In Business America today you might hear terms like trust, respect, and integrity in regards to managing and supervising employees. At the post office, the terms that come to mind are harassment, intimidation, fear, threats and coercion. There are several reasons for the Postal Service's heavy-handed approach, and each requires action for the total problem to be corrected.

First, there is an inherent confrontation built into the system, especially in the letter carrier craft. Letter carriers are paid by the minute, and the longer they work the more they get paid. Management, on the other side, is tasked with getting carriers to accomplish the mission in the shortest time possible. Right off the bat, the two sides are at odds with no inherent common mission. However, this inherent confrontation is no reason for the unprofessional treatment of carriers and other postal employees, for there is a professional way to handle the overall situation. Unfortunately, many of today's frontline managers and supervisors are not professional nor do they know how to be professional. Therein lies the underlying problem, and this problem stems from several factors.

The first problem within the problem involves the selection of individuals for supervisory and management positions. In most cases, frontline supervisory positions are filled from craft ranks. In the old days of fifteen years ago, individuals were directly introduced into temporary supervisory positions (204B) after being identified by their superiors as having leadership or managerial abilities. In this system, individuals who proved themselves to be able supervisors would eventually become full-time supervisors. Individuals who didn't prove themselves went back to the craft ranks. In this system perhaps 50 percent would prove themselves and 50 percent would find it wasn't for them and go back to the craft. It wasn't a perfect system, but it was better than today's system. Today, individuals apply directly to the Associate Supervisor Program (ASP). There is no experience required - no introductory trial run to determine if a person shows promise for the job. With the ASP program, individuals are selected based on an interview only. Once selected, most individuals make it through the ASP training program whether they show actual leadership and/or managerial abilities or not, as long as they pass several paper tests along the way. There is usually no "going-back-to-the-craft" in this system. In this system, most all become supervisors - the 50 percent who would actually make good supervisors but also the 50 percent who should have gone back to the craft. With this system, 50 percent of the Postal Service's new supervisors are unqualified to lead from the start. This 50 percent may know the terms and the processes taught in ASP school, but they don't have the social abilities and other intangible qualities needed to lead, manage and supervise other employees. This "50 percent," lacking leadership and managerial qualities, must nevertheless try to do their jobs. But how do they do it? They do it by using their existing personalities, not professional skills. Unfortunately, in this inherently confrontational environment they handle it like confrontations in their personal lives. To be very blunt, some handle it by being "a**holes" and by being "b*tchy," bristling with threats, intimidation and disrespect. That is the only thing they know for such confrontational situations.

Another problem is that this "bad" 50 percent end up training new ASP candidates. Subsequently, these new ASP candidates, both from the potentially good 50 percent and the bad 50 percent, end up learning to supervise by being "a**holes" and by  being "b*tchy. Case in point. In Dallas there is a supervisor known to be abusive and who actually poured hot coffee on a craft employee during a situation. After several months, this supervisor was back on the clock... as an ASP coach training new APS candidates! I had the unfortunate opportunity to work under one of the abusive coach's pupils. She was as arrogant, abusive and abrasive as the coach, and didn't get very far supervising the post office.

Compounding a problem inherent in the ASP program is that individuals are not necessarily tasked with supervising their own craft. For example, in the Dallas area, many former clerks with no letter carrier experience are now supervising letter carriers, despite having little or no knowledge of the job. You might as well hire people off the street, they would have as much success in trying to supervise a job they don't know. For example, at my office, the station manager and morning supervisor are both former clerks and the 204B supervisor is a limited duty carrier from another post office. The manager and supervisor, who are part of the 50 percent that should have gone back to craft, don't really have a clue to what's going on. And they never will. In the several years they have been there, I don't think they have done not even one walking street observation. They instead rely on DOIS in the morning, and then when their plan doesn't go as scheduled, they huff and puff and rant and rave the next day, threatening punishments and removals.

Of course, the situation could be handled professionally, but these two (manager and supervisor) don't know how and they are really too lazy to learn. How could this be handled professionally? Well, first the supervisor gets an accurate count of mail in the morning, and at times if need be, manually count the mail pieces of "problem carriers." This information is input into DOIS. Using the information in DOIS as a guide, the supervisor then insures that carriers leave on time in regards to the mail workload. The supervisor should have already walked with all carriers on their routes, thusly knowing exactly how long each route takes and any special circumstances that could alter delivery times. The supervisor then should know how long the street portion of each carriers' day should take. The next morning the supervisor prints out the 1813 Report (Late Leaving and Returning Report) for the day before, and identifies carriers who were potentially deficient. (Often, the DOIS information is incorrect.) Using the information, the supervisor can see if carriers were potentially deficient in the office, on the street, or both.  Then, the supervisor can determine appropriate actions that are necessary to correct any deficiencies. Corrective actions can be accomplished behind closed doors, in the presence of a union steward, without a lot of ranting, raving and screaming. It's really simple, but it doesn't work that way at many post offices across the land.

Here's how it works at my station. The supervisor gets a morning count of the mail, which is usually made all the harder by all the mail cut back (at management's direction) by the carriers the following days. The supervisor inputs the data into DOIS and tells each carrier when to be back. Many carriers will argue this time, noting that much of the mail is thin and the piece count is wrong. (During this time, the station manager is abrasively warning and threatening the carriers over the intercom and on the workroom floor about their deficiencies.) In the evening many carriers return after their DOIS-appointed times. But because there were no street observations, and the morning mail piece count is in question, the supervisor has no identifiable practice to correct. The next day the whole situation is repeated again, and then again the next day and so on... Management has no control over the situation, and they have no idea how to gain control. So they resort to intimidations and threats that ultimately only undermine their positions even further.

The mentality of such supervisors and managers is sick. A recent comment made by a visiting district official to my post office illustrates the inherent confrontational attitude postal management has to employees. It was in the AM and the carriers were sorting and casing their mail. Some were talking to other carriers and admittedly the carriers were probably talking either too much or too loud or both. Over the loudspeaker, the station manager told the carriers to hold the noise down. Some carriers kept talking, but not as loud. The district official, upon hearing the carriers continuing to talk, tartly said out loud "insurbordination is grounds for removal." Well, technically it is, but do you want to propose termination for this? Sounds a little severe if you ask me.

Overall, my observation is this: If a supervisor or manager utilizes threats, intimidation and coercion then I know that the person does not have the knowledge or abilities to conduct their job professionally. Threats, intimidation and coercion is not a management style, it's a sign of an incompetent manager. If the Postal Service is to one day become known as a professionally-run organization, then its management team must act professionally. Then, with a little respect, craft employees might start acting more professionally, instead of some like little children, and customers might start being treated with a little more respect and professionalism. Currently, the Postal Service's crippling weakness is the weakness of its frontline operational supervisors. The Postal Service must correct these deficiencies to maximize its core, frontline operations.

How can these deficiencies be fixed? It won't be easy, because the problems are institutional and are actually part of the Postal Service's organizational culture.

First, the good, competent people of the Postal Service should be enticed to become managers. Currently and unfortunately, for many of these good, competent people, management is the last place they want to subject themselves to. At least in my area, management has largely become a joke. In fact, I know more than a few people who have quit supervising and returned to the craft because it has become such a joke. Somehow, becoming a manager should be a good thing, not a dastardly deed where it's been said you have to sell your soul to the devil for admittance to the ranks. Likewise, good and competent people are hired each day into the Postal Service. Some would make good supervisors and managers in the Postal Service. But many of these new hires, seeing the threats and intimidation by current managers, gravitate to the union side and ultimately become union stewards and other leaders in postal unions.

Second, individuals should not be selected to the Associate Supervisor Program without proven, part-time supervisory experience in the post office. Currently, there is an Officer in Charge program that allows managers to be temporary postmasters in preparation to becoming full-time postmasters. Similarly, like in the old days of fifteen years ago, interested individuals should be placed in temporary supervisory roles to determine their suitability for the position. This performance should be the number one factor in determining entrance to the ASP school, not an interview where the person with the biggest breasts is selected (which has happened).

Third, instructors and coaches in the ASP school should be above reproach. Managers with a history of abuses or who have a number of grievances and/or EEOs filed against them should be restricted from participating in the program.

Fourth, I would like to see moral leadership expounded upon in the Postal Service. I would like to see qualities and traits such as integrity, respect, bearing, and unselfishness extolled. It would be a welcome addition to what I have seen.  What have I seen? It makes me want to puke. It was in the days of VP George Lopez's days when I was a supervisor, before I returned to the craft for good. The married Dallas postmaster at the time, who had been brought in by Lopez, was having an affair with a prominent Dallas USPS public affairs employee. One of the area managers was sleeping with her male secretary. She was also sleeping with another area manager who happened to be married. He (the other area manager) was sleeping with his handpicked (light-duty) ASP candidate who shouldn't have been selected at all but who quickly became a station manager herself, much to the protestations of some competent supervisors who had held their positions for ten years or more. Now, no one is perfect, and I have plenty of shortcomings myself, but these people's ethics were not much better when managing their employees and areas of operations. It would be nice to see some "upstanding" people in local management for a change.

(This paper is critical of some supervisors and managers and craft employees. To be sure, there are many supervisors, managers and craft employees who are honest, hard working, competent and professional. I would like to note that the current Dallas Postmaster [Pat Williams] is competent and professional and I suspect she can't be very happy with some of the people she must rely and depend upon to help accomplish Dallas post office goals.)

Fifth, the Postal Service, at an organizational (top) level, should promote systemwide the importance of professionalism in the workplace. This effort would need to come from the top, and trickle down through every level of the Postal Service to where professionalism becomes the culture of the USPS. With that, costly grievances and EEOs would be reduced, the use of sick leave would be reduced, violence in the workplace would be reduced, productivity just might increase, and the Postal Service's public reputation would be repaired.