With my box office job, I didn’t really worry too much about when I might need to be on a phone call or Zoom for a union meeting. Of course, I wished I could go to those in person, but at least that job was easy enough to make sure I could be on the phone to attend. And since the pandemic, all the meetings are virtual so I’m not missing out on anything. But I’m only doing that job a few hours a day now since it’s no longer my main job.
And for my current main day job, I have a lot of different meetings and calls I need to be on. Most days, I have at least one meeting. And they do work around different appointments and conflicts that I have, but it’s not always perfect. Especially when a lot of team members need to be on one call. And that’s what happened the last time I was supposed to be attending the LA Local Communications committee meeting. It was during an all-team meeting and I knew that I had to be on my work meeting. There just wasn’t a way around that. And while I hated missing a union meeting, I knew there would be notes after that I could review.
So I was glad that when the next committee meeting was announced and it was not during a time that I had to be at a work meeting. It was right after one of my work meetings, but there wasn’t any overlap so that was pretty lucky. And while I did still have to continue working while I was in the meeting, I did try to pay as much attention as I could so I didn’t miss too much about what was going on.
A lot of the meeting was going over things that happened at the last meeting, so I was catching up. I wasn’t working on any particular projects or tasks since I missed that meeting, so I didn’t have any news or updates to share. But it was good to hear what other people have been working on and to get ideas for things that I might want to present to the committee in the future. We also went over preparations for our next meeting where there will be a union staff member available to answer questions. So we are supposed to come up with questions we think other members would like to know. I have some time to think about this, so I want to make sure I think of some good ones.
I know that I was quiet during this last meeting because I missed the last one and wanted to hear what had been happening, but I do tend to be very quiet during all the committee meetings I’ve been a part of. I think part of this is due to not feeling confident about the information I might think I know or the questions I would ask. I do try to stay educated as much as I can about various union issues, but I know there is so much that I don’t know about. I know that everyone has to start somewhere and I shouldn’t be embarrassed if something I say is wrong, but it’s easier to know that than it is to act that way. And maybe my time on committees now will be more about educating myself and understanding things and hopefully I will be invited on committees again and I can take more action. While this isn’t the first time I’m on a committee, it still feels different this time. And being on a local committee is different from a national committee, so I think that’s something else I’m working through.
I want to try to be a bit more vocal and participate more when we have our next committee meeting, but I know that might not happen. All I can do is to continue to learn, do my research, and be as prepared as I can for each meeting. And hope that the next meeting won’t conflict with a work meeting.
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Missing Some Union Meetings (or Even Virtual Meetings Don’t Guarantee I Can Go)
Lots Of Virtual Meetings (or Virtual Union Meetings)
Getting More Union Meetings In (or I’m Grateful These Are Done On Zoom)
More Virtual Union Meetings (or Hopefully We Will Be Back To In-Person Meetings Soon)
Union Committee Work (or Continuing To Be More and More Involved In My Union)
Continuing With My Union Committee Service (or I’m Still So Grateful These Are Done Over Zoom)
