We can't claim to have changed the course of health care with this grievance. We still have understaffing, lack of retiree health care, and crazy hours. However, we succeeded in making our workplace a little more worker-friendly and in doing so, learned how to challenge management policies that are unreasonable and/or unfair.

Why go to so much trouble? To answer that, I would have to explain the many reasons, big and small, that we voted to join a union last year. Suffice it to say that we wanted to have a voice in our workplace-- that we work better (and thus provide better care) when we can participate in decisions about how our work is done. If you as a healthcare worker can be trusted to make decisions about people's lives, shouldn't you be able to chose what pictures to have in your work space?