Tag: Outsourcing
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Workforce Planning – An Oxymoron?
“We are all interested in the future,” the “futurist” Criswell once said, “because that’s where we will spend the rest of our lives.” I spent the last week or so at work planning for the future. All good businesses are supposed to look ahead and anticipate the future. The same is true with the federal…
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This and that
So much happening in my life these days that it is hard for me to even catch my breath, let alone find time to blog. But blogging has been preying on my mind. I’ve wanted to blog but couldn’t because there was all this more important stuff! So this entry will be a bunch of…
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The end of the fast food job
It seems even the fast food industry is not immune from outsourcing. I don’t know why this article surprised me, but it did. An excerpt: Pull off U.S. Interstate Highway 55 near Cape Girardeau, Missouri, and into the drive-through lane of a McDonald’s next to the highway and you’ll get fast, friendly service, even though…
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The Outsourcing Madness has reached its logical end
As a career federal employee I am keenly aware of the Bush Administration’s outsourcing initiative. In case you don’t know it is, it means the Bush Administration would like to fire federal employees and hire contractors to do their work providing (they say) that they can justify a cost savings. As you may recall I…
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What’s Going on at NASA?
My friend Tom and I were big space program enthusiasts growing up in the 60s. It was hard not to be excited about the space program during that time, but we were something like fanatics about it back then. The space program embodied the best of American ingenuity at a time beset with otherwise pretty…
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An Open Letter to George W. Bush
Dear Mr. President, I hope it’s okay if I can be informal and call you George. I promise not to call you, for today at least, some of those less flattering names that many have openly called you. I have for you today, sir, one heaping serving of humble pie for your immediate consumption. It…
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Outsourcing Madness
News item: 150 federal workers rally at Freedom Plaza in Washington, D. C. to protest zealous efforts to “outsource” their jobs to the private sector. I had no idea about this rally. I suspect if the word had gotten around there would have been a lot more people at the rally. But hey, it’s a…
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The True Size of Government
My agency is going through another one of its periodic, politically required, staff reductions. My agency is hardly unique. Cutting the number of federal employees has become the key metric for demonstrating that government itself is smaller. In 1996 when President Clinton declared the era of big government was over there were approximately 1.9 million…
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Let’s keep doing more with less and less!
This is going to win me no friends on Capitol Hill, or in the White House for that matter. But isn’t it time we civil servants said “Enough with the downsizing crap!”? I’m sick of it. Our agency is going through another one of its politically required processes to bring the number of federal employees…
Occam's Razor 