Cite as: 522 U. S. 359 (1998)
Opinion of Breyer, J.
fall outside the Board's lawfully delegated authority. The Board in effect has said that an employee statement made during a job interview with an employer who has expressed an interest in a nonunionized work force will often tell us precisely nothing about that employee's true feelings. That Board conclusion represents an exercise of the kind of discretionary authority that Congress placed squarely within the Board's administrative and factfinding powers and responsibilities. See Radio Officers v. NLRB, 347 U. S. 17, 49ñ50 (1954). Nor is it procedurally improper for an agency, rather like a common-law court, (and drawing upon its accumulated expertise and exercising its administrative responsibilities) to use adjudicatory proceedings to develop rules of thumb about the likely weight assigned to different kinds of evidence. Cf. Bell Aerospace, 416 U. S., at 294; Chenery, 332 U. S., at 202.
Consider next Bloch's statement, made during his job interview with Worth, that those on the night shift (five or six employees) "did not want the Union." 316 N. L. R. B., at 1207. The ALJ thought this statement failed to provide support, both for reasons that the majority mentions (" 'Bloch did not testify and thus could not explain how he formed his opinion about the views of his fellow employees' "), ante, at 369; 316 N. L. R. B., at 1207, and for reasons that the majority does not mention ("no showing that [the other employees] made independent representations about their union sympathies to [Allentown] and they did not testify in this proceeding"), ibid.
The majority says that "reason demands" that Bloch's statement "be given considerable weight." Ante, at 370. But why? The Board, drawing upon both reason and experience, has said it will "view with suspicion and caution" one employee's statements "purporting to represent the views of other employees." Wallkill Valley General Hospital, 288 N. L. R. B. 103, 109 (1988), enf'd as modified, 866 F. 2d 632 (CA3 1989); see also Louisiana-Pacific Corp., 283 N. L. R. B.
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