The National Association of Letter Carriers announced today that it is hiring the Lazard Group investment bank, along with former presidential adviser Ron Bloom, to help develop “a viable long-term, pro-growth business plan for the Postal
Service,” according to a news release.
Bloom, who also comes out of the financial sector, is no stranger to troubled enterprises, having worked as President Obama’s “car czar” during the bailout of the auto industry. He went on to serve as assistant to the president for manufacturing policy, but recently left his White House post for family reasons, according to news reports.
Bloom also has long-standing ties to the United Steelworkers. While Lazard and organized labor might look like an odder fit, NALC President Fredric Rolando said that the union has had some prior dealings with Lazard and liked what it had done.
In a conference call with reporters, Rolando made clear that the overall goal is to come up with a bullish alternative to the cost-cutting agenda–such as eliminating most Saturday delivery–that the Postal Service is pursuing to deal with a plunge in revenue. Not clear, however, is precisely what Lazard and Bloom are supposed to produce (a report, legislative proposals?), how quickly they might produce it and how much it will cost the union.
“I really couldn’t tell you exactly how this is going to unfold yet,” Rolando said. The move was announced during a national NALC conference on the Postal Service’s financial crisis. The mail carrier’s other three unions are not involved.
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How about getting better customer friendly people that move faster than glacier movement to man the customer service desks and have more than one person at the customer service desk during the lunch hour when everyone is trying to get stuff done.
Honestly, you can fire half of the postal workers and very few people would see a change in service level. My mail deliver is hit and miss and that is a PO Box.
I’ve been following the drop in revenue for the postal office and I think a new revenue stream would be for added services for listening to how consumers want to be contacted for what respective product. Providing the ability for consumers to tell the post office what they want to hear about and when, a tool that Gryphon Networks provides to their client base and could help the US Post office provide to their client base of both company and consumers. Check out http://www.gryphonnetworks.com/core/ email sales@gryphonnetworks.com with questions, put US Post office / Preference Center in the Subject line.
The NALC hire’s Lazard and Bloom to come up with a proposal or proposal’s that they have no clear or defined mission statement of? To counter the ALREADY defined position of USPS management?………….And no idea of the stated cost involved? I’m a retired letter carrier, and a small business owner. You can’t run a business that way and succeed. In this case I think the old axion is true…….The quickest way to become a millionaire with NO business plan is to start out with 2 million…………… That boat ain’t’ going to float. Thank God I’m outta’ there. Someone please tell Rolando to get a grip and pull his head out of his ‘6’ before he sinks what’s left of the union.
As a 30 year retired letter carrier , I believe it is high time that the Postal Servive get out of the bussiness of politics, and get back to what it used to do best , serving the American people with the greatest mail delivery. Letter Carrier’s have always been rated the number one profession in TRUST by YOU the American people . Let’s get back to serving our patrons again.
Grant- D
Good luck USPS. If the cash for clunkers scheme is any indication of the service you’ll receive from Mr. Bloom, better start looking for new jobs now. Here is a novel idea (and keep in mind, I’m not employed by the USPS): Try listening to what your employees and customers are saying. The bloated management could be pared by half without a drop in service. PM’s are not required in PO’s that have 2 employees. Centralizing operations to larger towns and cities and utilize the small PO’s as satellites would certainly save a few bucks. Last, eliminate standby time. No one should be paid to stand around waiting for work that may or may not be needed.
Being one of those customer service employees at the window I can attest to the fact that when there isn’t a worker on the window they have been pulled off the window to do something else in the mail processing area- either receive a truckload of mail or case box mail or spread mail to the carrier cases. This glacier speed you talk about may be because that particular window clerk has a customer with alot of packages or has international packages which require that each individual customs form be input into the computer. It is only going to get worse as we are being hit by a reduction in staffing and this is all happening right before the holidays. Instead of blaming the poor clerk who has to work at an understaffed window why don’t you contact your congressman or the Postmaster general. They are doing a great job destroying the postal service and are the ones cutting staffing by skewing numbers . It is ludicrous to think that you actually believe the clerks staff their own window. There is a supervisor making the schedules and telling employees to get off the window and do something else behind the scenes. What do you think is behind the window anyway?! It’s an entire building of mail which needs to be passed out individually to carrier cases , parcels which need to be distributed to each route, P O BOX mail, accountable mail (individually distributed),2nd notices to be written up for accountable mail in the 100’s and much more. Also, trucks need to be loaded. Who do you think does all of this work anyway- it is clerks- and you won’t see them on the window- they are working behind the scenes making sure the letter carrier has mail to deliver-