Sherman Dorn has a nice response to yesterday's post, in which he basically argues that established unions are generally better off when administrators are competent than when they aren't. (Nascent unions can benefit from having a cartoonish villain to provoke their formation, but that only holds in the early stages.) I think he's right, both for the reasons he gives and for another one.

He lists several, including the daily wear-and-tear of living with a siege mentality, the real damage that idiotic decisions can do before they get reversed, and the cost (in time and money) of litigation and/or open conflict. (These arguments also apply to union leadership, for all the same reasons.) I'll add another: the wild card of third party solutions.

In many cases, discussions that don't get resolved internally get referred first to mediation, which isn't binding, and then (if that doesn't work) to arbitration, which is. While arbitration can settle a given question, it's usually a little like using a shotgun to kill a mosquito: it works, but there goes the living room window.

When The Administration and The Union discuss an issue, they both (usually) have at least some sense of what's involved in it. Much of that won't have to be spelled out, since it's common knowledge. But when a third party comes in from the outside, empowered to settle the question, the ever-present danger is that the settlement will inadvertently go far beyond the issue at hand. And if it does, both sides will be stuck with it.

That usually happens with the arbitrator invokes some sort of principle or general rule behind the decision. In a large and complex system with layers of history, statements tend to have ripples of meaning far beyond the intention (or even knowledge) of the speaker. That's why it's so maddeningly hard to pin down a single interpretation of a contract. Implementing a contract involves far more than simply reading it and trying to follow it; if it were that easy, we'd all be much better off. It also involves "past practices," past grievances, past settlements, and different interpretations of words like "reasonable" or "customary" or "terms and conditions." I've had people flip out when I've used the word "program" when I should have said "initiative." ("That's an initiative, you jerk! Since when did that become a program? Has it been vetted through the program review process?" Honestly, life is too short, but I've actually had this conversation.) And heaven help the poor soul who refers to "student affairs" instead of "student services," or vice versa.

Language is a minefield for people who live with it every single day. Bring in an outsider whose knowledge is pretty much limited to single presentations by opponents, and I'd be surprised if she didn't set off a few landmines without even knowing it.

I read once that part of the reason that most criminal cases are plea bargained is that juries are just too hard to predict. Now imagine if jury verdicts carried the force of precedent.

Smart administrators who are lucky enough to have smart union leadership will seize the opportunity to work things out between them whenever possible, even if it sometimes means swallowing a little more than they think they should have to. A bad agreement can be revisited, but a bad arbitration settlement is forever.