How many IT people needed to unionize?
This seems like a simple and stupid question but I am just not able to get a clear answer on my own despite several attempts and asking several people in person who I thought would know. Part of the problem may just be how rare IT unions are? The examples Ive found online tend to be for places like Google, whereas we are IT people within a non-tech company.
Several people on my team at work are interested in joining a union. Our boss actually quietly supports it. The confusion is we don't work for a tech company, but are IT people at a non-profit (with other unionized divisions, fields that are more traditionally union). We dont really get how many people are needed to sign on for a union to be legitimate. We all assume there is a certain level of manager where you have to get most of the people to sign.
The numbers are made up, but proportionally correct:
100,000 - Entire company (Other divisions are unionized, we would be far from first)
2,000 - All of IT people
100 - Everyone reporting to our SVP
40 - Everyone reporting to our VP
20 - Everyone reporting to our manager (who quietly supports it, and where probably most of us like the idea).
A little direction would be much appreciated. Knowing the structure, is there a specific number of people we have to get in support? Are we going about this all backwards, should we be picking a union first and working with them before worrying about support?