This BLOG is for LLNL present and past employees, friends of LLNL and anyone impacted by the privatization of the Lab to express their opinions and expose the waste, wrongdoing and any kind of injustice against employees and taxpayers by LLNS/DOE/NNSA.
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This article is right on. Quality science at LLNL is dead because it will be impossible to recruite or retain top talent. Even the rest of us are looking for opportunities with at least a positive work ethic and better working conditions. It is depressing to watch the steady decline in the infrastructure needed to accomplish your daily tasks. Brining in WFO has been a major challenge the last few years due to rising costs, but now with lessening adminstrative and programmatic support it's harder than ever. Doesn't everyone--best & brightest or even just the plain vanilla dedicated employee--want to do good work without having to struggle against increasingly difficult circumstances? Management's plan to reduce cost is to shift cost from one pocket to another. If our "corporate" contract management were to run their corporations the way they are running the lab they would be bankrupt. Where are the improvements that corporate management was supposed to bring to our inefficiently run government organization???
I surely agree that issues could have been better handled through the contract transition and budget problems. But, I honestly have to believe that an article like this is heavily skewed toward one point of view. I have a few friends who were let go in the ISP. I can surely empathize with them, because I was not sure of my own status. However, I still get a charge out of the work I do. It's still stimulating, interesting and important. I'm a scientist working at a National Lab. That is cool.
Read this article, according to the lab spokesperson they think they deserve sainthood for simply falling into the corporate norm of offering counseling and job fairs. Can you say AT&T or IBM? Nothing can cover up the fact that this layoff was manipulated, Legal perhaps ,but still manipulated.How else do you justify keeping unvested employees and dumping vested ones? not to mention the ones the protected list. Just because it is legal doesn't make it right. Legality has nothing to do with it just go down to the Southern states and you will find out.
To 4:47, that's great you still get a charge out of the work you do, a lot of us also still love what we do. But what the article stated is that we don't trust that we'll be doing it for much longer, regardless of what we are being told. That sums up the mood perfectly.
To 7:03, I agree 100% the layoff was manipulated, but some (not all) layoffs were justified and I think most in that category saw it coming. The lab knew who had to go and did what they had to do to make it happen. Welcome to the private sector.
GM goes on to add that "After reading the article in Times on the importance of science I read the article in the local Times about how the quality of science at the lab was suffering because we've fired so many scientists and that all the other good scientists were leaving and we're now unable to hire anyone in. I am bouyed by this news! I can see that by going over to an all management facility, LLNS has helped increase the quality of science happening elsewhere in the bay area. The country as a whole will benefit from the ingenuity and experience of the men and women that used to work for LLNS."
To 3:30 p.m.: Perhaps you can post the actual article. The URL you list is a PAO Internal site that those of us who got canned can't access. You've gotta love GM's comment... just goes to show you that the Lab is now willing to operate with mediocre staff (but, hey, the country is really going to benefit from its laid off 'best & brightest'!).
Why would anyone graduating from college or anyone else looking for employment want to work at LLNL ? The word is out - the once great LLNL no longer values its workforce and on May 22 and May 23 kicked out 440 career employees - the vast majority of those were dedicated, valuable and hard working people that had many, many years of excellent service.
Many employees had more than 25 years of outstanding service and probably around 90% had " Q " clearances and yet we were treated like criminals and or " problem employee's " on our lay-off day.
I will never forgive management for forcing me to leave the job I enjoyed for so many years and for the way we were treated on our lay off day.
10 comments:
This article is right on. Quality science at LLNL is dead because it will be impossible to recruite or retain top talent. Even the rest of us are looking for opportunities with at least a positive work ethic and better working conditions. It is depressing to watch the steady decline in the infrastructure needed to accomplish your daily tasks. Brining in WFO has been a major challenge the last few years due to rising costs, but now with lessening adminstrative and programmatic support it's harder than ever. Doesn't everyone--best & brightest or even just the plain vanilla dedicated employee--want to do good work without having to struggle against increasingly difficult circumstances? Management's plan to reduce cost is to shift cost from one pocket to another. If our "corporate" contract management were to run their corporations the way they are running the lab they would be bankrupt. Where are the improvements that corporate management was supposed to bring to our inefficiently run government organization???
Nice summary of the general mood.
I surely agree that issues could have been better handled through the contract transition and budget problems. But, I honestly have to believe that an article like this is heavily skewed toward one point of view. I have a few friends who were let go in the ISP. I can surely empathize with them, because I was not sure of my own status. However, I still get a charge out of the work I do. It's still stimulating, interesting and important. I'm a scientist working at a National Lab. That is cool.
Read this article, according to the lab spokesperson they think they deserve sainthood for
simply falling into the corporate norm of offering counseling and job fairs. Can you say AT&T or IBM?
Nothing can cover up the fact that this layoff was manipulated, Legal perhaps ,but still manipulated.How else do you justify keeping unvested employees and dumping vested ones? not to mention the ones the protected list. Just because it is legal doesn't make it right. Legality has nothing to do with it just go down to the Southern states and you will find out.
To 4:47, that's great you still get a charge out of the work you do, a lot of us also still love what we do. But what the article stated is that we don't trust that we'll be doing it for much longer, regardless of what we are being told. That sums up the mood perfectly.
To 7:03, I agree 100% the layoff was manipulated, but some (not all) layoffs were justified and I think most in that category saw it coming. The lab knew who had to go and did what they had to do to make it happen. Welcome to the private sector.
Well the point of the article is not whether we still like the science we're doing, but that we'd all rather do it some place else!
https://pao-int.llnl.gov/news/2008/june/docs/061608_miller_column.php
GM goes on to add that "After reading the article in Times on the importance of science I read the article in the local Times about how the quality of science at the lab was suffering because we've fired so many scientists and that all the other good scientists were leaving and we're now unable to hire anyone in. I am bouyed by this news! I can see that by going over to an all management facility, LLNS has helped increase the quality of science happening elsewhere in the bay area. The country as a whole will benefit from the ingenuity and experience of the men and women that used to work for LLNS."
To 3:30 p.m.: Perhaps you can post the actual article. The URL you list is a PAO Internal site that those of us who got canned can't access. You've gotta love GM's comment... just goes to show you that the Lab is now willing to operate with mediocre staff (but, hey, the country is really going to benefit from its laid off 'best & brightest'!).
The numbers are finally in. In the last month, 10% of my division was let go. Of that 10%, ~85% were scientists, ~15% support/admin, 0% managers.
40% of the division has gone in the last year. We still have the same number of managers though and actually almost the same number of admins.
I think the message is pretty clear.
Why would anyone graduating from college or anyone else looking for employment want to work at LLNL ? The word is out - the once great LLNL no longer values its workforce and on May 22 and May 23 kicked out 440 career employees - the vast majority of those were dedicated, valuable and hard working people that had many, many years of excellent service.
Many employees had more than 25 years of outstanding service and probably around 90% had " Q " clearances and yet we were treated like criminals and or " problem employee's " on our lay-off day.
I will never forgive management for forcing me to leave the job I enjoyed for so many years and for the way we were treated on our lay off day.
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