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Every Day Is Goof-Off-At-Work Day At the US Patent and Trademark Office
McGruber writes An internal investigation by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office found that some of its 8,300 patent examiners repeatedly lied about the hours they were putting in and many were receiving bonuses for work they did not do. While half of the USPTO's Patent Examiners work from home full time, oversight of the telework program — and of examiners based at the Alexandria headquarters — was "completely ineffective," investigators concluded. The internal investigation also unearthed another widespread problem. More than 70 percent of the 80 managers interviewed told investigators that a "significant" number of examiners did not work for long periods, then rushed to get their reviews done at the end of each quarter. Supervisors told the review team that the practice "negatively affects" the quality of the work. "Our quality standards are low," one supervisor told the investigators. "We are looking for work that meets minimal requirements." Patent examiners review applications and grant patents on inventions that are new and unique. They are experts in their fields, often with master's and doctoral degrees. They earn at the top of federal pay scale, with the highest taking home $148,000 a year.
Congress will goof off for 3 months, then rush to pretend like they were investigating it.
Keep watching, you will learn a lot.
I foresee nobody losing their job, except the snitches. Government work.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
I used to work at the patent office, and I can tell you the article doesn't quite understand the way the office works. Examiners are required to get a very specific amount of cases done for the hours they work or they are fired. They seriously total up the hours worked and require X number of cases done based on it. At worst what is happening is that people are slacking off at the beginning of a quarter and then working extra at the end to make up for it. But it's not like they never do any work. If someone doesn't make their counts, as they call it, they are pretty quickly in trouble.
So the worst here is that some examiners might be doing a bad job at the end of a quarter because they slacked off at the beginning of it. Even still, there's a lot of other reasons why someone might get less counts at the beginning of a quarter. They might be working on their harder cases early, for example, because they're not up against a deadline. Or they might be hanging on to cases they've worked on just to think them over -- since they aren't really due yet. So it's hard to say what's really going on here. There are definitely some bad examiners but there's no way people are never working or they wouldn't get their counts and they'd be fired.
From the sounds of it, I could do it in the background while at my real job.
It has happened before. Albert Einstein developed the theory of relativity while goofing off at the Swiss Patent Office.
http://xkcd.com/1067/
of why small-government types are not completely out of their fucking gourd.
Size and quality are not, necessarily, related. They assume that small government would be staffed with highly qualified and highly motivated people, yet forget there only about 550 people in the US Congress (Senate+House) and they haven't gotten anything done in years.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
The reason is that it is hard to fire a federal employee is so that the positions are not used to reward political allies and contributors every time someone new is elected.
Oh, I'd imagine that private workers goof off too. The thing is, when they do it jeopardizes whatever project they're involved with, with monetary loss to the company.
In the case of the USPTO... well I'd imagine you've ready some of the stories of the horrific patents that keep getting passed (and how the USPTO claims they're sooooo overburdened). It's the whole country (and some would say other countries as well, see Apple V Samsung) that's suffering from *that* mess
Ever seems to be missing the point. Sure, nearly everybody goofs off occasionally. Have I ever spent most of a work from home day goofing off? Sure. Have I ever dialed into a meeting and played video games because the meeting was totally useless for me? Yup. Ever encompasses many many things.
The thing is, the article isn't about how this one time a guy at the Patent office spent a day goofing off. Its about how goofing off, not doing the work, and then rushing the report is standard operating procedure.
You do get that there is a difference between something that someone did or something that happened and... how business is normally conducted. Like, its one thing to go out for lunch with your coworkers and all get drunk one day....its quite another to do it every day as a matter of course.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
But it is our business when public employees are being paid good money for bad work. I can understand how you believe differently. Wait. I can't. I can see no reason that your belief that the public has no interest in ho the people they are paying to do a job are performing that job.
The fact that you would state something so obviously wrong makes me think that either you have an agenda or are incredibly stupid.
Why is it so hard to only have politicians for a few years, then have them go away?
Really? I'm sorry, but when was the last time any IRS official pulled a gun on someone and told them to hand over their money.
Try not giving them the money. Then you will see.
Why is it so hard to only have politicians for a few years, then have them go away?
If you don't pay, IRS will put a lien on your house. If you still don't pay, the house will be sold — and police (with guns) will arrive to kick you out from it.
Don't be stupid disputing the obvious — all governments world-wide collect revenues at gun-point. It is normal and the only way possible. It just means, the monies thus collected should only be used in situations, where weapons would take place: enforcing laws and fighting foreign enemies.
Corporations don't have the means of coercing people to buy their services, don't even bring them up here.
Again, corporations are not (normally) in a position to coerce anybody to buy their services — only the government is in such a position and its role in our lives must be minimized, not perpetually expanded.
Your link is to a description of some outrage committed by Comcast — which is funny, because the company is a book-case example of crony capitalism: it (and other cable giants) grew out of government's idiocy of giving them monopoly, and their CEO today plays golf with the President.
Corporations are not any nicer, than they have to be — in order to compete. But monopolies — like Comcast — don't have anyone to compete with. And the government is the biggest and harshest monopoly of all. One can cancel their Comcast bill — even if it can be infuriatingly ridiculous. Now try opting out of Social Security...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
> The real problem is that firing an underling reflects poorly on his manager(s). This is also the truth everywhere, of
> course, but in normal enterprises there is this dirty and otherwise reprehensible "profit" to think about, so a bad
> employee can still be fired even if the manager's record gets hurt in the process.
I think you are looking at the wrong problem. Yes, this exists but, I look at it this way:
If there is an underperforming employee who just isn't doing the work, there is, most likely, a problem with THAT employee. It may be one you can work with or fix, but, very likely it is localized; and there is a chance, either way, that replacing him fixes it.
If many employees are not doing the work however, the problem is likely not the employees but a more general systemic issue relating to management or work structure; and replacing the employees will likely be about as effective as rotating your tires because the battery stopped charging.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
They assume that small government would be staffed with highly qualified and highly motivated people
By no means! A small government will attract the same sorts of people; the difference is the evildoers can't hide in the massive, inscrutable cogs of the machinery. Accountability is easier when there are fewer places to pass the buck.
For all of the jokes about the DMV, every time I've been there the workers know their jobs and move things along just fine. Its the folks who couldn't be bothered to make an appointment, didn't bring the right paperwork, or hate the law and are (very loudly) requesting that it not be applied to them who end up spending lots of wasted time at the DMV.