The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, April 16, 2006, Sunday

Copyright 2006 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

April 16, 2006 Sunday
Main Edition

SECTION: BUSINESS; Pg. 2E

HEADLINE: People in Business;
A worldly focus;
Trouble-shooter's big job has kept him traveling, from Colombia to China

BYLINE: CAROLINE WILBERT

BODY:
Ed Potter has a big job description.
He is the director of global labor relations at Coca-Cola, which operates in more than 200 countries. Despite the geographic breadth of his role, Potter gets the most attention for dealing with issues in one relatively small country: Colombia.
Labor activists claim that Coke and one of its bottlers had something to do with violence against union organizers there, including the murder of a worker in a Coke plant in 1996. The company has denied the charges, but the issue keeps getting more attention, thanks to a well-organized, grass-roots organization called the Campaign to Stop Killer Coke that is led by longtime labor activist Ray Rogers. Across the United States, activists have staged protests on college campuses.
Last year, representatives from a number of universities, including the University of Michigan, formed a commission to assess the allegations in Colombia and decide whether their schools would ban Coke products. Coke agreed to a third-party investigation. However, the commission and the company couldn't agree to the terms of the probe. Both New York University, which was not a participant in the commission, and the University of Michigan banned Coke from their campuses late last year. They were the largest and most high-profile of about 10 schools that have banned Coke in conjunction with the Colombia issue.
However, Coke last week was able to release some good news on the Colombia front. The International Labor Organization, an agency of the United Nations, has agreed to conduct an investigation, prompting the University of Michigan to rescind its ban. A spokeswoman from Michigan said Coke would again be for sale on campus as soon as the machines could be stocked.
In the middle of this public relations crisis, Coke revived the position of global labor relations director, a post that had been unfilled for several years. Potter started at Coke in March of last year. He flew 150,000 miles in his first seven months on the job. He has been to Colombia six times.
He's also been to Europe twice. He's been to China, Vietnam, the Middle East and Indonesia. Soon, he'll make his first trip to Africa.
He says Colombia isn't the focus of most workdays, despite the high-profile nature of the issues there. Instead, he is concentrating on broader goals, such as putting together a workplace rights policy for the company.
Q: First of all, the most obvious question. Do you think there is any possibility that Coke or its bottlers were in any way complicit in violence against union organizers in Colombia?
A: I really don't. I have been down to Colombia now six times, five of them doing Coca-Cola work and also as part of an ILO high-level visit that we did in October. I have seen a tremendous amount of the country. I've talked to a lot of different people within the bottling organizations that are down there. The events we are talking about here took place in a civil war, in which every business, big and small, was caught up in that environment.
We have something that actually is a bit unusual. We have a criminal court decision and an attorney general investigation, both of which concluded the company was not in any fashion involved in any of this. One of the things I learned in the ILO high-level visit is these trials are relatively rare because typically witnesses, even if identified, are not willing to testify because of fear for their lives. I really believe we are not involved.
That said, obviously a focus on Colombia is important because of the awful things that happened there. They are using, in my opinion, the trademark as a vehicle to create that publicity and not really appreciating that it is not within the capacity of any particular company to solve the problems. It is a civil war.
Q: I know it has been challenging to come up with an investigation procedure that the company, the university commission and other involved parties can agree on. Why has it been so hard?
A: There are several issues. Different people want different things in this assessment, and because of that fact alone, it has been difficult to do it. It also has been difficult because you want to establish a process that is first credible and secondly that is neutral and impartial, and what is one person's credibility and impartiality is another person's bias. So that has been difficult.
Q: The Campaign to Stop Killer Coke has gotten a lot of momentum on college campuses in the past year. Is there anything Coke could have done differently to stop that?
A: Hindsight is always perfect. Undoubtedly, earlier engagement in that process could have been helpful. By the time I arrived here, it had been over two years that this had gone on. That said, it still at the end of the day is a relatively small protest activity. A lot of noise but still pretty small.
Q: I know the company is touting its recent commitment to the United Nations Global Compact, promising to take a leadership role in the four focus areas: human rights, labor rights, protection of the environment and anti-corruption. Can you explain the significance of this? What makes it more than just talk?
A: It is the largest corporate governance program in the globe. The significance from a U.S. point of view is there are relatively few brand U.S. multinationals that have signed onto it. For Coca-Cola, they are putting a stake in the ground. They are saying, 'We are going to live up to this, we are going to measure ourselves by it, we are going to work in this environment.' It is really a best practices environment, so there is a tremendous amount of information sharing that can go on. It really is a very important symbolic step.

GRAPHIC: Photo: RENEE HANNANS HENRY / StaffIn the middle of a public relations crisis over dealings in Colombia, Ed Potter became Coke's director of global labor relations in March of last year.
Graphic: THE ED POTTER FILE * Age: 59 * Title: Director, global labor relations and workplace accountability * Education: Bachelor's in economics from Michigan State University, 1968; master's in labor economics and collective bargaining, Cornell School of Industrial and Labor Relations in Ithaca, N.Y., 1972; legal degree, American University in Washington, 1978. * Professional history: A former federal mediator who practiced labor and employment law in Washington for 26 years with a focus on international labor issues; in 1997, became the U.S. employer delegate to the International Labor Conference; in 1983, founded the Employment Policy Foundation, a nonprofit economic research foundation focusing on workplace policies and trends, and became its president in 1988. * Family: Happily married for 28 years to Regina Olchowski, who is a principal in a community-based mediation business, MediationWorks; proud father of two young adults, Jonathan (Jon) and Katherine (Kat). Jon is a 2001 Dartmouth graduate in mathematics and economics who founded the Dream Program in Burlington, Vt., which provides mentoring to children in Vermont housing projects using students from Vermont schools of higher education and Dartmouth College. Kat is a 2004 graduate of the College of William & Mary in chemistry and environmental sciences. She is currently a Ph.D. student at MIT majoring in atmospheric chemistry. * Hobbies: Snow and water skiing; hiking; reading; sailing; college basketball junkie. * Last book read: "The Education of a Coach" by David Halberstam * Favorite movie: The original "The Thomas Crown Affair"