Opinion ID: 198566
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Assigning and Effectively Recommending Assignment of Work

Text: 50 Provident also argues that the district and charge nurses participate in and effectively recommend the assignment of work. It makes the following arguments in support of its contention that the nurses have authority to assign work 9 to the MHAs. It says the job descriptions provide the nurses with authority to assign tasks to other staff; that the nurses actually assign MHAs to particular residents (through pre-determined groupings of residents); that if an MHA is absent, the nurses redistribute the work among the present MHAs and can ask an MHA to work beyond a shift or to float; and that the nurses determine when the MHAs take breaks, including lunch breaks. The employer also focuses on the fact that the nurses are the highest level of staff physically present at the nursing home on weekends and at night. Provident relies on several decisions from other circuits to support these arguments. See Glenmark Assocs. v. NLRB, 147 F.3d 333, 340-45 (4th Cir. 1998) (finding nurses had statutory authority to assign work); Caremore, 129 F.3d at 369 (same); Beverly California Corp., 970 F.2d at 1553 (same). 51 The Board found that while the district and charge nurses possess some assignment power, the power is circumscribed and does not amount to the exercise of independent judgment. The Board placed great weight on the fact that the Unit Managers select groups of residents for assignment to the MHAs; the nurses' only authority is to assign MHAs to those predetermined groups. The Unit Managers also determine the specific duties to be performed for each resident, as well as the shift or floor to which each MHA is assigned. Once MHAs are assigned to a group of residents, the assignments tend to remain the same. As to the occasional reassignment when MHAs are absent, the Board found that, although the nurses consider the needs of individual residents, the matching of skills to requirements was essentially routine. Further, all floating work or beyond shift work is based on predetermined requirements that there be a certain number of MHAs per unit. While nurses can request that an MHA work overtime, they cannot compel the MHA to do so. Once nurses do exercise their limited authority to transfer, they must immediately notify the Unit Manager, who reviews the decision. Finally, the determination of order of lunch and other breaks is essentially clerical. 52 The Board's conclusion that such hemmed-in, limited authority to assign work -- authority which is confined by predetermined groupings and schedules and is subject to post-action recission by a Unit Manager -- is not the independent judgment required by the Act is both rational and supported. See Northeast Utils. Serv. Corp. v. NLRB, 35 F.3d 621, 625 (1st Cir. 1994) (finding non-supervisory status where employee had no ability to assign work other than filling openings on a shift from a pre-determined list). The mere fact that an action is subject to review and to being countermanded by a higher-up employee does not alone mean that the acting employee is not a supervisor. See NLRB v. Metropolitan Life Ins. Co., 405 F.2d 1169, 1177 (2d Cir. 1968) ([The] power to review held by the immediate supervisors of the [employees] whose status is at issue does not demonstrate that the latter are not 'supervisors' under the Section 2(11) definition.). But the Board does not rely on that fact alone, and its assessment of what is routine work as opposed to work requiring the exercise of independent judgment is adequately supported by the record.