FLRA NEWSFLRA NEWSPhyllis Segal, Chair of the Federal Labor Relations Authority (FLRA), appointed Thomas R. Colosi and David W. Geiss to three year terms on the Foreign Service Impasse Disputes Panel (the Panel). Mr. Colosi will serve as Chair of the Panel and Mr. Geiss will serve as the Department of Labor representative on the Panel.
Mr. Colosi is the Vice President of the Office of National Affairs of the American Arbitration Association. He has extensive experience as an advocate and as a neutral in a variety of dispute settlement processes. Mr. Colosi also trains advocates and neutrals in negotiation, mediation, mini-trials, fact-finding, and arbitration. Mr. Colosi has written extensively on dispute resolution training techniques and negotiations. On and Off the Record: Colosi on Negotiation is his most recent book, published in 1993.
Mr. Geiss is the Chief, Reports and Disclosure Section, Office of Labor-Management Standards, Employment Standards Administration at the Department of Labor. He joined the Labor Department as the Executive Assistant to the Assistant Secretary for the Office of the American Workplace, after working 12 years as the Chief of Staff to Congressman William D. Ford of Michigan. In the House of Representatives, Mr. Geiss worked on many issues related to labor-management cooperation, as well as educational programs directed at the workforce of the 21st century.
The Panel assists in resolving impasses arising from collective bargaining over conditions of employment affecting Foreign Service personnel in the State Department, the U.S. Information Agency, the Agency for International Development, and the Departments of Agriculture and Commerce. The Foreign Service Act requires the Chair of the FLRA to appoint to the five-member Panel individuals who are knowledgeable in the field of labor-management relations or the conduct of foreign affairs. The Panel must be composed of two members of the Foreign Service, one member of the Federal Service Impasses Panel, one individual employed by the Department of Labor, and one public member who does not hold any other office or position in the Government. All members serve on a part-time basis.
Other members of the Panel are Betty Bolden, Chair of the Federal Service Impasses Panel; George Lannon, representing the State Department; and Dorothy Young, representing the Agency for International Development.