4The Alliance québécoise des techniciens de l’image et du son (AQTIS – Alliance of Image and Sound Technicians) represents some 5 500 freelance professionals in more than 134 trades associated with the design, planning, set-up or creation of audiovisual productions in Quebec. As part of its mandate, the union negotiated about ten collective bargaining agreements covering the various sectors of operation of its members. AQTIS selected Qweri to manage and disseminate its collective bargaining agreements online for its ability to unify the internal and external management of documentation.
The Challenge
First, AQTIS wanted to improve its communication tools in order to better reach and serve its members. In the context of strong competition from a foreign competitor, AQTIS must maintain and increase its visibility by adopting the best industry practices. This is especially true regarding access to information since the association is targeting professionals on the cutting edge of technology.
In parallel, AQTIS was also looking at projects to improve the productivity of its labor representatives by equipping them with modern information management tools. In order to get there, several solutions were being considered including a document management system and a labor case management tool. Regarding collective bargaining agreements, they were previously made available in a static PDF format on the union website.
The Solution
AQTIS selected Qweri for its ability to unify the internal and external management of collective bargaining agreements. The original Word files available to the union are simply uploaded in Qweri to be converted into a dynamic HTML5 version, as well as in PDF. Depending on the access rights granted, certain documents can be accessed by all of the union members via the website of the organization, while others are made available only to union representatives with a username and a password.
This approach allows members of AQTIS to benefit from powerful navigation and search across all agreements negotiated by their union, or inside any of them taken individually. Because Qweri merges with the graphic design of the AQTIS website and is made available on the subdomain ententes.aqtis.qc.ca, members never feel they are leaving the website of their association. In addition, AQTIS agreements being available in English and French, the Qweri dashboard allows them to navigate easily, regardless of language.
Union representatives for their part gain privileged access to the collaborative features of Qweri: they can add personal notes directly into the body of collective agreements (for example by combining the reference of one of their file to a specific section of a convention) and share these notes with each other. Groups can even be created for teams as needed (for example to prepare the next round of negotiation). Moreover, all this knowledge is accessible from their mobile devices, a non-negligible aspect considering all the time spent on the road by union representatives.