Every September, Labor Day marks a celebration of workers’ rights – a basic premise of collective success and career empowerment that’s worth lauding throughout the year. This month is a great time to focus on the benefits of cooperative business models and how they not only safeguard those rights but also prioritize fair compensation, shared profits, and a truly democratic workplace for their worker-members.
Why a Co-Op Model?
Worker co-operatives are businesses owned by their workers, with a member-driven democratic governance structure. Owning their business enables worker-owners to make decisions that are in their best interest and the interests of their families and community – from setting wages to selecting benefits and crafting staff schedules that promote a healthy work/life balance.
- This democratic ownership model has a positive ripple effect. Training is a core principle of co-ops, building skills that workers can use throughout their careers. As worker-owners commit to the economic and social future of their communities, this enhances volunteering, voting, and the tendency for other businesses to stay in the community as well.
- In contrast to traditional companies, workers at co-ops participate in the profits, oversight, and management of their organization using democratic practices. Workers own the majority of equity in the business and control voting shares. This is an effective business model for maintaining sustainable jobs, generating local wealth, improving workers’ quality of life, and promoting community economic development.
- Bringing in more stakeholders to share business profits helps address inequality, as it prioritizes workers’ needs over investors’ profits. In other words, worker co-ops democratize wealth rather than concentrate it.
Why AlliedUP?
AlliedUP is proud to partner with SIEU-UHW (United Healthcare Workers West) to collectively form a larger movement with the power to broker better terms and regulations that can benefit your career, both short and long-term. Our SEIU-UHW partnership enables us to offer above-market, union-scale wages and benefits.
We are a co-op built exclusively for healthcare workers, which means you benefit from community support structures and annual dividends. Our leadership board is voted on and led by our worker members at our Annual General Meeting. In short, as a member, you are also an owner at AlliedUP.
- Joining our AlliedUP community not only gives you access to the best-allied healthcare jobs in California and nationwide but also provides you with all the benefits of worker membership. These include annual profit sharing, leadership opportunities, and packages including medical, dental, and vision insurance, accrued paid time off, career coaching and training, a continuing educational fund, referral bonuses, and more.
- We offer a wide range of positions, including medical assistants, licensed vocational nurses, sterile, medical, pharmacy, radiology and CT technicians, and phlebotomists. Our growing network offers flexible and permanent placements with top healthcare organizations around the country.
- As we redefine the healthcare worker experience as a member-owned company, we are committed to championing diversity and inclusiveness. Seventy percent of our allied health jobs are filled by people of color.
Become a worker-member of AlliedUp Co-op! Click to check out available roles on our job board, or Contact us today to learn more.
