May 30, 2007

Notes from the All Managers Meeting

Three sound bites of interest:

"There will be no layoffs on June 1... No RIF, no request for layoffs has been submitted to DOE at LASO or ABQ or Washington... not planning a RIF on June 1st or any other day." Director Anastasio

"We are not going to become a plutonium production factory." Principal Associate Deputy Glenn Mara

"I am not disbanding directorates in a reorganization, but I am looking at reorganizing some divisions." Director Anastasio

24 comments:

Anonymous said...

Why are they re-organizing again so soon? They made a mess of things by creating a whole lot more directorates, divisions, and groups. What can they possibly do now to screw things up worse.

Anonymous said...

Of course not on June 1st. You can't have a RIF on a Friday when half of the people are on their 9-80 day off.

AND, with the idiots that are doing payroll, you can only do a RIF on the last day of a pay period. Any other day would not be possible because the accounting dunces could not figure out how to calculate the severance checks.

Some rumors say that they are hoping for a lot of retirements on June 30th with people expecting the UCRS COLA. And, if that doesn't get the needed staffing reduction, then there are always the limited-term employees and the contractors.

Anonymous said...

"I did not have sex with that woman."

Anonymous said...

Did he mean that we are going to have a RIF without it being planned?

Anonymous said...

AND, with the idiots that are doing payroll, you can only do a RIF on the last day of a pay period. Any other day would not be possible because the accounting dunces could not figure out how to calculate the severance checks.

Cheap shots......let me guess you are a PhD - I bet you would make a bigger mess in a shorter period of time.

Have some respect for each other in their chosen profession and don't take pot shots lest they be fired back

Anonymous said...

Of course not on June 1st.
They're gonna wait until a week before Christmas....

Anonymous said...

and why do we have to take vacation and sick time in half-day allotments? Talk about a waste of time for an hour's doctor appointment. Can't the computers manage to figure ONE hour off?

and why do we have the antiquated VACATION and SICK time accrual? Wouldn't it be cheaper and easier to combine them for PERSONAL time and dispense with the bull shit attempts to enforce rules about taking a sick day on a FRIDAY and such??

Anonymous said...

5/30/07 8:42 PM - wow, talk about Tourette's syndrome! How did this come out from the post? You let it out!

Anonymous said...

I did have sex with that woman...no ...wait... was it a woman....?

Anonymous said...

"and why do we have to take vacation and sick time in half-day allotments?"

Wow, wrong tree here. But I'll answer it anyhow.

The reason is easy. Half-day increments prevents abuse of labor laws for exempt employees. That was settled in the courts decades ago. LANL is actually current with the labor rules here. Exempt employees may only take vacation and sick in half and full day increments.

If you take an hour or two off for the doctor and don't make it up in the 9/80 or 5/40 period, then you charge it to DA.

Non-exempt employees are handled differently.

We now return to our regularly scheduled program.

Anonymous said...

the whole blog is tourette's syndrome....

but then the half-day question did fit in with Payroll and its RIF ability to figure out payroll and severance pay.

Anonymous said...

I'm hearing that the monkey's are being moved around again. VanProoyen is staying in the Deputy Director position. Mallory moved from ADSMS to PADOPS. Jay Johnson stays in the deputy PADOPS position. Bets are on Carl Beard for Mallory's old job.

Anonymous said...

Hi-de-ho! The LLNS org chart is now posted:

http://llnsllc.com/orgChart/

Anonymous said...

The RIF'S will began when Mikey hears what the new budget has in store for FY 08, then he can RIF and RIF, with the blame going to Congress for a less than a flat budget....Who says Mikey doesn't know what he's doing...Right around Thanksgiving......stay tuned

Anonymous said...

Let's see. No evidence of RIF's yet. Looks like June 1 is a bust for RIF's, but hey, we're still optimistic. Current betting pool appears to have moved on to Thanksgiving, so the uninformed can start agonizing all over again. Keep up the good work guys! Being right isn't really that important.

Anonymous said...

9:56 How long do you really think this Gravy Train can run? You seem to think the funding is never ending, you have dodged the bullet but the target is et...

Anonymous said...

All the predictions of gloom and doom are a bunch of nonsense. Anyone coming to these blogs looking for real information is wasting their time.

Anonymous said...

10:14 I don't think anyone questions that there are financial issues and concerns. However, some of us optimists are willing to think that the collective intelligence the lab has long been noted for might actually be capable of keeping the lab alive. It isn't as exciting as predicting RIFs, but at the moment it hasn't been proved wrong either.

Anonymous said...

Now I'm really scared! Relying on the "collective intelligence" of this place?

Anonymous said...

Well 12:30 PM, its obvious that not all contribute to the "collective intelligence." It is regrettable that you didn't qualify.

Anonymous said...

5/31/07 10:20 PM - Anonymous said... "All the predictions of gloom and doom are a bunch of nonsense. Anyone coming to these blogs looking for real information is wasting their time."

Must be one of our Lab leaders trying to keep the message going that things are better since LANS took over. I have heard that crap so many times out of Gene Petersen and Mary Neu that I am ready to puke. I guess they think if they say it enough times someone might start to believe it.

Anonymous said...

I know LANL staff that were preparing to sell their homes on the Hill and take jobs at other institutions due to the fear and dreadfully low morale at Los Alamos. However, Mike's constant promise of "no RIFs, no plans for a RIF" have apparently soothed the fears of these people and most of them have now decided to stay the course. If LANS implements any type of RIF in the next few years a lot of these workers are going to feel they have been totally betrayed by LANS management.

Big financial decisions are being made by LANL staff based on Mike's "no RIF" promise. I hope Mike realizes the tremendous damage he will have done if his words turn out to be false.

Anonymous said...

4:34 pm
Anyone who banks their financial future and career on anything Mike Anastasio says is a fool! Remember the RRW? Mike gave us his word there too.

The guy cares about one thing, POWER. He has no desire to bring LANL out of the ashes.

Now, the reality is, none of us long time Los Alamos people could possibly sell our homes. So, best to just cross your fingers, and try to do no harm.

Anonymous said...

Today there are 267 homes for sale in Los Alamos. March 3rd there were 191. Both numbers taken from realtor.com. Everything is wonderful I'm sure in the twilight zone (aka Los Alamos). Look on the bright side, there will be affordable housing in Los Alamos in the very near future...