MESSAGE TO OUR
EMPLOYEES
Kaiser Permanente and the National Union of Healthcare Workers discuss telecommuting, technology, and commitment to nondiscrimination.
This message was sent on behalf of Lionel Sims, interim senior vice president, Human Resources, Kaiser Foundation Health Plan and Hospitals; and Priya Smith, chief employee human resources officer, The Permanente Medical Group, to Kaiser Permanente’s Northern California mental health and addiction medicine professionals on Friday, September 19.
To our mental health and addiction medicine professionals,
Kaiser Permanente and the National Union of Healthcare Workers met on Friday, September 19, to continue negotiating a new agreement for our Northern California mental health and addiction medicine professionals.
We continue to bargain in good faith and are committed to reaching an agreement that benefits our patients, members, and you. Exchanging proposals and receiving feedback from both sides helps us get to agreement.
We must create greater operational flexibility to ensure patients can easily access high-quality care at the right time. Contract language that is too operationally restrictive and does not consider our changing environment can become a barrier to teams working together to find the right solutions. For example, eliminating the new-to-return patient appointment ratio provides the flexibility needed for individual clinicians and their managers to work together to construct individual provider profiles that flex to the needs of the clinician’s caseload and operational needs.
The Kaiser Permanente bargaining team provided NUHW with 2 counterproposals related to telecommuting and the introduction of new technologies in the future. We affirmed that we will not unreasonably revoke telecommuting agreements, and we reinforced our commitment to communicating and discussing new technology implementations or offerings that materially impact you or the way you practice care.
The NUHW bargaining team continues to seek nondiscrimination protections that are already explicitly covered by legal obligations and our long-established companywide policies. We want to be clear that Kaiser Permanente’s commitment to nondiscrimination and equitable treatment of all employees, physicians, members, and patients is unchanged and our policies and enforcement already align to this.
In our counterproposal on posting and filling positions we called out that hiring internal candidates is important and engaged in discussions around the student loan repayment program. We also discussed health, welfare, and benefits as included in Articles 22 and 24 for both active and retired employees.
And we reached a tentative agreement concerning the organization of contract content on transfers and promotions.
We are awaiting NUHW’s response to our ATB proposal — 17% across-the-board wage increases over 4 years, with wage increases that will keep our mental health professionals among the highest paid in Northern California.
The next bargaining sessions are on Tuesday, September 23, and Thursday, September 25. We will continue to provide updates.
Thank you for providing high-quality mental health and addiction care to patients every day, and for staying informed on the facts as bargaining continues. We remain optimistic that we can reach an agreement that works for both parties and delivers the access to mental health care our members and patients deserve.
For more information, visit kp.org/nuhwbargaining.