The Strategy of an Ostrich

[Superman]

In a recent meeting among smart guys, engineers, I briefly entered into an existing discussion about our local WSDOT. Now, these are smart guys who I respect. Their ability to solve engineering and construction problems is impressive. Their general intelligence is impressive. In this same meeting, hilariously, the guys noticed how much we use acronyms, and they seamlessly entered into a several-sentence discussion that included no words whatsoever. It was very amusing and impressive.

But I guess smart guys can be just as captured by McPolitics as anyone. In the WSDOT discussion, there was plenty of eye-rolling and backhanded criticism of WSDOT. So, I reported that my experiences with WSDOT over the last fifteen years have been very professional. The engineers straightened up and asked about my experiences. I reported that my very positive impressions were mostly in the areas of design and contract administration. They agreed. On those two measures, WSDOT is very effective and professional. Their smiling, backhanded criticisms were in the area of politics and money-wasting.

So, I reported that both sides of the legislative aisle have been in agreement for more than ten years that we are WAY behind in transportation infrastructure, that WSDOT needs money in order to accomplish the needed construction and maintenance, and that the voters have the impression that taxes are unnecessary so no one is willing to support ways to get WSDOT the funding they need. In the meantime, there has been the pageantry of a "witch hunt" of WSDOT. Legislators and their committees have, rather than solve the problems, been commissioning studies and audits of WSDOT with the dishonest pretense of looking for "efficiencies." At this point, no committee can think of an audit that has not already been ordered and delivered. We've squeezed every possible drop from that washrag. Everyone agrees. Except, of course, the am radio talk show guys. Who apparently have engineers in the audience. The engineers had no intelligent response to the information I provided to them, and now it seems clear they do not want to talk about transportation matters any more, or WSDOT. Apparently, it's fun to pretend that all our problems are caused by lazy, in efficient gubmint workers. Even if you're otherwise very smart. And even if all the objective evidence disagrees.

[RoninLB]

convicts should be out there working on a chain gang. It's also a good crime deterint. It should be politically correct to teach job ethics. I'll call Bush later and explain the situation to him.. no prob.

[MotoSook]

I agree Ronnie..why should tax payers fund the prisons and get nothing from it...other than a place to hold criminals who learn to be worst /better criminals. Put the criminals to work! And when the protesters show up, hand them a bill for all the public works projects that need funding. It's not prison labor if the work is for payment of accomodations while imprisoned, right?! It's called a job!

[dhoward]

Well.
It's a good thing you were there to set them straight.

[Superman]

Et tu, dhoward? Again, you wander onto our state capitol campus and saunter up to any conservative legislator, and you will hear a story very different from what you hear on am talk show radio. But hey, it's a lot more fun when you ignore the facts, or just never place yourself in a position to be exposed to them. That way, you can have fun with your friends, placing all the blame onto an organization you have no concept of or support for. That organization would be your government. Now, tell me about your patriotism, between your bouts of stone-throwing at my government.

Inmate labor is an interesting subject, and a hot one. Rather than waste my typing time, how 'bout if I just ask whether anyone understands why this issue is so interesting, and why we might consider carefully the decisions to accomplish public works with inmate labor. dhoward, here is your chance to set us straight.

[lendaddy]

The govenrnment workers are fantastic, highly motivated employees! I don't know why you guys would think otherwise.. I mean if they don't perform they get..............hmmm.........welll...........uhhh h....

Can I get back to you on this?

[Superman]

Len, I've said before and I'll say again, this caricature of gubmint workers as somehow fantastically lazy is....sometimes inaccurate. (though sometimes accurate as well) The state government office I ran was packed with the gubmint equivalent of green berets. I'd square them off with any team in head-to-head competition. And if you're suggesting that incentives be used in that environment, I heartily agree. I'm a labor relations guy as you know, and I have a special love for organizational development, management, motivation, compensation analysis, that sort of thing. Unfortunately, it's not easy. You have to be very very careful what behaviors you encourage and discourage, and other considerations. It can backfire very badly. But yes, I would fully support looking into performance-based pay schemes, incentive programs above salary, non-monetary incentives and a host of other tools. In fact:

One thing that struck me like a sledge almost daily is the question of why we cannot get some managerial talent from industry, applied in the private sector. We've got leaders out there. Real leaders. Unfortunately, going to work making public policy, while terribly important and high-impact, is also low-payed and low-respect. I myself made decisions that impacted, no kidding, hundreds of thousands of employers, and millions of workers. Would it make sense to apply more than just bargain-basement resources to positions with that kind of impact. Or should we continue to offer bottom-of-the-spectrum pay and nothing but jeers and empty beer can tosses at gubmint? See, if that's all we're willing to do, then all you get will be crazy, demented, slow-minded dolts like me.

[Superman]

Okay I'm back, briefly. I made a mistake. I suggested that we consider providing gubmint with the resources to do a good job. My mistake.

[dhoward]

Intrestingly or not . I do saunter up to my state, and local legislators, conservative or not, to express my views on topics of interest not necessarily discussed on AM talk radio. Um, not sure I have an AM radio to be truthful. In fact, talked just yesterday to MO Speaker Rod Jetton re: elimination of vehicle emission testing. Conferenced rep Harold Selby who is sponsoring the bill (MOHB113) to clarify the term of the contract held by Gateway Clean Air Inc. I believe we will see testing rescinded, but I digress....

Of course not all government workers are caricatures, but neither are they all exemplary. Like it or not, Len speaks the truth in many cases.

After attending a local City Council meeting, I was appalled at the way our trash hauling service contract was negotiated. No service level agreements, no performance penalties! I've contracted millions of dollars of IT services over the years, and it's unbelieveable what little experience our representatives have. Must have really poor (not in the billing category) attorneys also.

I agree, make it worth someone's while to take a government position. Oh, wait, we do! We just don't take the politics out of it.

[dhoward]

Actually Supe, whenever you mention Ostriches or heads being buried in the sand in your subject line, it just seems to attract me like buzzards to carrion...

[Moneyguy1]

Never confuse fact with conjecture. It ruins an otherwise flawless concept of the world.

[lendaddy]

Well Bob, when I look at things I try to understand them. Sup(and you) say Governement employees work as hard or harder than than those in the private sector on average. Just tell me why that would be, what is your theory? I have stated countless times my theory which I base on human nature: lack of accountability, lack of incentive, lack of reinforcment altogether (both positive and negative). We can have a discussion if you have a theory on this, if you don't then please sit in the bleachers with the other spectators J/K

So what's the reason for the public employees good/great work ethic? And where might I go to witness it in action?

[island911]

Originally posted by Superman
In a recent meeting among smart guys, engineers, I briefly entered into an existing discussion about . . how much wood could a woodchuck chuck; if a woodchuck could chuck wood? . . .. It was very amusing and impressive.

But I guess smart guys can be just as captured by McPolitics as anyone. . . .. The engineers had no intelligent response to the information I provided to them, and now it seems clear they do not want to talk about woodchuck chucking any more, or WSDOT. Apparently, it's fun to pretend that all our problems are caused by lazy, in efficient woodchuckers. Even if you're otherwise very smart. And even if all the objective evidence disagrees.

a yeah . . . it's them-um engineers who don't get it.

Yep, you shut them up with your staggeringly superior insight of WSDOT?

I mean really, supe . . when you say crap like "and that the voters have the impression that taxes are unnecessary so no one is willing to support ways to get WSDOT the funding they need" in the face of BILLIONS of local dollars being aproved BY THE VOTERS for the RTA here; locals here are are going to make a mental note to put you on their crack-pot list . . . you may as well wear a dress to work.

[dhoward]

Thanks Island. Cleaning up Pepsi now...

[island911]

.. . who me?


For a good Local issues read here;

"Years of neglect in building infrastructure to keep up with Washington state's population growth has produced the second worst traffic congestion in the country. For the last ten years, we have spent over $12.7 billion on transportation. Unfortunately, this has translated into only 70 new lane miles on our state highways. It has also paid for a bloated bureaucracy that syphons money away from meaningful congestion relief projects . . . . .more

[Superman]

Originally posted by lendaddy
Well Bob, when I look at things I try to understand them. Sup(and you) say Governement employees work as hard or harder than than those in the private sector on average. Just tell me why that would be, what is your theory? I have stated countless times my theory which I base on human nature: lack of accountability, lack of incentive, lack of reinforcment altogether (both positive and negative). We can have a discussion if you have a theory on this, if you don't then please sit in the bleachers with the other spectators J/K

So what's the reason for the public employees good/great work ethic? And where might I go to witness it in action?

dhoward, I agree that Len speaks truth in many cases and I do enjoy it.

Island, I tried to couch my post well and maybe that doesn't matter or you missed it. I've got a lot of respect for the guys in the story. They are indeed smart men. Characterize me as some sort of high-and-mighty, elitist guy if you wish, but that suggests you missed both the message and the content of my post. I'm certainly not any smarter than those guys. But those guys have not sat next to WSDOT staff at the testimony table and been grilled by committee members (prevailing wage is commonly identified to be a cost escalator, in direct contradition to the most objective of evidence...I'll touch on this in a moment). They have drawn the conclusion, apparently in the absence of information, that WSDOT is just inefficient. Trust me when I tell you that there is no more closely studied state agency over the past ten years than WSDOT. As you can imagine, if you think about it. The legislature has audited that agency AD NAUSEUM. And they were very efficient before the audits began, in my humble but of course subjective view.

Now, one of those audits included a question about state prevailing wage law. Actually, a double-question. Some nasty conservative legislators thought this would be a clever time to uncover deep dark secrets about prevailing wages. They asked how much state prevailing wage rates were in excess of federal prevailing wage rates, and they separately asked how much could be saved from eliminating the state law. They had the impression (lore, innuendo, assumption,....) that state prevailing wages are higher than fed ones. Turns out that's very much not the case. In almost each instance of paired comparisons, craft by craft, the fed rates are higher. And since fed prevailing wage law applies to almost all our state highway construction projects (because we use federal funds), nothing is to be saved by elimination of state prevailing wage requirements. And before anyone shouts "They're witches!," the auditor in this case was an accounting firm from outside Washington State.

All I was saying is that even educated, smart people like to view gubmint in cartoon terms. The facts are not nearly as entertaining.

[island911]

Hey I'm not saying they're lazy.

Many obviously work damn hard to protect their turf . . ."their" power . .. "their" money.

[Superman]

Originally posted by lendaddy
Well Bob, when I look at things I try to understand them. Sup(and you) say Governement employees work as hard or harder than than those in the private sector on average. Just tell me why that would be, what is your theory? I have stated countless times my theory which I base on human nature: lack of accountability, lack of incentive, lack of reinforcment altogether (both positive and negative). We can have a discussion if you have a theory on this, if you don't then please sit in the bleachers with the other spectators J/K

So what's the reason for the public employees good/great work ethic? And where might I go to witness it in action?

Oh gosh. I neglected to prosetylize on Len's question. Len, in my case, the office I worked in was responsible for making the lives of working men and women better. Gubmint offices that have no emotional mission would lack this motivator, so I suppose this would not apply in all cases. Before I went to work for gubmint, I did nothing more than make some money for me, and some for an employer. When I took the gubmint job, I was thinking "Where are all the hippies now? We talked a good game back in the '60's, so how did we forget those important causes?" It took me a while to recognize them (by the dimples in their left ears), but I found them. They're working from the inside now. There are many of us. You can't tell who we are by our haircuts any more. Once I got that taste of accomplishing two things at once (making money AND improving peoples' lives), I was hooked. I think I'll probably die with this jones.

And with this in mind, I guess I would challenge you to show me a private sector incentive system that can even come close. And I'm a compensation analyst. This is how some gubmint workers can turn in outstanding performance, day after day. I still help working people, as a consultant. We bill for eight hours per day. I will most likely end the week having not worked any day of less than eleven hours.

[dhoward]

Alright. I can't stand it any more!
Which is it?
Labor relations guy.
Compensation analyst.
Gubment worker.
Super Hero.
Mild-mannered reporter.

[Superman]

Porn Star.