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Monday, April 08, 2002

Revealing statistics contained in Ombuds annual report

From compensation and benefits to personal interactions and quality of work life, more employees are taking the time to tell the Ombuds staff their concerns. In fact, 50 percent of all visitors come to talk about interpersonal relationships and treatment; 36 percent involve employee-supervisor conflict. These one-on-one relationships are often the cause for seeking assistance in categories listed in the annual report as "incivility," "unfairness" or "ethics."

The Ombuds Program Office has had confidentiality as a cornerstone of its operations from its inception, and this is not breached through sharing information on trends with senior management, emphasized Jack Foley, Ombuds Program Office chief of staff, who put together the report.

And management has responded to many of the issues raised, said Foley. Student and postdoc concerns, including those affecting institutional recruiting and retention were the catalyst for the creation of the Student Ombuds Program, designed specifically to reach out to students.

The creation of the Ombuds Small Business Program was the positive outcome of Ombuds staff interaction with regional businesses.

The Ombuds efforts post-Cerro Grande Fire are another aspect of senior management's efforts to help not only Laboratory employees directly affected by the fire, but the communities and businesses affected by it and the Lab's two-week closure.

Some of the other initiatives supported by management include expansion of the Ombuds confidential telephone hotline as a means to discuss concerns about sexual harassment and make appropriate referrals; enlarging the future@lanl.gov electronic mail venue to include "Ask the Director"; and a Department of Energy, complex-wide cooperative effort to address technology transfer concerns.

"The program has grown because both managers and employees value a neutral and confidential resource with which to safely explore options for resolving concerns," said Foley.

The Ombuds Program Office staff impacts annually between 10 and 20 percent of the work force, according to the report. Fully one-third of the visitors seeking assistance from the Ombuds Program are supervisors and managers. The report also shows that technical staff members have increased their use to 52 percent of all visitors assisted by Ombuds staff - a six percent increase over the past year, and that there is a four percent increase in use by those in the specialist staff member series. Usage by other job categories remained the same.

Delving further into demographics, there is "almost an equal number of males and females" who have used the program from its inception, even though females are only one third of the work force. By ethnicity, visitors use the program in proportion to their representation in the work force.

As long as the issues bringing people into the Ombuds Program Office are under the control of the University of California, its services can be accessed by the entire work force, including students, subcontract personnel; members of the community; and those who do, or would like to do, business with the Lab.

To read more detail on the various Ombuds Program Office services, to contact that office or to read the complete annual report, go to http://www.lanl.gov/ombuds/ online or call 5-2837 (OM5-BUDS)

Located in Los Alamos at 113 Central Park Square, the Ombuds office is open from 8 a.m. to 5:30 p.m., Monday through Friday. Special appointment hours may be arranged if needed, said Foley.

--Judy Goldie

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