NBC News Digital employees are forming a union

A day after NBC News Digital announced plans to invest in its digital properties — but also that it was laying off a small group of staffers — the division’s editorial employees have announced they are going to attempt to form a union.

• The employees say the union will represent about 150 staffers in the NBC News Digital division, mainly those who write and produce video for NBC News’ digital properties such as NBCNews.com, Today.com and more.
• This union will not represent any non-editorial positions within NBC News Digital — nor any employees within NBC, NBC News or MSNBC.
• According to The New York Times sources, a big push to unionize is as a result of the multiple sexual harassment scandals at the network and how the network handled firing Matt Lauer and allegedly squashed reports on Harvey Weinstein.
• “Forming a union will afford us a collective voice in decisions that will benefit the entire company, providing much-needed transparency and ensuring a safer workplace,” reads a statement issued by the team organizing the drive.
• The employees are looking to organize under the NewsGuild, which represents employees a The New York Times, The New Yorker and some digital properties, including BuzzFeed.
• NBC News currently has unionized employees, though most of them are on the technical side.
• No changes to existing union agreements within the network will change as a result of this attempt to unionize.
• At this point, a key exception to network level digital content producers being non-union are those working for CBS News’ streaming service CBSN.