted issue, political,
and membership research for many of the nation’s largest
labor unions, and we are highly attuned to the particular
set of challenges faced by unions today. LRP is known for
its insights on the changing concerns and priorities of union
members and for strategic advice on new opportunities for
unions in a changing political environment.
We frequently undertake union membership and communications
studies. We have helped several national unions more fully
understand the concerns and priorities of their own members
and develop effective communications strategies to engage
their membership in support of the union’s goals. Recent
internal studies of union members include surveys and focus
groups for the International Association of Fire Fighters
(IAFF); a communications study for AFSCME involving focus
group and survey research; several statewide surveys and focus
groups with members of UNITE; and a communications survey
for the Communications Workers of America (CWA).
We have been involved in organizing work for CWA and the
AFL-CIO, which included looks at the national potential to
organize among women, among African Americans and Hispanics,
and among the Union Privilege associate program. We have also
conducted research in local efforts for CWA and National Education
Association (NEA) state affiliates.
In 1997, our groundbreaking research on working women’s
concerns and priorities for the AFL-CIO Working Women’s
Department has helped to spur a surge of interest within the
labor movement in women and women’s issues. As a result
of this research, we are working with a number of unions to
help them understand the views of their women members and
find ways to connect labor’s agenda to women’s
concerns.
The AFL-CIO also recently turned to LRP for help in understanding
why many union members vote only sporadically in national
elections, while others do not register to vote at all. Our
focus group and survey research is now being used to re-tool
the strategies, messages and materials used by the union movement
to encourage members to register and vote in greater numbers.
Unions turn to LRP for strategic insights when undertaking
public campaigns that extend beyond their traditional constituencies.
For example, we conducted focus group research to help CWA
develop a media campaign encouraging consumers to choose union
companies for cellular phone service as well as to bolster
the union’s negotiating position with Bell Atlantic.
Our research showed that the audience we were targeting (mainly
college educated and middle to upper income) was resistant
to pro-union messages, but that the union could still wage
an effective campaign by addressing consumers’ concerns
about the impact of layoffs on the cellular service they receive,
and reinforcing consumers’ sense of fairness by highlighting
the human face of the layoffs.
Many other labor unions have asked us to conduct research
for public campaigns. For AFSCME, CWA, and the IAFF, we conducted
survey and focus group research to examine public attitudes
on privatization of government services and to craft messages
for raising public awareness of the risks and costs of privatization.
For Service Employees International Union (SEIU) we did extensive
work on national health care reform and for AFSCME we looked
at attitudes and messages on welfare. Other public issues
we have researched on behalf of labor unions include environmental
concerns, retirement issues, health care, women’s issues,
child care, and the role of labor unions in politics.
As part of the successful effort to defeat Proposition 226
in California, the anti-union Paycheck Protection Initiative,
we conducted membership research for CWA and the International
Union of Bricklayers and Allied Craftworkers, Rural Letter
Carriers, and United Food and Commercial Workers.
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