They endured weekly mandatory captive audience meetings in the basement of their Lexington Avenue MetroPCS store, tight monitoring from management and even a visit from T-Mobile U.S. CEO John Legere and other top executives who trekked from Bellevue, Wash., headquarters to the Harlem store. But this week, the workers voted 7–1 to join the Communications Workers of America (CWA).

On the surface, that may seem like a small victory, but the huge effort T-Mobile mounted to defeat the workers’ choice to form a union shows just how significant it really is.  

There are thousands more call center representatives, retail associates and technicians across T-Mobile US who want representation to address their issues on the job. In August, they launched T-Mobile Workers United (TU) to connect with each other to build strength in their drive for workplace justice and respect. MetroPCS merged with T-Mobile earlier this year.

Jose Ortiz, one of the New York City MetroPCS workers who voted for the union, says:

This has been a David versus Goliath struggle and I'm beyond thrilled to say that David won. We look forward to bargaining a fair contract that gives MetroPCS workers a real voice at work. When we stick together we win.

Yesenia Cabrera says the store workers were forced to attend captive audience meetings every week after they began their drive for a voice at work. She says she had heard about such meetings but, “hearing about them and experiencing them are very different things.” In a conference call last week, she said:

There have been dozens of these captive meetings held in the basement of our store, and participation isn’t optional….For more than an hour we get the company line. But we stand strong. We question what they’re saying and they usually get pretty defensive about it. Usually at the next week’s meeting they have more information, something they probably got from their union-busting lawyers. Our message to other workers is to be brave, don’t let anyone convince you not to be a part of this.

Click here to hear the entire conference call that focuses on the workers’ organizing drive across T-Mobile US and the international support they are receiving. In 2011, CWA, ver.di (the German union that represents workers at T-Mobile’s parent company Deutsche Telekom) and a coalition of community and labor groups around the world partnered on an international campaign to win workers a voice and respect at T-Mobile. Read more about the global campaign here and here. 

Be sure and watch the accompanying video the workers made this summer, and visit T-Mobile Workers United and We Work Better Together to learn more.