Federal Government & Union spar over returning to office

[Brad Sallows]

Not to mention the frustration of having to have to fight for a spot when I hit the ground.

Maybe mention to management the existence of on-line booking tools? Find a company that has already solved the problems and pay them to deliver their solutions?

 

[brihard]

Come on now, you think the federal government hasn’t both already thought of this, AND still found a way to botch the implementation?

 

[dimsum]

Maybe mention to management the existence of on-line booking tools? Find a company that has already solved the problems and pay them to deliver their solutions?

Not sure if it was that article, but I read somewhere that people weren't following the online booking tools.

So people would book, show up, and realize that the spot they booked was taken by someone else.

 

[Brad Sallows]

Impossible to compensate for moronism, so I suppose those companies are SOL.

 

[Remius]

People couldn’t even get conference room bookings right so I can’t imagine workspace bookings going any better.

 

[Navy_Pete]

Not sure if it was that article, but I read somewhere that people weren't following the online booking tools.

So people would book, show up, and realize that the spot they booked was taken by someone else.

The online booking tools for conference rooms in Ottawa is through the IT self service portal, and sends it's over to Shared Services Canada. I'm still waiting from a response to a request from 4 days ago.

Previously the different conference rooms were available as resources in outlook with their own calendar, so all you had to do was add the room to a meeting as a guest and that was it.

If they can't keep up with conference room bookings with very few folks in the office no idea how they'll manage when we scale up.

 

[dimsum]

If they can't keep up with conference room bookings with very few folks in the office no idea how they'll manage when we scale up.

Narrator: It won't.

 

[dangerboy]

The online booking tools for conference rooms in Ottawa is through the IT self service portal, and sends it's over to Shared Services Canada. I'm still waiting from a response to a request from 4 days ago.

Previously the different conference rooms were available as resources in outlook with their own calendar, so all you had to do was add the room to a meeting as a guest and that was it.

If they can't keep up with conference room bookings with very few folks in the office no idea how they'll manage when we scale up.

I did not realize that it had changed, I have not had to book a conference room in a while. Booking through outlook was fairly easy, so of course we had to change it.

 

[Colin Parkinson]

Or when the EA's of the senior managers book the few conference rooms every day, so they have a meeting space if by chance their boss has a meeting, but otherwise it's empty, but you can't book it for a meeting you need to have.

Mind you the solution with outside clients resolves itself when they discover that all you can offer them is lukewarm tap water and then after that, all further meetings are at their office, with coffee, juice, snacks etc.

 

[Navy_Pete]

I did not realize that it had changed, I have not had to book a conference room in a while. Booking through outlook was fairly easy, so of course we had to change it.

I was a bit shocked myself; the old system was easy peasy with zero external monitoring/input required. The only thing they had to do was create some kind of outlook user for each conference room, and probably had some kind of auto-rule to accept meeting requests if there was no conflict.

That worked great, and I had a generic contact list of all the meeting rooms in my building so it was really easy to figure out what was available at that meeting time, and there was no advanced notice required, so if you were talking to someone and wanted a conference room to go through something on a whiteboard took about a minute to block one off. And if you were looking at people between two locations was similarly really easy to figure out if it was easier to go to one building or the other.

Now I'm sure there is some kind of KPI for SSC response time to confirm conference rooms. And is probably especially soul crushing for whoever has to do it, knowing that people hate the system and there are way better ways to do it, and can be automated. Nothing like time delays via busy work and extra cost to improve morale.

 

[Furniture]

I was a bit shocked myself; the old system was easy peasy with zero external monitoring/input required. The only thing they had to do was create some kind of outlook user for each conference room, and probably had some kind of auto-rule to accept meeting requests if there was no conflict.

That worked great, and I had a generic contact list of all the meeting rooms in my building so it was really easy to figure out what was available at that meeting time, and there was no advanced notice required, so if you were talking to someone and wanted a conference room to go through something on a whiteboard took about a minute to block one off. And if you were looking at people between two locations was similarly really easy to figure out if it was easier to go to one building or the other.

Now I'm sure there is some kind of KPI for SSC response time to confirm conference rooms. And is probably especially soul crushing for whoever has to do it, knowing that people hate the system and there are way better ways to do it, and can be automated. Nothing like time delays via busy work and extra cost to improve morale.

I've come to discover that in Ottawa creating and following processes is more important than actually accomplishing anything. My new pastime is watching thew spark of life slowly fade out of existence in people newly posted in...

 

[daftandbarmy]

Or when the EA's of the senior managers book the few conference rooms every day, so they have a meeting space if by chance their boss has a meeting, but otherwise it's empty, but you can't book it for a meeting you need to have.

Mind you the solution with outside clients resolves itself when they discover that all you can offer them is lukewarm tap water and then after that, all further meetings are at their office, with coffee, juice, snacks etc.

I always liked to have meetings at the Canadian Forest Service building in Victoria.

They have a full cafeteria, and someone always plays classical music on the piano at lunch because: seriously smart folks

 

[Brad Sallows]

Example of a booking tool: web-based; drop-down to choose building and floor; map of floor showing IDs of everything bookable (eg. cubes and rooms); booking up to two weeks in advance; confirmation required near booking date/time. Canada-wide.

 

[Navy_Pete]

I've come to discover that in Ottawa creating and following processes is more important than actually accomplishing anything. My new pastime is watching thew spark of life slowly fade out of existence in people newly posted in...

When I get juniour people posted in, try to limit their tour length and shield them from some of the stupidity. About 18 months seems roughly about right to meet enough people to have useful POCs when things go poorly and they need help, learn enough about some of the support side to understand how to feed the beast, and then get out of there before their will to live withers.

But senior people who's first posting to Ottawa and think they are going to change the world, that's a different story. They usually start out with some variation of thinly disguised sneering thinking people are lazy, think they are going to overrun the bureaucracy, then get stymied when people who don't work for them politely tell them it doesn't work like that.

Best case they get frustrated for a bit, then realize they can get some things done if they work in the system and at least try and shield people from pointless busy work, or trying to get everything done (instead of what you can actually do with the numbers you have). Worse case they get broken and join the cynical dark side where we have bitter dark chocolate. It's fun to watch that happen in real time.

 

[dapaterson]

"I took a three day executive course on X so I am therefore now an expert!"

"What do you mean we have to follow the law?"

"What if we do the same thing as the last five times? Certainly I have no need to understand why it failed before!"

And the ever popular "Congratulations! Based solely on a posting message, with no education, training or experience, you are now the CAF's resident expert on this complex topic!"

 

[daftandbarmy]

When I get juniour people posted in, try to limit their tour length and shield them from some of the stupidity. About 18 months seems roughly about right to meet enough people to have useful POCs when things go poorly and they need help, learn enough about some of the support side to understand how to feed the beast, and then get out of there before their will to live withers.

But senior people who's first posting to Ottawa and think they are going to change the world, that's a different story. They usually start out with some variation of thinly disguised sneering thinking people are lazy, think they are going to overrun the bureaucracy, then get stymied when people who don't work for them politely tell them it doesn't work like that.

Best case they get frustrated for a bit, then realize they can get some things done if they work in the system and at least try and shield people from pointless busy work, or trying to get everything done (instead of what you can actually do with the numbers you have). Worse case they get broken and join the cynical dark side where we have bitter dark chocolate. It's fun to watch that happen in real time.

FWIW…Young people are leaving in droves, it seems:

These Are the Agencies Federal Employees Are Leaving at the Highest Rates

After jumping during the pandemic, the government's overall attrition rate has stabilized.

www.govexec.com

 

[Brad Sallows]

If money is a problem, people ought be informed of the value of their entire compensation package, including parts that might be beyond price (eg. pension indexing above the customary 2% per year limit). Won't be a complete solution, but surely would help.

 

[dimsum]

If money is a problem, people ought be informed of the value of their entire compensation package, including parts that might be beyond price (eg. pension indexing above the customary 2% per year limit). Won't be a complete solution, but surely would help.

Not for the folks who aren't considering (yet) a full 25-year career.

Which, from what I'm gathering, is most of the younger generation.

 

[dimsum]

I've come to discover that in Ottawa creating and following processes is more important than actually accomplishing anything. My new pastime is watching thew spark of life slowly fade out of existence in people newly posted in...

I was just reading this Reddit thread about "process rather than success" in the Aussie military:

https://www.reddit.com/r/AustralianMilitary/comments/10hnfdk

 

[Edward Campbell]

"I took a three day executive course on X so I am therefore now an expert!"

"What do you mean we have to follow the law?"

"What if we do the same thing as the last five times? Certainly I have no need to understand why it failed before!"

And the ever popular "Congratulations! Based solely on a posting message, with no education, training or experience, you are now the CAF's resident expert on this complex topic!"

That was me a few decades ago ...

Senior officer: "Well, Ted, what do you know about [fairly complex technical subject]?"​

Me: "Not much, actually ..."​

Senior officer: "Oh, well ... can't be helped; you're now Director of [fairly complex technical subject]. Someone has to do it ... your turn in the barrel I suppose. You'll figure it out, won't you? Good lad!"​