Timing

If the time scale of politics is months and the time scale of many businesses is quarters of years but the time scale of a successful weapons lab is decades, what is surprising is not that we are having this clash of time scales (temporary politics killing off things that cannot be rebuilt within three Senatorial terms).

What is surprising is that the current scenario has not occurred before now.

Kudos

Senator Domenici had a letter printed in today's New Mexican.

http://www.santafenewmexican.com/Opinion/Commentary_Let_s_get_serious_about_the_LANL_debate

I liked the letter a lot. The letter is succinct and focused. It points out where there is smoke and mirrors and where there is fire.

I have quibbles about some facts but still like the letter and thank the Senator for having the courage to write it and publish it.

Total, targetted, and excluded

I down loaded the Lab's RIF analysis, put it into Excel, and have started to make charts and spreadsheet pages from it.

For instance, I have the percent of people targeted for layoff charted by skill set.

I may post some of these charts here later, once I figure out how to do it. ;-)

Fundamentally fragile and under assault

David Brook's column in today's New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/27/opinion/27brooks.html?hp

"Follow the Fundamentals"

suggests that many Americans and certainly American politicians view America as under assault and fundamentally fragile to that assault. I hear many people at LANL say the same thing about LANL.

I disagree.

I do not think that LANL is under this inexorable assault nor that it is fundamentally fragile. I think that the assualt can be thrown back. I think that LANL is more robust than it appears.

My only need is to have more people than just me have this positive view. Then I need those people to take some action to defend the battlements.

Just a thought.

Jobs

Lockheed Martin runs Sandia - 8,400 employees, 80 jobs lost.
UC - Bechtel runs LANL and Livermore - 20,000 employees; 2,000 jobs lost and counting

Eating your seed corn

In the book "Built to Last," companies that did well for at least fifty years changed their product line as needed to survive. 3M, for instance, routinely stops producing products, even good ones, to foster innovation and new products.

At least recently, the Lab seems to have been run a bit differently. The analogy is not of an innovative company trying to survive but of a buggy whip manufacturer bought out by a private equity firm. The object is to sell as many buggy whips and as many company buildings as possible as quickly as possible and then close the place down.

In the mean time, sell the tanning solution that makes the buggy whips pretty (think 'safety' and 'security') because this is all the customer wants to buy.

So you get short term income at that cost of eating your seed corn -- there will be no new crops because there is nothing to grow them from.

Playing to win

George Lakoff, of UC Berkeley, has written a number of books. The books are about choosing words and their meaning so that your side wins.

For instance, he told the Democrats that trying to win an argument against the Republicans on national security by using Republican terms and meanings was a losing battle. The Republicans knew how to win this fight better than the Democrats did. He suggested that the Democrats had to stay on message and use terms that were not Republican terms.

The apparent application to here is to stop talking to DOE, Congress, etc. about 'safety,' 'security,' 'pensions,' and 'entitlements' and go back to talking in different terms such as 'national security,' 'economic prosperity,' and 'long term national interest.'

Basically, this approach says to change the verbal game so that your side wins.

Restructuring needs

In yesterday's LA Monitor newspaper, there was an article about organizations that are banding together to help those who no longer work at LANL.

This banding together has been tried before in Northern New Mexico. There were a number of 'job fairs' for contractors who no longer worked at LANL.

I went to some of these fairs to see what was being offered.

There were many jobs at casinos. There were jobs doing hard labor. There were opportunities to take courses at community colleges. There were not any jobs being presented beyond Northern New Mexico.

The above is just some information that might save time for the laid off.

The new look

For years now, I used the same color scheme in these blogs that was used in the original LANL:The Real Story. I was assuming that there was a way to preserve and enhance the value of the Lab, especially the science at the Lab.

That assumption appears to be untrue.

So, now, the background design is of a house at the edge of a harbor. We are in the house, looking out to sea, getting our boat ready and planning the voyage. The voyage should be exciting. I am hoping for decent weather.

Sitemeter - The number and duration of visits is going up. Given the expected employer - employee nastiness that is likely to occur over the next few months, I chose to take down the sitemeters so that they could not be used to track who comes here or who comes to scienceatlanl.blogspot.com. I may put them up again later. Sitemeters are odd. There have been more than 200,000 visits to LANL:The Rest of the Story in the last few months; yet, no actions have taken place to alter the timing of the train wreck that is LANL.

This blog has general discussions. Science at LANL has specific science talk and references to available jobs.

To All

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

The rest of the story

It was announced by director Anastasio that about 750 people need to leave LANS in order to balance out the $100,000,000 shortfall in the budget.

These people were asked to leave voluntarily. (An idea that seems to defy common sense.)

The $100,000,000 number was not presented as having a basis in facts. Some local residents compared it to the $70,000,000 to be awarded in fees.

If you add up changes in the Lab's budget over the last year, you do not get $100,000,000 for the shortfall. Once you put in salary increases, gross receipts taxes, decreased funding, and fee, the total appears to be $500,000,000. This is equivalent to about 3,000 more jobs on top of the projected 750 that will be lost.

So, my question is: "What happened to the missing $400,000,000 and who are the unannounced 3,000 people who will have to leave in order to make up this budget deficit?"

Mood music

Today's mood music is:

"Deathly" or "Goodbye Stranger" - Aimee Mann
"Another Brick in the Wall" - Pink Floyd
Various - Rammstein
Various - Rocky Horror Picture Show

Stress and pain

Indicators of stress are rising in Los Alamos.

1. There are almost 400 houses on the market. Normal is 70.
2. Many more people are angry and rude in their dealings with others.
3. Many more people have stopped having dealings with others and have withdrawn.
4. The wait to get in to see a marriage counselor has risen from one week to 2 months.
5. The wait to see a veterinarian has dropped from two months to one week.

More later.

Do the math

1. LANL outsourced to potential campaign donors
2. LLNL outsourced to potential campaign donors.
3. President Bush raises more in campaign contributions than at this stage in 2005 - $63,000,000.
   

Forgiveness

Two days ago I found out about a new book.
One day ago I found that this book had been purchased by Mesa Public Library.
Last night I got the book out of the library.
This morning I am one third of the way through it.

The book is "Amish Grace" by Donald Kraybill, Steven Nolt, and David Weaver-Zercher.

It is about the Amish's deeply ingrained forgiveness of others who hurt them. The main thread of the story is about the Amish's behavior after the tragedy at Nickel Mine, PA.

A central belief of Amish life is

"For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you: But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses." Matthew 6:14-15

Read the book.

It is no longer morning. It is 5PM. I just finished the book. A little forgiveness seems that it would allow all of us to get through this mess with more grace and less bitterness.

Owners capitalism versus managers capitalism

Worried about your pension?

Read John Bogle or listen to him on Bill Moyer's journal. He says that pension funds and other places that hold your money are much more focused on keeping your money for themselves and not giving it to you than they were 40 years ago. Forty years ago, they were more focused on giving value to you the customer.

Then worry harder.

Two interesting sites

Mocking companies and government - the king has no clothes

http://www.theyesmen.org/

Wonder where your tax dollars are going in earmarks. This may help
"Taxpayers for Commonsense"

http://www.taxpayer.net/

Quotes from Abba Eban, Israeli Prime Minister

His ignorance is encyclopedic.

History teaches us that men and nations behave wisely once they have exhausted all other alternatives.

It is our experience that political leaders do not always mean the opposite of what they say.

The multiperson prisoner's dilemma

It is easy to say "Big companies are evil. Division leaders are stupid. The people at DOE are the C students. Support staff is worthless. The county council consists of a bunch of idiots."

All these things have been said and have been believed by some.

All of these things, besides being untrue, are unproductive.

A more productive approach seems to be to assume that each person listed above is acting in what they perceive to be their own self interest. Each person is acting under what they perceive to be the rules governing their portion of the game.

This 'everyone is a rational player and is playing in different games' approach seems to be strongly predictive of what is happening and what is likely to happen.

Today's question - Why is it in the rational interest of anyone listed in the first paragraph to try to defend the people who talk to them in the ways that are listed in the first paragraph?

The phrase 'biting the hand that feeds you' comes to mind.

Moved up from 2 November 2007

Layoffs and new jobs

There are 3,000 people who are projected to be laid off at the weapons labs in the next few months.

Ignoring the thoughts about what this layoff will do to the current ability of the workforce to make milestones and ignoring the crushing effect that this layoff will have on the ability to attract younger workers, what will happen to those laid off.

Tradition says that they will be forgotten or ignored by those who still have jobs. The laid off will become "The Disappeared."

But what about each laid off person. What happens to them?

Most of the laid off are 45 or older. Most of the laid off have never written a competitive resume. Most have never applied for a job other than the one they just lost. Most have only done classified work and can't talk about it. Most want to stay in the locale in which they now live. They have not lived anywhere else in a long time.

There are two likely scenarios for the laid off. In the first scenario, the laid off retreat to their houses, husband their resources, drink heavily and hope that things will change for the better locally. This is the scenario that has occurred in many towns across the US.

The second scenario, after the grief and anger, is that, one by one, people pick up their lives and find rewarding new lives.

As Yogi Berra said, "When you come to a fork in the road, pick it up."

Cheers

Experimental research institute

More than 18 months ago I had some conversations about setting up an experimental research institute locally. I had some interested scientists and some interested funders.

I had a talk today about this same topic.

Is anyone interested in getting such an institute set up and going?

Is anyone more interested since Schoenbauer of NNSA, on Thursday, seemed to imply that all non NNSA work and all science were no longer part of LANL's 'mission.'

A book for today

"Amish Grace"

Consultant in chief

http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110010846

The article above is about Mitt Romney and about trying to govern based on data and goals, a refreshing approach.

Keep your head down, do your job

I realize that this has been said before, but "Keep your head down, do your job, ask no questions" behavior by LANL and LLNL staff is exactly the behavior that lets management get away with what they are accused of doing. Management knows that there will be no response.

For more insights, check out a post a couple of years ago that quotes an article about Bullies and Victims. The article talks about the dynamics between bullies and victims. It also talks about the surprising finding that bullies and victims are the same people.

In one setting a person is a bully. In a different setting, the same person becomes the victim. Bully and victim seem to be the only two personas that the person understands.

RIFs at LANL, LLNL or beyond

I have not said much about RIFs recently.

I have resisted the urge to post URLs about the latest rumor of the day.

To me, the reason to say little right now is that the RIFs are inevitable. There is no money to prevent them and Complex Transformation will drive the RIFs.

The only unanswered questions are:

1. How many people will be RIFed?
2. When will they be RIFed?
3. How will the survivors make deliverables on time?
4. Will the towns be livable after the RIFs?

The optimal strategy for surviving a RIF is individualistic and must be adopted by each motivated person. I am helping a few people with their own strategies at the moment.

The optimal strategy does not seem to depend strongly on the answers to the questions listed above.

My short answers to the questions currently are:

1. At least 5,000 across the DOE weapons labs.
2. In the next month
3. They won't
4. Probably not, at least for 5 to ten years.

Denouement - A better strategy for a standard company might be to leave the threat of a RIF in the air while quietly letting people go until budget goals are met. Then the company announces that there will be no RIF, for instance in time for Christmas. The actual number of people who no longer work for the company is the same as it would be if the RIF was announced, but the company gets to claim that they worked hard and avoided a RIF. From the individual employee's point of view, the results are the same and all of the questions above still apply.

Just a thought.

Sheeple

If I put down other people whether they work at LANL or not, call me on it. I will stop.

Putting down others is wrong on many levels, especially now.

Unintended consequences

If your job and career are safe for the next few years, but

1. Many of your friends are RIFed and move 1000 miles away,
2. Your house loses 50% of its value,
3. Your church now runs at a deficit and is fairly empty,
4. Downtown Los Alamos and Espanola loses half of its stores for lack of business,
5. The aquatic center closes,
6. The school system becomes much worse for lack of funding,
   
7. Los Alamos is viewed, from the outside, as a relic and a pit facility, but
8. The walking trails are less crowded.

Is Los Alamos or Northern New Mexico a place that you want to live?

Yippee

Finally, on LANL:The Rest of the Story, after years of avoidance 'avoiding the reality of the future of LANL' seems to be a topic that no longer has to be avoided.

(How often do you get to use the word 'avoid' legitimately three times in a sentence? ;-) )

Real estate values

There is a good article in today's New York Times about how people across the country are being affected by loss in the value of their homes.

The simple message is that they can no longer get loans from the bank.

The elephant and the mouse

The elephant - If LANS, as unit of Bechtel, is expected to make a 20% profit on its income ($2,200,000,000), this is about $400,000,000 in profit and if LANS is currently running about $300,000,000 in the red, where is the $700,000,000 difference going to come from? This difference is the salaries and benefits of thousands of staff.

The mouse - If you work at the Lab now, what is your best strategy to protect yourself, your career, and your family? How does this best strategy depend on your skill set, your age, your family situation, and whether you chose TCP1 or TCP2? What is the cost of not figuring out your best strategy and executing it? (Answer to the third question - about $500,000 per family, much of it in lost value of real estate)

Newspaper articles

Newspaper articles are the ephemera of the situation at LANL now, the husks left by a moving beast.

The reporters work hard and are doing as well as they can, but the important question seems to be 'What organism would generate the events that newspapers report?"

The analogy that seems apt is "If we could see the scat, the destruction, the feeding behavior, etc. of a herd of elephants, what could we say about the shape and functioning of the elephant or the herd if we could never actually see an elephant or a herd of elephants?"

Jobs everywhere

As usual, job openings will be mentioned on ScienceatLANL

www.scienceatlanl.blogspot.com

Odds

The odds of anything changing in a good direction for LANL seem to be at least 100 to 1 against.