Oklahoma – Knock, Knock. Who’s There? A Proud Union Member.

Tulsa, Okla., Local 1180 members prepare to make house calls as part of their VMO training. They reached out to co-workers to have a greater voice on the job. (Photo by Aisha Salleh)

It’s intimidating knocking on someone’s door and asking them to join a union. Even knowing it’s a co-worker may not calm the jitters. But when you begin to explain that there is power in numbers and that coming together as a union gives workers a voice, it gets easier.

That’s what eight members of Local 1180 learned one February weekend in Tulsa when they knocked on co-workers’ doors to encourage them to join the union. These Volunteer Member Organizers (VMOs) have never done anything like this before. But the preparations, field training and house calls made believers out of them.

Local 1180 represents approximately half the city’s employees, so about 2,000 are not yet members. That’s the challenge. The citizens of Tulsa deserve the vital services provided by the city’s water, sanitation and road maintenance workers, airport safety officers, 911 emergency operators and administrative employees. But privatization threats and anti-worker legislation could cost jobs and a deterioration of services.

The VMOs participated in a three-day training, learning one-on-one communication skills. Partnering with experienced organizers, they headed out to make house calls. Similar VMO training programs are held across the nation.

“Doing a cold call on somebody’s door — somebody you may work with but don’t know — and saying, ‘I want to learn about your experiences and talk to you about joining the union,’ is very intimidating at first,” says Robert Mulvihill, a mechanic and also one of the VMOs (as well as a steward) for Local 1180. “But after you get past the initial butterflies in the stomach, it’s incredibly satisfying knowing you’ve made a difference, whether or not you got them to sign a union card. You’re showing them the members of the union are there for them.”