The End of QWL/EI for Rural Carriers
The announcement came as no surprise for me because of the abuse of the process by both craft and management. The process needed to be a consensus process as was originally designed. The process when used as intended is a way for management and craft to opt in to getting questions answered and problems solved and bridge barriers brought on by lack of contact with those in charge of the office.
This process is golden in work environments where management has a large contingent of employees and has little time to address the issues that arise on the work room floor and small offices that need outside intervention to moderate personality conflicts that can cause great stress when there isn’t an outlet for both.
The process served as counseling, information exchange, training, and postal modernization. Small things like Spanish 3849’s, stamp order envelopes that replace blank envelopes often lost in the mails by unthinking customers and educating craft and management in the use of the Rural Carrier Matrix and edit sheets. Improvement of parking practices of LLV’s would probably not have come without the QWL/EI program to facilitate improved conditions in our offices when people weren’t panicked by extending their day another 1/2 to one hour into the heat of the summer or the darkness of the christmas package season. Why not meet at the end of everyone’s shift? Carriers on different sized routes come in at different hours, and many want to go home after being an industrial athlete for 3-5 hours ending their day mentally and physically exhausted.
In some instances it became a forum for management want-to-be’s to show their skills at controlling fellow craft members to impress managers with their ability to control their fellow craft members in the meetings. This alone blocked members from participation because they were often controlled out of the process but even with that it still served a purpose to solve problems because those individuals couldn’t help but improve something in the name of recognition and served the process well.
After the shootings brought on in the eighties and nineties showing the high disconnect between management and craft the QWL/EI process was instrumental in holding overbearing management to eye to eye contact to their employees as a group with outside participation reducing the stress brought on by the lack of accountability in the management arena.
It often provided the only medium for management to learn the contract and for employees to participate in a forum where everyone was on an equal basis of information sharing.
Letter carriers work very hard for the money and deserve at the very minimum what the contract guarantees each carrier. Cutbacks usually precede periods of heavy inflation and modernization making the carrier that much more important to delivery of the postal products in the recovery periods.
This begs the question are we back to those kind of stresses and those kind of sweetheart deals where smoke screens and sweetheart deals nullify the spirit of the contract to give everyone an equal right to benefits and seniority rights? Is management accountable to all carriers by conscientiously abiding by the contract? Can we implement a replacement for the process that will give voice to those who need to know that the USPS is not going to return to policies that corner employees to the point of losing all hope and going postal on their fellow employees and management?
Is there some replacement that will allow those who see a way of improving on procedures, customer support and security for all who work there so we can at least work together as a postal team under one roof. If we regress then the terrorists are not our only concern, there are many forms of terrorism and some of the most insidious kind is practiced skillfully in the good old USPS.
Bible Study
This will give you the chills……..GOOD chills.
A young man had been to Wednesday night Bible Study.
The Pastor had shared about listening to God and obeying the Lord’s voice.
The young man couldn’t help but wonder, “Does God still speak to people?”
After service he went out with some friends for coffee and pie and they discussed the message.
Several different ones talked about how God had led them in different ways.
It was about ten o’clock when the young man started driving home. Sitting in his car, he just began to pray, “God…If you still speak to people speak to me. I will listen. I will do my best to obey.”
As he drove down the main street of his town, he had the strangest thought to stop and buy a gallon of milk.
He shook his head and said out loud, “God is that you?” He didn’t get a reply and started on toward home.
But again, the thought, buy a gallon of milk.
The young man thought about Samuel and how he didn’t recognize the voice of God, and how little Samuel ran to Eli.
“Okay, God, in case that is you, I will buy the milk.” It didn’t seem like too hard a test of obedience. He could always use the milk. He stopped and purchased the gallon of milk and started off toward home.
As he passed Seventh Street, he again felt the urge, “Turn Down that street.”
This is crazy he thought and drove on past the intersection.
Again, he felt that he should turn down Seventh Street.
At the next intersection, he turned back and headed down Seventh.
Half jokingly, he said out loud, “Okay, God, I will”.
He drove several blocks, when suddenly, he felt like he should stop. He pulled over to the curb and looked around. He was in semi commercial area of town. It wasn’t the best but it wasn’t the worst of neighborhoods either. The businesses were closed and most of the houses looked dark like the people were already in bed.
Again, he sensed something, “Go and give the milk to the people in the house across the street.” The young man looked at the house. It was dark and it looked like the people were either gone or they were already asleep. He started to open the door and then sat back in the car seat.
“Lord, this is insane. Those people are asleep and if I wake them up, they are going to be mad and I will look stupid.” Again, he felt like he should go and give the milk.
Finally, he opened the door, “Okay God, if this is you, I will go to the door and I will give them the milk. If you want me to look like a crazy person, okay. I want to be obedient. I guess that will count for something but if they don’t answer right away, I am out of here.”
He walked across the street and rang the bell. He could hear some noise inside. A man’s voice yelled out, “Who is it? What do you want?” Then the door opened before the young man could get away.
The man was standing there in his jeans and T-shirt. He looked like he just got out of bed. He had a strange look on his face and he didn’t seem too happy to have some stranger standing on his doorstep. “What is
it?”
The young man thrust out the gallon of milk, “Here, I brought this to you.” The man took the milk and rushed down a hallway.
Then from down the hall came a woman carrying the milk toward the kitchen. The man was following her holding a baby. The baby was crying. The man had tears streaming down his face.
The man began speaking and half crying, “We were just praying. We had some big bills this month and we ran out of money. We didn’t have any milk for our baby. I was just praying and asking God to show me how to get some milk.”
His wife in the kitchen yelled out, “I ask him to send an Angel with some. Are you an Angel?”
The young man reached into his wallet and pulled out all the money he had on him and put in the man’s hand. He turned and walked back toward his car and the tears were streaming down his face.
He knew that God still answers prayers.
THIS IS A SIMPLE TEST….? If you believe that God is alive and well, send this to at least ten people and the person that sent it to you!!!!!!!!
This is so true. Sometimes it’s the simplest things that God asks us to do that cause us, if we are obedient to what He’s asking, to be able to hear His voice more clear than ever. Please listen, and obey! It will bless you (and the world). Phil 4:13 This is an easy test, you score 100 or zero. It’s your choice.
If you aren’t ashamed to do this, please follow the directions. Jesus
said, “If you are ashamed of me, I will be ashamed of you before my
Father.”
Not ashamed Pass this on .
Is This How The Postal Service Saves Manhours?
Comment here about your experiences with self management. The dynamics of getting relief through teamwork and how difficult it is to get some subs in to help fill the gaps.