“Decatlon doesn't pay you to sit on the toilet.” Diego* didn't know what he heard when he knocked on the toilet door recently. At first, he thought his colleagues were joking, but it turned out to be a manager who was tracking how long he had been betting. And then he also wrote a warning about it.
As an isolated incident, it is nothing more than an anecdote, and for employees at Decathlon it is an example of a high workload and lack of respect.
“One colleague became paranoid: he saw the shelves coming toward him,” says a union representative. “As it turned out, his manager was standing on the other side of the stand preparing the chronometer for him.”
Sports retailer Decathlon has recently made a splash with its racing bikes and as a sponsor of the Oliver Nyssen cycling team, but behind the scenes things are less rosy. The French chain is on its way to clash with the unions in our country.
The problems do not lie in the 35 stores in Belgium, but in the logistics center in Willebroek, far from the public's attention. A few years ago, the warehouse supply warehouse had seven hundred employees, but the number has become fewer and fewer.
Peter* recently left on his own after more than ten years of loyal service to Decathlon. He was no longer mentally sustainable and needed antidepressants. Again, just an anecdote: Peter suffered from tennis elbow at one point and decided to spend his shift differently instead of staying home.
“I took inventory that day, instead of carrying boxes. Half an hour into my shift I received an email: a written warning for insubordination.
Liberal company
The new head of the logistics center arrived this week from Canada. The unions welcomed it with symbolic action. They placed three chairs at a table in the parking lot, one for each union and a fourth for the new director. And it remained empty.
“This shows how they are systematically destroying social dialogue,” says union representative Matteo Marin. I don't think it will be different with this manager, because the company has a clear vision. And mold on the head.”
See Decathlon in black and white Our story, a book the company self-published a few years ago. Tells of Decathlon's transformation into 'Free enterprise“, edited company. This means that employees must feel involved and independent, and that from now on there will be no managers, but “Leaders'.
When employees went on strike in 2020, the unions requested a meeting with management, but this was denied. “This is no longer how Decathlon works,” says one. Leaders In this book.
The company deregulated, which means that consultation with unions is an outdated concept. All employees are now engaged and independent. Another says: “The result is that we no longer need a body linking employees and managers. This word no longer exists with us at all.” leader.
This direct communication with the employee also means that employees are sometimes told via WhatsApp that they should look for another job. That was how it was possible the morning Show a message to an e-commerce employee announcing: “Next week we will be having a session on ‘How do I build my resume’.” A few months later, the e-commerce department, now entirely located in Tilburg, began to be phased out without any communication about this with the employee organizations.
End in sight?
The unions have the impression that their representatives are being systematically escorted to the exit and that it is no longer possible to hold any consultation with them. The strikes seemed to slide like water off a duck, and Decathlon successfully lodged a complaint with the urgent proceedings judge, forcing the strikes to stop. Recently, the Socialist and Christian unions collected all the reports and filed a criminal complaint with the Labor Prosecutor.
This shows, among other things, how council meetings often last only fifteen minutes and are “contentless”. The unions, but also many employees, are convinced that Decathlon wants to close the logistics center in Willbrook, but is avoiding mass redundancies by spreading the layoffs over time, pushing people out and communicating as little as possible.
“They deliberately undermine the entire social legal system and do not deserve the status of an employer,” the criminal complaint said.
Given the possible violations of the law, the Labor Audit Office has now commissioned the Inspection Services to conduct a judicial investigation. This did not go unnoticed by federal parliamentarians, who recently posed questions about this matter to Labor Minister Pierre-Yves Dermany (note:).
The minister explained in his response that his government was following up on the matter, but Decathlon refused to participate in the conciliation office that was supposed to mediate. Dermani: “It is unfortunate when an employer deliberately refuses to engage in social dialogue.”
The company itself did not respond to questions from the morning.
*Diego and Peter are pseudonyms. Their real names are known to the editors.
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