Life of a Lab Rat

Jonathan was talking about tactics versus strategy, and what those words mean for project management. Just to recap, 'strategy' is General Patton planning to turn the Third Army around to relieve Bastogne and 'tactics' is what you do when you see a ruddy great 5th Army Panzer cresting a ridge before you.

So the well-paid Generals and staff get to sit safe in Verdun talking about strategies while the poorly-paid, under-equipped and generally knackered grunts get to do tactics. You can probably already see where I'm going with this.

The Generals do their thing, and the grunts do theirs. And you know what? The grunts get really ratty when a General tries to tell them how to do their job. If the Vice-Chancellor were to come into my lab and tell me how to do minipreps I'd either send him away with a burning earhole or give him the Gilson, say "get on with it, then" and nick off to the pub for a pint or three. The Vice-Chancellor is good at Vice-Chancelloring (I hope) and I'm good at minipreps (among other things, he adds modestly). Which is Good and Right and How Things Should Be.

So why have I been asked three times in a week to do a General's job?

First, we have the 'junior staff representative' to the 'Select-a-Head' committee organizing meetings to canvas our opinion on the selection of the new Head of Department. To be fair, I think she is merely trying to take the responsibility seriously, which is to be lauded. I doubt very much whether the opinion of the junior staff (all 50+ of us) is going to be taken seriously — which is a shame really because we could probably swing things if this were truly an open and democratic process. I'll give my opinion anyway, in case anyone is reading and on the off-chance the nobs are going to listen: give the job to someone whose research career is basically over. Because, let's face it, once you're Head you're never going to get any real work done. And there are one or two people I have in mind.

Next, there's an email asking us all to make suggestions for the Department's one-page policy document — the Strategic Plan on research. Now this does look as though our opinions matter:

Staff members are invited to email mission/vision statement(s) or any other feedback to email by date. A draft plan will then be compiled by the research committee based on the comments received.

But this is really taking the piss. Most of the workers here are on short term contracts with a strategic vision that is limited to "I want a paper in Cell" and how they are going to achieve that. And the Generals want us to do their job for them, in "We utilize synergies to obtain results towards the bottom line"-Dilbertspeak-type terms? (There should probably be an 'empowered' and a reference to workers as 'resources' in there somewhere if we are going to do this properly).

And third, all staff have received a long, impenetrable and incredibly tedious paper prepared by the Provost and Deputy Vice-Chancellor, discussing the University's realignment of Faculties. Here's a sample:

A paper prepared by the Provost was considered at the meeting of Senate held on 19 June. This paper summarized the consultation process to date and highlighted the advantages and risks of proposed Faculty changes. Senate expressed particular concerns about the level of communication and resolved to note the proposals, on the understanding that further consultation and consideration would be required before appropriate nomenclature and final relationships among the new academic entities could be finally determined through Senate resolution. It requested that a further iteration be brought back to Senate together with appropriate draft resolutions.

(I find the comments about communication very funny. Senate has said that they will acknowledge that there are proposals. Priceless.)

Am I supposed to read, mark and inwardly digest the email? What happens if I don't? Should I care? I just want to know that the University is going to keep funding science and stop the administrators getting in my hair so that I can do my job.

Hah, here we go — the very 'empowerment' I want:

[T]he development of shared services will lead to a significantly enhanced level of professionalism, service orientation, reduced risk, and empowerment of capability, where career progression and continuing professional development are as integral to the support functions as they are to the core functions of the academic and research professionals.
The most significant impact of shared services will be the release of critical academic time to pursue the core activities of teaching and research as opposed to wrestling with systems and processes

The irony of it all is stifling.

What do you think, fellow unempowered, high risk, unprofessional workers? Is it some attempt at democracy? Are we actually going to get a vote on any of these matters? I'm going to be a cynical bastard here and say that if you pay me like a General then I'll act like one. Until then, the strategic planning of my own project(s) has a greater priority, I'm afraid.

(Added in proof: Social Sciences want us to plan their strategy, too)

And in other news, the NTEU is squaring off for a big stoush (isn't that a nice word?) with the University VC over HEWRR, AWAs, EBAs, UEAs and other TLAs. It all comes down to money. The University gets thirteen million of your Australian dollars for offering AWAs to its (empowered? maybe) human resources, and

. . . can reward high performance, streamline policy and procedure, lessen bureaucracy and generate cost savings as well as facilitate direct consultation with staff on University matters

Staff may choose to accept this agreement, or not. Acceptance of an AWA is not a condition of employment and you can choose to remain covered by the University's Enterprise Agreement.

It is a genuine and distinct choice

And the University wants us to go to "AWAs are GOOD!" meetings and the NTEU wants us to go to "NTEUs are EVIL!" meetings and I just wish my cloning would work.

What do you guys think? Do I need to realign my faculties?