Opinion ID: 790046
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Authority to Reward

Text: 26 The revenue-protection workers are supervisors if they exercise independent judgment to reward or effectively recommend rewarding other employees in the interest of PSC. To determine whether they satisfy this test, it is first necessary to review the extent of their exercise of independent judgment in the bonus process. 27 The record reflects that the revenue-protection analyst exercises virtually no independent judgment. To determine whether a reporting employee is eligible for a bonus, she uses strict criteria: (1) does the employee belong to one of the bargaining units whose members are eligible for a bonus and (2) was the diversion of power authorized? She does not compute the amount of the loss and merely applies a mathematical formula to compute the amount of the bonus. Her only discretion is in deciding whether the apparent loss is large enough to forward to the billing department for prorating. Forwarding the matter can never reduce a bonus (without forwarding, the employee receives the minimum bonus of $10), and it can help the employee only if the billing department ultimately charges the customer more than $100 for the diversion of power. The record amply supports the Regional Director's decision that the analyst does not exercise independent judgment to reward other employees. 28 The revenue-protection investigators exercise greater, but still limited, discretion. The meterman, not the investigator, determines whether there has been a diversion. And the only bonus-eligibility criteria the investigators examine are (1) whether the reporting employee belongs to one of the two collective-bargaining units whose members are eligible for bonuses, and (2) whether the cause of the diversion found by the meterman is the cause reported by the employee. The record suggests that the investigators may have authority to relieve the reporting employee from the clerical error of checking the wrong box for the reported cause of the diversion; but it is unclear whether such an error has ever occurred. Otherwise there appears to be no discretion regarding eligibility. 29 The calculation of unmetered use is not so mechanical a task, but the record supports the Board's view that the investigator's discretion is rather limited. According to the investigators' testimony, objective criteria determine which method to use in calculating the amount of unmetered use, with the future-use method employed whenever practicable. Their testimony and supporting documents also suggest that the application of each method is a matter of applying standard formulae to reported data. The principal exercise of judgment by the investigators, as they describe their duties, appears to be the determination whether the customer has satisfactorily proved that the calculation of unmetered use is incorrect because, for example, the customer added or subtracted equipment (such as a refrigerator) that consumes significant amounts of electricity. The testimony indicates, however, that this determination is based largely on objective evidence and is an uncommon occurrence. 30 The limitations on the investigators' discretion are a crucial consideration. As the Supreme Court stated: 31 Many nominally supervisory functions may be performed without the exercis[e of] such a degree of ... judgment or discretion... as would warrant a finding of supervisory status under the Act. It falls clearly within the Board's discretion to determine, within reason, what scope of discretion qualifies.... [I]t is also undoubtedly true that the degree of judgment that might ordinarily be required to conduct a particular task may be reduced below the statutory threshold by detailed orders and regulations issued by the employer. 32 Ky. River Cmty. Care, Inc., 532 U.S. at 713-14, 121 S.Ct. 1861 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted) (alteration in original). See NLRB v. Meenan Oil Co., 139 F.3d 311, 321 (2d Cir.1998) (dispatchers were not supervisors because they made assignments according to detailed procedures established by management). 33 A second important consideration is the principal purpose of the investigators' estimate of unmetered usage. That purpose is to enable PSC to collect from customers the value of electricity or gas they have consumed without paying. The workers who receive bonuses are only the indirect beneficiaries of the process. Although the actions of the revenue-protection staff affect the bonuses received by Union members, their job is not to evaluate or improve the performance of fellow employees, any more than it is the job of the batter in a major league baseball game to provide souvenir baseballs for fans who retrieve foul balls or home runs. 34 On this point the Regional Director relied on Brown & Sharpe Mfg. Co., 87 N.L.R.B. 1031, 1949 WL 8285 (1949), enforced, 183 F.2d 259 (1st Cir.1950). In that case the collective-bargaining agreement provided for an incentive wage plan under which time studies set a standard rate for any particular operation. See NLRB v. Brown & Sharpe Mfg. Co., 169 F.2d 331, 332 (1st Cir.1948). Employees were guaranteed a minimum hourly pay, but by increasing their piecework rate beyond the standard rate, they could earn more. Id. The issue was whether time-study personnel were supervisors. The appellate court described their work as follows: 35 The function of determining the time standards for each operation is the primary responsibility of the time-study men. By means of a stop watch and the application of specialized knowledge and experience gained both at the plant and at technical schools, the time-study men time each operation and initially fix the time standard for the job. The time study is not a mere routine operation but requires the use of judgment, particularly in respect of the making of corrective allowances. 36 Id. (internal quotation marks omitted). The Board found that although the functions of time-study personnel may have an effect upon the earnings and employment conditions of `other employees,' such effect is entirely incidental, and clearly does not stem from the exercise by them of a bona fide supervisory power to `reward' within the intendment of the amended Act. Brown & Sharpe Mfg. Co., 87 N.L.R.B. at 1036. The assignment of bonuses here is even more incidental to the task of calculating unmetered usage than the relationship between production workers' incentive pay and time studies because the principal purpose of time studies was to set worker pay, whereas the principal purpose for calculating unmetered usage is to collect from customers, a matter totally divorced from employee compensation. 37 PSC counters with three cases in which the Board found workers to be supervisors because they effectively recommended rewards. In Bayou Manor Health Center, Inc., 311 N.L.R.B. 955, 1993 WL 191457 (1993), the nurses deemed to be supervisors annually evaluated certified nursing assistants (CNAs) on 16 criteria. Id. The CNA's scores directly determined the merit increase the CNA received. Id. In Pine Manor Nursing Center, 270 N.L.R.B. 1008, 1009, 1984 WL 36473 (1984), the charge nurses evaluated probationary aides and orderlies and recommended their retention or dismissal. They also awarded stars in their discretion; for every ten stars accumulated, the aide or orderly received a ten-cent increase per hour. Id. In Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., 335 N.L.R.B. 1310, 2001 WL 1149041 (2001), the employee in question was similarly involved in the evaluation of other employees and the evaluation determined the amount, if any, of the employee's pay increase. 335 N.L.R.B. at 1315-16. 38 All three cases are readily distinguishable. Even ignoring whether the supervisor's task in each of these cases required more independent judgment than that exercised by the revenue-protection workers here, the relationship between the supervisor's judgment and the worker's reward was hardly incidental. The purpose of the evaluations was to influence the performance of the evaluated employees. 39 The Board appears to have been consistent in interpreting the phrase reward ... other employees in the definition of supervisor, 29 U.S.C. § 152(11), as not including actions that only incidentally benefit other workers. This interpretation is a reasonable construction of ambiguous language — when one thinks of a supervisor rewarding an employee, one generally thinks of the supervisor as doing so with the purpose of influencing the employee's job performance — and therefore is entitled to deference. Four B Corp., 163 F.3d at 1182. Under that interpretation, and in light of the record evidence indicating that revenue-protection workers exercise little independent judgment in the bonus process, we must affirm the Board's rejection of PSC's contention that the three workers are supervisors because they reward ... other employees ... or effectively ... recommend such action.