Article Menu

If you don't see hyperlinks, please click the title or READ MORE to open in a larger window.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Case 1 - Expensive Clerks Who Are Not Clerks

This is part of an ongoing series about LA County government's wasteful practices. A lot of County tasks involve rather routine and clerical work. Ideally a manager or specialist should not spend too much time on routine and clerical work. In some cases it can't be easily avoided, such as approving actions, also known as "signing off on requests". That's a manager's job. And illnesses and long vacations may also result in such. But misallocation is often chronic , not temporary.  Many on-going clerical and repetitive tasks can be given to just about ANY general clerk familiar with PC's with a bit of direct training and maybe written steps. They don't require any degree beyond high school graduation with decent grades. If the general clerk gets stuck, they can contact a specialist or their manager. Needing occasional help is not a reason to have expensive people do ALL of it, but this is sometimes given as an excuse. They invent lots of excuses for wast...
Read more

Nice Try County, but still a FAIL – New Policy Clause

This is part of an ongoing series about Los Angeles County gov't waste. Relatively recently one Department’s policy manual added a clause that at first glance looks like it’s addressing the waste reporting policy issue I mentioned earlier. It’s possible precursors of this site persuaded them to finally address waste reporting, or at least LOOK like they are addressing it. (I’ve given similar grievances before this site was created.) The problem is a comparison with my suggested policy text (see link below) shows it’s missing most of the steps needed to be useful. Here is a paraphrasing of the clause added by a given Department of the County: Office managers shall report any and all wasteful practices to [a given office]. There are multiple problems with this. The biggest one is that the receiving office is not required to do anything with the information. It could sit silently in a dusty folder forever (real or virtual). Remember the ending scene in the first Indiana Jones where t...
Read more