Digital Communication and Employee Inclusion

Oh dear. Speaks for itself:

"Hey Ruffin,

I hope you had a pleasant vacation.

I'm pretty sure there is good reason for the appearance of a 28" (??) color LED screen in my kitchen in the Southern Village Weave. I'm pretty sure it is for something that can not be accomplished on the five computer screens we have in the general office upstairs. I only wonder aloud because I'm pretty sure this is another one of those decisions that was made without involving ordinary workers in the decision-making.

This is not some Geoff-is-itchy-cos-he-can't-go-on-Spring-Break wheeze. We all sweat to make the money in this co-op. We all have a right to determine how that money is spent. Not because I say so. But because co-op policy says so.

It is not something small and inconsequential. I am pretty sure I am not the only employee a little disappointed that, having had a year when the growth in sales in my immediate department averaged good double figures, my pay raise was in the single figures.

And then I find a computer screen, to which I do not have access, sitting proudly next to my walk-in. And I'm wondering why my pay raise could not have been bigger? Why I am not involved in the process to determine how much of the profits I help to earn are devoted to pay raises? Why I was not involved in the decsion to spend who knows how much on digital co-op management? When all of this is my right under co-op policy.

I would be grateful if you could let me know how much the whole project (screens, software, electrician time, IM time) to digitalize co-op management communication has cost and will cost, in total. Then, I would be grateful if you would let me know when employees might expect some inclusion in the process you and I discussed to allow them to help design ways in which we can be more included in decision-making, as is our right under WSM co-op policy.

All the best,
Geoff"

[By the way, who can work out the connection between the pics attached to my previous posts on Employee Inclusion in Decision-Making within The Weave and the pic attached to this post?]