A Day in the Life of Rebecca Gill

Rebecca Gill’s alarm goes off at 7:30 a.m. By 9:30, she’s already at the post office – and from that moment on, it is nonstop.

A Lead Clerk at the retail window of her post office, Rebecca starts every shift the same way – reviewing Time & Attendance Collection System (TACS) records and making sure her fellow clerks have what they need to do their work. But Rebecca’s day is not just postal work and taking care of customers and coworkers. On top of her duties as Lead Clerk, Rebecca serves as industrial relations director of the Salt Lake City Area Local, a job that does not get to clock out.

As industrial relations director for her local, Rebecca serves as the safety coordinator. Stewards and members can reach her by email or text anytime a concern comes up, or they need advice on handling a grievance. Along with her union brothers and sisters, she attends the quarterly Joint Labor-Management Safety and Health Committee meetings with her local and the USPS, where the group reviews PS Form 1767s that workers submit but have not yet been addressed. She also conducts monthly walks, known as Gemba walks, with postal managers, during which she and her counterpart at the USPS walk through the facilities together and address hazards.

“If we see any safety concerns, especially with the managers right there, we address it right then,” she says. “So hopefully they can put in a work order, whatever needs to happen.” When a steward sends her a PS Form 1767, she follows up with management and then follows up again with the steward to confirm the issue was actually resolved.

Rebecca was appointed to her current position about three years ago, after serving for years as a local union steward and then as the local customer service coordinator for the local. Safety was a new area for her, but she has been learning fast.

She leans on the resources around her, connecting with management safety contacts, and thinking creatively. She recently floated an idea to the local’s executive board about offering CPR training to all stewards. The suggestion came after hearing about a coworker who had collapsed on the job. “Ideas come from those things,” she says.

32 Years and Still Showing Up

Rebecca has been with the Postal Service for 32 years. She was a union steward for at least 13 years, then a trustee, then a customer service coordinator, and now the local industrial relations director. It is not her title that keeps her motivated, though. For her, it is the people she gets to help. She said, “Sometimes I’m up at night thinking, stewing over a grievance…” and may even get up to write notes to herself so that she does not forget an argument she thought of in the dark.

She still remembers the employees she helped years ago and feels satisfaction when she sees them still working, still saying hello. “It is really fulfilling. For [workers], this is their livelihood, their life. So, I get to help them protect that – that’s what we do. We protect; we help.”

Her instinct is always to show up, to volunteer, to stay involved. “I’m happy to serve in this union,” she says. “I love our union.”