Austin News: Travis County Death Spiral: A Commissioners Court seminar in how not to manage human resources – AustinChronicle.com.

A Commissioners Court seminar in how not to manage human resources

When the Travis County commissioners narrowly voted Sept. 1 to terminate two long-tenured and high-ranking employees, the official explanation was that the two women simply could not get along, and their feud was taking an unacceptable toll on county operations and employees. 

Linda Moore Smith

Screenshot from Travis County Commissioners Court Video

But reams of documents since provided by the county through open records requests reflect a much more complicated workplace situation within the Human Resources Man­agement Department – a situation that commissioners and the county attorney had long been aware of before they finally decided to take action. By waiting from roughly 2002 until late 2008 to try to resolve the problem – first with a “climate assessment report” of the HR depart­ment and later a mediator – it appears commissioners enabled or tolerated a nasty state of affairs that eventually became what one county employee called a “death spiral.” Ultimately, commissioners came to believe their only solution was to fire both the supervisor, Executive Manager Alicia Perez, and her subordinate, Human Resources Director Linda Moore Smith.

By the time the county voted to terminate the two managers, the tangible price tag for the failed remediation had hit nearly $68,000, with more than $40,000 of that amount spent investigating employee complaints against Smith. And the bills will keep on coming. The final tab is expected to be well into the six figures, given the commissioners’ stated intent to negotiate severance agreements with Perez and Smith.

Alicia Perez

Photo by John Anderson

Setting aside the irony of a dysfunctional human resources department – traditionally expected to be the steady personnel anchor of an organization – the commissioners’ action raises questions about why the longstanding HR dilemma reached the point of a very public ouster of two minority women approaching retirement age (Perez, 57, is Hispanic, and Smith, now 60, is African-American).

County commissioners have laid the blame squarely on Perez’s shoulders. They say she failed to manage Smith, who, despite her professional abilities to deliver on her job responsibilities, was a source of friction within the department. According to internal memos and the climate assessment report conducted by Employment Practices Solutions Inc., Smith had a history of abusiveness and disrespectful treatment of employees. The December 2008 report cites “a climate of verbal abuse, intimidation and suppression affecting employees in HRMD; where Ms. Smith [and one of Smith's managers] have been free to yell at employees, slam doors and otherwise act without civil, common and ordinary restraint.”

The report also refers to strained relations between Perez and Smith, which ultimately became the commissioners’ ammunition for terminating both.

In her nearly 12 years as HR director, Smith had four Equal Employment Opportunity Com­mis­sion complaints filed against her, and had gone through five employee relations managers in nine years. Two of the former managers, both African-American males, were among the four employees who filed EEOC complaints. Smith’s attorney, Terry Davis, points out that the complaints were found to be without merit; however, the county spent hours in multiple executive sessions negotiating settlements with two of the employees, while a third complaint has moved to litigation. Davis also said Smith is declining media interviews, explaining, “My client has never been one to seek publicity.”

Stormy Weather

The commissioners’ HR shakedown may continue to have legal reverberations and could have an impact on the re-election campaigns of County Judge Sam Biscoe and 4th Precinct Com­missioner Margaret Gómez, each expected to seek another term in 2010. Gómez seconded Biscoe’s July 28 motion to place Perez and Smith on administrative leave. But on Sept. 1, when commissioners took final action, Gómez joined Commissioner Ron Davis in voting against terminating Perez and Smith. Her vote change came after sharp criticism from Hispanic leaders – and the threat of drawing a viable political opponent in 2010 (former Austin City Council Member Raul Alvarez is a possible candidate). In any event, by the time of the Sept. 1 vote, the damage had already been done. Perez and Smith had been effectively fired July 28; the vote to place the women on administrative leave also included specific instructions to clean out their offices. “It was a painful experience, to say the least,” Perez said of the commissioners’ actions. “To come out [of executive session] and say, ‘You’re fired’ … that was bloody wicked.”

Gómez now says she was not aware of how bad things were in the HR department until the problems had escalated into a crisis-management situation. “On top of that,” she said, “I tried hard not to meddle with any of the executive managers and their employees.” Gómez echoed the implication of the outside consultant’s climate assessment report, citing a poor working relationship between Perez and Smith. As the assessment states, “Several [employees] reported a ‘trickle down’ effect, suggesting Ms. Perez’s attitude toward Ms. Smith causes Ms. Smith to either ‘go off’ on HRMD employees or withdraw.” Gómez firmly believes the unrest in human resources originated from a conflict between Perez and Smith. “To give them credit, they both did deliver the county work, [but] they had this conflict; they didn’t like each other, they didn’t trust each other … and then the employees started filing complaints.”

But Perez and several former and current employees take issue with such a simplistic explanation. “Our conflict started when those complaints started. I could not ignore them,” said Perez, who hired Smith for the HR position in 1997. But, Perez added: “We weren’t at each other’s throats. It wasn’t as horrible as people make it seem.”

County documents dating back to 2004 and 2005 include e-mails from employees to Biscoe, commissioners, and the County Attor­ney’s Office, and they raise concerns about Smith’s management style. The records also do not support the tidy “trickle down” theory that the complaints against Smith were a direct result of Perez’s treatment of her.

By 2008, however, records show that the relationship between the executive manager and the HR director had indeed reached a tipping point. Perez’s memos to Smith between late 2007 and 2008 carry the tone of a supervisor who has completely run out of patience. “I am very disappointed in our conversation on Friday,” Perez wrote in a two-sentence e-mail to Smith Oct. 22, 2007. “Perhaps we can engage the County Attorney to help mediate our differences.” Another e-mail, this one dated Nov. 1, 2007, concerns Perez’s dismay over Smith’s secrecy regarding an executive search process – and it closes with a statement that certainly sounds like a warning of a potential dismissal. “I spoke with the Judge [Biscoe] and he supports the perspective that recruitment for any position should be transparent and not a ‘closed’ process. … Since our perspectives are so opposed on how important the principle of open and honest communication is to Travis County and what our roles are to make sure we maintain public integrity and organizational values, it may be time for us to consider alternatives to our working relationship.”

Yet if the problems in HR did indeed originate with Smith, Gómez asks, “I have to be left with the thought, ‘Why didn’t [Perez] take action?’”

Pointing Fingers

The answer is buried somewhere within two conflicting accounts. In 2005, the Travis County Attorney’s Office investigated two complaints against Smith and found she had not violated any laws or policies. The investigation did, however, cite problems with Smith’s interactions with employees. Perez says she sought the green light from the County Attorney’s Office to give Smith the opportunity to resign. But there was a sense among county officials that Smith would not voluntarily resign, Perez said, and the logical solution in 2005 – in terms of avoiding litigation – was to place Smith on a performance improvement plan, instructing Smith to receive coaching on “interpersonal relationships and work environment communications.”

On two previous occasions, Perez said, the legal staff had blessed her decision to seek resignations of other department heads, both white males. County commissioners’ remarks in their job evaluations of Perez indicate they were happy with Perez’s new replacement hires in those departments, but they continued to find fault with HR, the most time-consuming burden of Perez’s multifaceted responsibilities. “I believe we need to talk about a change in direction at the top in HRMD,” former Commissioner Karen Son­leit­­ner wrote in her 2002 evaluation. “I think that Linda [Moore Smith] has taken this department as far as it can, and I’m ready for someone to take it to the next level.” And again, in 2004, Sonleitner wrote, “I’m still unhappy with Linda’s direction at HRMD.”

Perez followed through with the county attorney’s advice to place the HR director on a performance improvement plan. The June 2005 directive called for Smith to draw up a plan of action to address her interpersonal skills with HR employees and other county staff. In the same document, Perez commended Smith on her “ability to accomplish tasks and articulate Human Resources principles.” Smith responded a few weeks later with the requested action plan, while strongly suggesting that the problems were not entirely her responsibility. “I am committed to address any actual or perceived communication gaps,” Smith wrote (emphases in original). “Conversely, I am cognizant that any efforts on my part to enhance communications and workplace relationships require the commitment and effort of others whose attitudes, behaviors and practices are not within my authority to change.”

Biscoe, for his part, says when Perez discussed the possibility of terminating Smith, he advised her to talk to the legal department, but he flatly denies accusations that he actively blocked Perez’s efforts to fire Smith. “This thing about me not wanting her to fire [Smith] is hogwash,” Biscoe said. “Alicia,” he said, “is blaming everybody else. … Alicia doesn’t admit to anything.”

Under the performance plan, Perez said Smith started to show improvement, “but then the complaints started again.”

Brought to a Boil

County documents show Perez’s next attempt to oust Smith came in July 2008. The legal department instructed Perez to present documentation to support her rationale for dismissing Smith. In her August 2008 memo to Biscoe and County Attorney David Escamilla, Perez cited a number of reasons, including “discord and instability” in HR’s Staffing, Training and Employee Relations Division, which had seen the turnover of five managers in nine years. Additionally, Perez wrote, “Difficulties in communication between Ms. Smith, her colleagues, her supervisor, her staff, and elected and appointed officials have diminished her effectiveness as HRMD director.” Perez acknowledged that her own communications with Smith “have also been strained and grow increasingly difficult.”

By the time Perez submitted the 2008 letter seeking Smith’s termination, commissioners had begun discussing hiring an outside consultant to conduct a climate assessment of the HR department, Biscoe said. The strained relations between Perez and Smith quickly became the focal point of the consultant’s assessment. A mediator was brought in. In the end, the long-simmering management problems in HR – the source of complaints and high turnover throughout the years – boiled down to a very rudimentary public explanation: The two women just could not get along. The explanation was apparently satisfactory to the county judge and most of the commissioners. “They would work together for a couple of months, and then there would be a flare-up,” Biscoe said, as though the entire problem was little more than a personal conflict between the two women.

Former commissioner Sonleitner says she was disappointed with the public portrayal of the two female managers. “The way this was presented fed every horrible and false stereotype out there that some folks want to believe – that women can’t manage, that minorities can’t be good managers, and that government in general can’t manage.”

Nor did the “cat fight” explanation – as some observers began to dismissively describe the situation – wash with Perez’s supporters. Nearly 30 of them, including at least eight county employees, appeared before commissioners Aug. 4 to voice their concerns about the county’s handling of the matter. At least a couple of speakers noted that neither Perez nor Smith deserved to be treated so poorly in such a public manner.

Biscoe later acknowledged his surprise to see the number of rank-and-file employees – ranging from a deputy constable to a groundskeeper – who testified on behalf of Perez, calling the testimony “not a good move in my view.” One of the speakers was in fact his longtime aide, Sheryl Brown, who helped Perez pack up her office the night of July 28. She told commissioners, “I was in shock” over their dismissal of Perez.

“I was raised by wise parents … and they said if you don’t stand up for something, you will fall for anything. I’m saying this now,” Brown said over scattered applause, “I came here as an employee of Travis County because I stand up for what I saw … the integrity [of Perez] and how she treated employees.”

A colleague and friend of mine wrote a recent blog entry on her experience and expression of the wounded healer archetype. She describes in startling detail how it manifests in her as a struggle with dyslexia. She just came to a diagnosis in her forties. Not common. But she’s very bright and managed to skirt the educational system that demanded that she have a command of reading the written word. She “tricked” the system and received an Ivy League education.

[One by-product of her “trickery” is that she is an excellent listener which adds to the profundity of her healing talents: an important issue worth returning to at another time.]

I had worked with her intimately in a mastermind group for almost a year before she “confessed” her suspicions of the dyslexia. I was a bit suspicious of her self-diagnosis. I thought that maybe she had under-estimated the demands on her time and energy. She is the mother of four, a wife, a healer, and an entrepreneur busy growing a business. My thinking was that she was more overwhelmed than she cared to admit and that fatigue and the lack of time to focus were more at play than anything else.

Rather arrogantly, I dismissed her concerns, which of course, reflects my bias.

What was so hard for me to process was my knowledge that she had spent the better part of the year writing a book. She was writing a book for goodness sakes. And I knew that prior to that she had been working on Wall Street as a successful editor of marketing and educational materials for the world of finance. No other dyslexic that I had known was a wordsmith. Instead, they chose to express themselves in different media.
However, I did find myself getting frustrated with her when we would discuss the progress on her book.

I have my own experience as an editor. I have edited thousands of freshman and sophomore papers written in response to literature, research, writing prompts, emotional prompts, grammar studies, rhetorical studies. In short, I was in the business of helping students understand their relationship to language and the self as evidenced in that language. I helped them watch themselves think and feel and record those thoughts and feelings.

[As a university instructor, I was never trained in determining “learning disabilities.” And I never had a student “confess” to being dyslexic, nor had one that struggled to the degree that I would have suspected a learning disability. Perhaps such students had self-selected themselves out of higher education. Or perhaps this was prior to the remarkable increase in autistic spectrum cases. In another entry, I will be discussing Ron Davis on this rise in autism and his theories on “The Gift of Dyslexia.” He sees dyslexia as part of that spectrum.]

This woman is a prolific writer. She is most comfortable, however, with writing short pieces because she has difficulty seeing how the pieces fit together. She sees the scribbles on the page we call words in a very different way. She has difficulty reading the material as a reader of her work would. All writers have trouble seeing their work objectively, but she also has the added experience of not “seeing” the work as her mind intends readers to see it.

We both recognize the value of her thoughts and the need for her message to be shared. Here we are in accord. The frustration for me is that we were having difficulty finding a common ground for our discussion. I now recognize it is because I am so language based. She, I was learning, is image based. With this shift in our perception of each other, we are finding ways of talking with each other that helps to heal our confusion.

This clarity begins with the use of the word Wounded Healer because I can understand it as a metaphor. And the power of metaphor is that it can bypass the mind and go to the heart.

In the telling of the story of at last diagnosing the “problem,” she is discovering the gift inherent in it. As a result, she is healing this cultural wound. She is overcoming the cultural “infliction.” And as a Wounded Healer, she is overcoming what society deems an “affliction.”

Creative Commons

Burbank Water and Power, as part of the city’s streetlight energy efficiency efforts, is testing LED streetlight luminaries in two residential blocks.

Executives are touting the move as an example of the city’s continuing sustainability efforts.

At Maple Street between Chandler and Burbank boulevards, the city is comparing the light intensity pattern with that of its typical, high-pressure sodium lighting along Kenwood Street.

The same is taking place at Mystic View Place, off of Haven Way, in comparison with neighboring Remy Place.

General Manager Ron Davis has said that for street LEDs to be practical, they have to be able to work with the city’s existing standards — as was the case when the utility moved from low-pressure sodium to high-pressure sodium lighting.

Test results are expected next month with plans in place to test alternative LED lights at other locations.

Written by Geoff Crawley

With his Major League leading eighth blown save, Philadelphia Phillies closer Brad Lidge is ever closer to fulfilling his boyhood dream of being in the record books for most blown saves in a single season.

“When I was a young boy, I always dreamed of breaking records in baseball,” said Lidge after literally throwing away a game with the Atlanta Braves. “But there was always one that was near to my heart, the holy grail. The single season blown saves record.”

The current record for blown saves in a season is fourteen, held by four different players. The last pitcher to do it was the Minnesota Twins’ Ron Davis in 1984.

Lidge was visibly choked up when talking about the record.

“That was a magical year, 1984,” said Lidge wistfully. ”It takes a special kind of situation. You can’t just suck. You have to suck in a special way.

“Kind of like I do this year.”

Lidge was in danger of saving the Braves game yesterday. With his Phillies leading 3-2 in the bottom of the ninth, it started off well enough for Lidge with Braves OF Garret Anderson singling to right, just under the glove of Gold Glove second baseman Chase Utley.

“That was a break right there,” said Lidge.

Then Matt Diaz laid down a bunt just to the right of Lidge. He had time to throw to second and start the double play.

“That went through my mind as I reached for the ball,” said Lidge. “But then I thought, the record!

“I bobbled the ball and threw it into right field. I had no choice, really.”

With that, Anderson scored. Lidge, charged with two errors on the same play, knew his work was not done yet. He then walked the next two batters, one intentionally, then struck out Ryan Church.

“It was more dramatic that way,” he said.

Then, to the surprise of no one, Lidge left a slider over the plate that Omar Infante hit into left field for the win.

More importantly for Lidge, the blown save.

“I really think I can do it if I get the opportunities,” said Lidge. “I’m glad Kim (Myers) hit (her husband and injured Phillies pitcher) Brett (Myers) in the eye like I asked her to. That should buy me a couple extra chances.”

When told that Kim denied that and that the Myers claimed that Brett fell out of his car, Lidge chuckled and said, “Sure, ok, whatever.”

“Six more to go. Wow, I can’t believe I am actually this close to history.”

Post by M. Nye. Photo by Lisa Law. Artist Ron Davis at left.

Dennis is offering a few introductory remarks re: his show, “Hopper at the Harwood,” to a crowd of art lovers who’ve shelled out $175 per for the pleasure, and dinner after. Dennis’s show (with catalogue and essay by the estimable Dave Hickey) is hot. And how could it be otherwise, featuring some of his own work (much better than you think) and that of five formidable artist friends who share his long-time LA-Taos connection — Ken Price, Larry Bell, Ron Davis, Ron Cooper and Dean Stockwell?

Dennis looks tiny and is charming, self-effacing and brief. He notes that he “ran into these bums in the early ‘60s when they were breaking all the rules,” and they’ve all been friends ever since. (Lucky, one reflects, in the perfectly installed exhibition. And what an odd place Taos is, or was.)

Dennis says he originally wanted to have a show with his favorite New Mexico artists —Andrew Dasburg, Georgia O’Keeffe, R.C. Gorman (!), these fellows, et al — but it came down to this and with the ostensible hook of the forty year anniversary of the release of the film “Easy Rider” (filmed partly, of course, in Taos, with hippies, Peter Fonda, Jack Nicholson, Karen Black and directed by Dennis), and the hopefully promoted and marketed “Summer of Love” in Taos with attendant exhibitions and events.

Dennis concludes that this show is not about him, and that if it has gotten some media sizzle — which it has and will — it’s only because he’s a movie star, etc. etc. Nice.

But the fact is Dennis was an active participant, documenter, supporter and creator of an art scene in LA from pre-Ferus Gallery, to this present incarnation as curator at the Harwood Museum. And the fact is he’s always had a keen, canny aesthetic eye and sensibility, and his stuff, and that of his friends here, is proof.

And it’s also true that when he brought his dystopian vision to Taos in 1969, right into the belly of the Anglo-artist beast, next to the Pueblo under the mountain, into the house that Mabel (and Tony) built, everyone from Bell and Price to Donald Rumsfeld and Julia Roberts came following.

Dennis’s show reminds us of the transcendent power of fine art and serious artists even as there is a trace of melancholia in the air. One reflects over dinner that the “Summer of Love” was actually 1967 — that 1968 was the “Summer of Hate,” and, if anything, 1969 the “Summer of Woodstock/ Nixon/ and The End.” One considers the “Devolution of Dennis” from “counter-culture” bad boy to neo-con, Bushie Republican front man for Cadillac, Ameritrade, and American Express; like a prodigal son returning to the faith and pieties of his fathers in the cattle town of Dodge City, Kansas, on the Great Plains, along the Santa Fe Trail. Western, ruggedly individual, conservative, contrarian. You couldn’t make it up.

And one considers the hippies, and their apolitical, narcotized hedonism, nihilism and narcissism, and how so many of them, over time, became real estate salesmen and developers.

And one recalls that Dennis and Peter’s “Easy Rider,” far from being any “celebration” of peace and love and the ‘60s, was actually the death notice for the era.

As Captain America says to Billy:

“We blew it, man. We blew it.”

Bummer. What a buzz-kill.

Okay, so you got this pile of business cards.

Or you have a long list from your boss. Perhaps you are looking at the white pages.

Whatever form your list of prospects takes, you probably need to winnow that list down to the truly viable leads – the more qualified prospects.

But how?

Did you know that social media can be the weed wacker you need to cut through all the weeds – and allow you to narrow your focus build a list of the right prospects?

I was having coffee with friend Ron Davis a while back. He’s the one who put this concept of social media as a weed wacker into my head.

Here’s the scenario we talked about:

You identify a new prospect. You begin calling this person in the hopes that you can secure an audience to talk about your product or service.

You keep calling this prospect. Again and again. Finally, the prospect agrees to see you. Why? Who knows? You really haven’t spoken with this person yet.

So, you get in the car, drive half way across the state to visit with this prospect. After waiting for 30 minutes past the appointment time and after drinking a cup of lukewarm coffee made hours earlier, you finally get to sit down with your prospect.

And within seconds, you know he has ZERO interest in what you have to offer. You think to yourself, this guy took the meeting just to get me to stop calling…

Sigh…

Happens every day. It has happened to me. It has probably happened to you. How do you make it stop?

Bring out the weed wacker!

What if you could engage these same prospects through social media? Either by following them on Twitter, friending them on Facebook, following their blog, or connecting with them on LinkedIn?

Think of all the information you could gather by following them on these tools. Just by observing them, you could gain insights into their business, learn about their struggles, and through these observations – begin to see how you can position your product or service.

And taking it a step further, if you engage in actual e-dialog with this prospect, you begin to establish a relationship.  You begin to discuss and debate potential solutions and ideas on how that prospect could improve their business.

In this exchange, you aren’t selling your solution. You are being helpful and giving value. And over time, this prospect comes to trust you.

What will result from this exchange is the understanding that the two of you should meet. And when that meeting finally takes place, there is no awkwardness. A rapport is already developed. A trust is implicit. You can get right to the point and see if there is benefit from a more formal relationship between the two organizations.

Or…

Or as a result of your social media interaction, you will learn that this prospect isn’t a qualified prospect for you, someone who you cannot serve. Or more to the point, someone who just isn’t interested in what you have to offer. This saves you that long road trip, wasted time in the waiting room, and that bad coffee.

Social media can act as a weed wacker to remove the weeds from your garden. It can help shed light on the good prospects, the people who come to see value in what you do, and who you can serve and help.

This takes too much time, you might ask? So does wasting the day driving to and visiting with a prospect who has no interest in what you sell.

Social media, and all the tools of Web 2.0, are designed to foster better communication, stronger relationships, and two-way conversation. Use the tools as they are designed to help you weed out the bad prospects from your list.

[As originally written for GrowthANSWERS' eMerge! e-newsletter]

Every time I am tempted to go and buy phonics teaching material to teach Bern to read, I turn to Ron Davis.  Even today, I almost gave in and spent a couple of hours contemplating which programme to buy, before deciding I couldn’t abide the American accents.  Then I investigated a few British ones and saw the name Davis.  Which kicked my mind back to Ron Davis.  Anyway, below is a link to an interview with him.  It’s well worth a read and really inspiring.  I’m off to make some clay…

http://www.guidancechannel.com/default.aspx?index=1929&cat=2

Here’s the link to his site about dyslesxia.  He also works with autistic kids.