What’s up with Jack? First let my assure you, Jack is not my name.

One time I received a call from a coworker, one who worked with a different state agency, and she asked me if my name was Jack. I told her that, well, we had worked together for a number of years, she had always called me John. Why would she think my name was now Jack?

The explanation was simple, another coworker told me. I had met with a group of agency representatives and gone over contract proposals with them. After I went through and reviewed all the agency proposals, I presented the “Jack” proposals. The proposals designed to “jack” with the other side. The person who had called to ask my real name was confused after I had introduced the “jack” proposals. She had thought they were “my” proposals and so my name must have been “Jack.” Hey, Jack!

So, whenever my office would prepare for a round of negotiations we would send a proposal form to all of the team caucus members to get their input on what we wanted to get from our negotiations. On the form was a ranking system of 1 Must have; 2 Like to Have; 3 Housekeeping and; 4 Throwaway. Pretty simple. The intent was to see what each team member thought of their own proposal. Must haves were fought for to the end. Like to haves were fought for but in all likelihood did not make it to the end. When we were wrapping up negotiations we’d usually pull the like to haves.

Housekeeping were usually used to correct misspellings, typos and other grammatical errors.

And then, there was category 4. I never liked category 4, the Throwaway. If your proposal fell in this pile, you might as well forget it. We really didn’t take those proposals seriously. We would propose them but would take them off the table pretty quickly. We’d say we’d use them for leverage but you won’t get much leverage if you withdraw them within the first couple sessions.

So, in my negotiations I used a different term. The Jack proposal. I didn’t use throwaways. No sir, I used jack proposals. You see if a team member gave me a proposal I used it. No throwaways. I presented all of their proposals. Now before you think “All of them?” Yes, as long as they were defensible and supported our side.

But the “Jack” proposal? It was meant to play with the other side. It was meant to “jack” with them. I would use one and then wait for the other side’s reaction. Usually they would get “bent” over what ever I had proposed. I mean once I proposed to reduce vacation days and the reaction was immediate and angry. It showed us what tripped their trigger. What got them angry. And the worse the proposal was to them the more they worked to get our side to withdraw it.

Which meant of course that they would be willing to bargain with us to get us to withdraw the”Jack” proposal.

Smart you say , no jackgenious!

Here are some samples of my “Jack” proposals:

(spoiler alert: not all of the following jack proposals are true)

No more bathroom breaks (get back to work)
Reduce vacation days;
takeaway holidays and holiday pay;
Change the definition of seniority;
Reduce the number of union stewards;
Lengthen the hours in a work day;
Eliminate health care;
Furlough days – days you work but don’t get paid;
Change the right to work laws;
Reduce paydays by one per month;
Limit the areas or issues where employees could file grievances;
Or simply, take away a benefit that they already enjoyed.

Why do this? Why be so mean?

Well, if my side claims to be out of money, nothing in the bank, well then you better have proposals to support your claim. And also simply put, if both side’s initial proposals are extreme then you had better insure your proposals reflect that.

And besides, if you propose something “out there” then the other side has to spend energy getting you back to center. And let me assure you this, the other side uses “Jack” proposals all the time. They just call them “reasonable and responsible proposals designed to promote the common welfare.”

Let me introduce you to my friend Jack.

JT

here is some Jack back at you…