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THE ART OF ORGANIZING  
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Brian O. Shepherd

Labor Politics
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_ 18 Tips from UAW Organizer Brian O. Shepherd _

Mural by Mike Alewitz,

 

_Organizing isn’t just a science, it’s also an art. Normally the
latter is passed on through phone calls, debriefs, meetings, and
late-night shit talk. This is an attempt to share with the next
generation of union organizers some of those lessons learned along the
way, some in victory, some in defeat. None of this is new. None of
this is mine._

_I certainly don’t have the answers, I just know it’s something
that I’ve given my life to over the past quarter of a century. The
art requires staying close to the ground where people are—and
that’s messy. It requires us to relate to others, take chances,
innovate, all while asking the hard questions of others and
ourselves._

_All of it is simple. None of it is easy._

_— Brian O. Shepherd,
[[link removed]] United
Auto Workers organizing director and lead organizer supporting
Mercedes workers in Vance, Alabama. June 3, 2025._

THE ART OF ORGANIZING

1) BE QUIET

After you have asked a question, be quiet and just listen.

2) STOP BEING WEIRD

It’s not what you are saying, it’s how you are doing it. Stop
being weird.

Organizers can easily get lost thinking about what’s the right
question to ask or what is the right combination of words that will
push this worker to make a decision. Not that it doesn’t matter, but
most of the time it’s the non-verbal cues or delivery that people
are reacting to more than what you’re actually saying.

If you’re talking really fast, and trying to bombard people with
information, you’ve already set yourself up for the other person to
put up some unnecessary barriers. Slow things down, be confident and
speak calmly and you will notice that people will respond differently.

3)_ _TRUST WORKERS

Sounds simple, right? But how often do we go into conversations,
meetings or campaigns with a predetermined plan and outcome?

There are three characteristics that organizers need to keep front and
center when helping workers build organization:

1. Workers have the power to decide WHAT the problem is.

2. Workers must have the power to decide HOW to solve those problems.

3. Workers have the power to ACT on implementing the solutions to
those problems.

There are systemic structures that prevent working people from acting
on any of those three things. A large part of our role as organizers
is to help people identify and break through the barriers our system
has set up. When we get workers to “buy in” to a plan, it sets us
up as yet another way to take agency away from people.

4) WORKERS WANT RECOGNITION

Workers need bread, but they need roses too. Labor unions generally
focus on negotiating wages, benefits, fair work rules, and safety.
That’s all very essential. But one thing we often fail to do is
acknowledge workers’ need for recognition. People have dreams and
values, along with a desire to be respected and to connect to others.
This is why technical organizing will only get you so far—building
something sustainable requires deep relationships.

5) ORGANIZERS ARE SCOUTS

In any workplace, there are going to be a small number of people that
support the union no matter what. Getting those people on board is not
organizing, that’s mobilizing.

The fundamental responsibility of an organizer is to identify,
recruit, and develop leaders—people who can bring along and persuade
others. That’s who you need to win hard fights and to sustain
shop-floor power.

An organizer does not provide services. Effective organizers wake up
each morning and go to sleep each night thinking about finding,
engaging, training, supporting, and agitating leaders. All that really
means is that you’re challenging a person to act on behalf of
themselves and their coworkers.

6) GET OVER YOUR EGO

Recognizing the dilemma you are facing is one of the most important
mental aspects of improving at union organizing. Most people’s egos
won’t allow them to be humble enough to recognize the problem in
front of them. If you think you always have all the answers you tend
to stick with formulas that worked before but might not work today.

7) BE CURIOUS AND LISTEN

As organizers we lead with empathy and curiosity to learn as much
information as possible about what the other person’s experience has
been. It sounds really easy to do but is also the place where
organizers stumble the most.

If we lead with the solution—that if they organize they will have
more power and more rights—we lose people because we are going
outside of their experience. Organizers listen, then propose that to
fix the raised issues, they have a choice to act or not.

8) ORGANIZING IS RELATIONSHIPS

Relationships lead to organizing. Issues alone lead to tasks.

9) LOOK FOR OPPORTUNITIES

​​Seeing opportunities while most people are simply not paying
attention to details, or are just plain unaware, is what separates a
good union organizer from everyone else.

10) FEAR IS THE OBSTACLE

A big part of what organizers do is help teach worker leaders to
overcome the fear of standing up to the boss. And even more than that,
most fear actually comes from the fear of rejection—doing a leaflet
at shift change, talking to a coworker about signing a card,
facilitating a meeting of coworkers, etc. So we have to get people
more angry than afraid.

11) DON’T TALK FROM A SCRIPT

A good organizing conversation isn’t you being a little robot
reading a script. The following framework, developed from the United
Farm Workers, is more helpful:

A: _Anger,_ turn fear into courage

H: _Hope_, turn despair into possibility

U: _Urgency_, it’s waited long enough

Y: _You_, can make a difference

At the same time, organizing conversations are intentional and not
just a complaint session or therapy. They have to be about specific
goals:

⁃ Identify what issue this person cares about

⁃ Identify if they have leadership potential

⁃ Connect them with a plan of action

⁃ Get them to commit

12) CARDS ARE UNRELIABLE

Union authorization cards are a very unreliable indicator of where
your support is at during an organizing drive. They are one measure of
support at a particular moment in time. What matters significantly
more is the deep relational organizing that comes through identifying
recruiting and training leaders—and then being public about that
support in the face of opposition from the employer.

13) DON’T BE AFRAID TO LOSE

The labor movement has lost our organizing muscle; failing is a part
of the process to get it back. Most unions aren’t even trying
because they are so afraid of losing.

14) TAKE A BREATH

Organizers tend to run from one task to another. Take a second to stop
and take a breath. Make a plan to have a few extra moments to just be.
Take that call and do a lap in the parking lot. Look for opportunities
to meet with your teammates outside and take in the local scene.

Twenty years ago a veteran organizer told me “if you are constantly
working yourself without taking even a moment to reflect and refresh,
you aren’t able to be truly present in the work.” It’s not a new
age or selfish self-care thing. It’s about giving yourself a chance
to recover so that you can be more present and effective at your work.

15) LEARN FROM THE PAST

Examine the past and learn from it. “The only right way of learning
the science of war is to read and reread the campaigns of the great
captains.” — Napoleon

16) DON’T FEAR MAKING MISTAKES

Organizers often freeze because they are more worried about making a
mistake than taking action. Organizers can only be forged through
experience on the ground and intense self-reflection. Yes, you will
not be good when you start, you will constantly make mistakes. Instead
of letting insecurities take over, you learn from doing and
reflection.

It’s easy to celebrate wins, good organizers never forget their
losses. The key is to ask yourself the difficult questions, analyze
what went wrong, then start looking for solutions so that you don’t
find yourself stuck in the same situation the next time. This is true
for a single phone call, a meeting with workers or an election
campaign overall. It’s important to not get stuck in the analysis
phase—learn your lesson and move to improved action as quickly as
possible.

17) KEEP SHOWING UP

No one ever really masters organizing, but that’s not necessary. As
an organizer you must constantly be developing your skills, increasing
your abilities to be able to face the situation in front of you. It
requires that you show up daily.

And there are going to be days (maybe weeks) where you’re not going
to want to. Show up anyway.

18) DON’T LOSE HOPE

Organizers must recognize that hope can emerge out of difficult
situations. Oftentimes it’s not even the opposition that gets to us.
It’s that nagging internal voice where we put pressure on ourselves
to do more or feel that we aren’t good enough or that we’re not
making a difference. It can stop an organizer dead in their tracks,
because it all seems so overwhelming. No matter what disappointments
we might have, we must refuse to lose hope.

UAW organizer Brian O. Shepherd

* Labor
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* organizing
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* unions
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* UAW
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