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Organized labor has arrived at Microsoft headquarters.
A two-day AI Labor Summit between AFL-CIO leaders and Microsoft executives this week reflects the tech giant’s revamped approach to unions — which includes a pledge by the company to incorporate feedback from labor unions and their members into the development of artificial intelligence.
“We’ve always said, as a labor movement, we are willing to work with companies who want to work with us,” said Liz Shuler, AFL-CIO President, speaking via phone from the event. “That invitation doesn’t often get accepted.”
Those in attendance included leaders of AFL-CIO unions representing teachers, electrical workers, public sector employees, communication workers, nurses, and entertainment, creative, and theatrical professionals.
“It gives us insight so that we ensure that we’re designing products that meet people’s needs, in really giving labor a seat at the table,” said Brad Smith, the Microsoft president. “We have to ensure that AI serves people, that it serves workers, and that we’re identifying the issues that may cause concern.”
The event, culminating in Redmond today, was closed to the press and public. It’s part of a larger union commitment by Microsoft that also includes a promise to take a neutral stance if any of its own employees choose to organize.
Historically, unions struggled to gain traction inside Microsoft, dating back to efforts to organize contractors and temporary workers in the late 1990s. The company started to change its approach two years ago when seeking regulatory approval for its $68.7 billion acquisition of Activision-Blizzard, including unionized employees.
Microsoft has upheld and expanded its union commitments since then.
In the process, the company has been able to publicly contrast itself with other corporate titans, potentially to its advantage in the eyes of regulators and political leaders favorable to organized labor.
While the AFL-CIO is meeting with Microsoft executives in conference rooms this week, for example, national Teamsters union leaders marched in the streets outside Amazon a year ago.
“Amazon is the poster child for what not to do,” Shuler said. “Their technologies are actually making life worse for working people, and [workers] don’t have a voice. They’ve tried to form a union and have a voice, but Amazon is the union-buster in chief. This is the opposite of what we’re doing here.”
GeekWire has offered Amazon an opportunity to respond.
Microsoft released a set of principles in 2022 acknowledging the rights of its employees to unionize, and pledging to work constructively with any who do.
At the same time, Microsoft made it clear that it hoped its employees wouldn’t feel the need to form or join unions, saying they would “never need to organize to have a dialogue with Microsoft’s leaders.”
Asked if the AFL-CIO sees opportunities to organize more Microsoft employees, Shuler said yes.
“The company has recognized that the right to form a union is embedded in federal law,” she said. “And if you want to come together with your your fellow co workers and form a union, they’re they’re not going to do what most corporations do in America, which is union-bust.”
She added, “Other companies can or should learn from what they’re doing, and we plan to look across the industry at other tech companies, to take Microsoft’s example and apply it to other workplaces in tech.”
Microsoft’s Smith pointed to the company’s existing reliance on unionized workers, explaining that many people who work on its campus are unionized. This includes bus drivers, food service workers, and those who maintain the grounds. He said Microsoft has good relationships with the unions representing these workers.
In addition, he noted that Microsoft has established policies that have led to benefits like paid time off and parental leave for the people who work for its contractors. More broadly, he said, the company depends on many professionals represented by unions, such as electricians and pipefitters at its major data center projects.
In the core tech industry, unions have historically seen more momentum in video games, in areas such as testing and quality assurance. However, Microsoft and other tech companies have yet to see the labor movement take hold in their core ranks of U.S. engineering or corporate employees.
Microsoft and the AFL-CIO announced their AI partnership in December 2023, saying they wanted to create an open dialogue to anticipate the needs of workers and include their perspectives in the development and implementation of AI. The agreement was described at the time as the first of its kind to focus on AI.
A study last year by the Pew Research Center found that about a fifth of all workers were highly exposed to the effects of AI, in jobs where the most important activities could be replaced or assisted by AI. In contrast with prior waves of automation, college-educated and higher-paid workers are more likely to feel the effects.
Shuler cited, as an example, concerns about the ways that AI and automation can influence workloads in healthcare by increasing the ratio of patients to nurses, impacting the quality of care in some situations.
At the same time, the Pew study found that many workers were more optimistic about AI’s positive impacts than they were concerned about job loss.
“What we know from the history of technology is that technology creates new jobs, sometimes it displaces existing jobs, and most importantly, it changes jobs,” Smith said. “What we strongly believe is that we have to use this technology as a country to create new opportunities. … There’s always a transition.”
How will feedback from workers and unions influence AI products? Smith cited, as an early example, Microsoft’s work with the American Federation of Teachers to automate basic tasks for teachers, such as turning Word documents into PowerPoint presentations, helping them spend more time with kids in the classroom.
Shuler acknowledged that Microsoft and the AFL-CIO would have moments of disagreement, but expressed confidence in their ability to work through any issues given Microsoft’s approach. Asked if any of those disagreements had come up, she said not yet, but pointed out that they were just getting started.
“Labor leaders,” she said, “are not afraid to speak their minds.”