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REPORT ON THE ACTIVITIES
OF THE 2003-2004 STAFF COMMITTEE
AUGUST 2003
This document contains a summary of the
activities of the 2003-2004 Staff Committee in the month of August and a
few notices of interest to staff.
Meeting of the Staff Committee with the
Secretary General’s Chief of Staff
A meeting was held on Friday, August 1,
between the members of the 2003-2004 Staff Committee and Mr. Fernando
Jaramillo, Chief of Staff of the Secretary General, in the Secretary
General’s offices. Taking part in this meeting were the following members
of the 2003-2004 Staff Committee: René L. Gutiérrez (Chair), Miguel A.
Merino (Vice Chair), Gladys Berly, Juan Carlos García, Carlos Humud, Raúl
Plata, Lucrecia Zea-Yonker and Ana María Lemos and Aída M. Rothe (alternate
members). See also Staff News #10.
Agreement on the use of the OAS logo
The Committee authorized the President of
the Staff Association to sign the agreement on the use of the OAS logo.
This logo will be used on articles to be put on sale in our Gift Shop. A
seed fund will be available to get this project underway and various
fund-raising options are being studied. The agreement was signed on August
21, in the presence of the Assistant Secretary for Management, acting on
behalf of the Secretary General.
Contributions to the Association
The President proposed keeping up efforts
to obtain more members and ensure that existing members keep up to date
with their contributions. In order to attract new members and offer
additional benefits, an effort will be made to obtain special discounts in
restaurants and other places of interest to the staff.
At the same time, a “Friends of the
Association” group could be formed to solve the problem of some employees
who are not members because of “conflicts of interest.” This arrangement
would allow them to contribute and, at the same time, benefit from the
perks that the Association provides for its contributors.
Loyalty Benefit
The President reported that we currently
have 369 paying members and that the Life Insurance (“Loyalty Benefit”)
would bring in more as well as induce payments by those in arrears. He
suggested starting this benefit with US$2,000 (two thousand dollars), per
member. To form this “Loyalty Benefit” fund, one suggestion is to use
US$10,000 (ten thousand dollars) of Staff Association resources as a seed
fund, to be built up with monthly payments averaging US$2 from each
contributing member of the Association, without any need to increase the
current percentage membership quota.
The Association would send each of its
members a form to fill in when presenting an updating request. That form
would indicate the name or names of the beneficiary(ies), in the event of
the contributor’s decease. This would take effect from the moment the form
is signed. This benefit would expire when the staff member concerned
retires, stops contributing, or fails to pay the updated contribution to
the Staff Association. If no beneficiary exists, the benefit could go to
the Terry Woods Foundation, which is a fund benefiting all personnel. It
was also decided to adjust contributions automatically every August.
Weekend activities
Raúl Plata met with Magaly Rothe, in their
capacity as members of the Events Subcommittee, to work on a directory of
the most appealing restaurants in the Washington area. He said another idea
would be to present for each weekend a list of amusing things to do. He
said enquiries were also being made with other international organizations,
such as PAHO, the IDB, and the World Bank about the possibilities of
joining their “Happy Hour” celebrations.
Tribute
Nubia González requested a special tribute
for Vanessa Redington, the daughter of our colleague Gala Redington, as she
has been helping the Christmas Party Subcommittee for the past 10 years.
The Committee agreed and Vanessa will receive public recognition and a
diploma at the celebration.
Work Plan
Gladys Berly handed the Committee’s Work
Plan for 2003-2004 to those present at the meeting. As proposed at the
previous meeting, this plan contains the four items of most concern to this
Committee: the Evaluation System, Continuous Contracts, Harassment in the
Workplace, and the Management Study. This Work Plan was discussed and it
was suggested that the members of each subcommittee should be included.
As regards the Evaluations System, a
survey is being prepared, which will be sent to OAS personnel on September
5. Later, the winner of the raffle used as an incentive to elicit replies
to the survey will be announced during the celebration of Dr. Leo S. Rowe,
on September 17.
With respect to continuous contracts, the
President was urged to ensure compliance with the outcomes of each of the
processes and to report to the Committee on a regular basis.
As for Harassment in the Workplace, it was
agreed to set dates for the subcommittee to present progress reports to the
Committee for possible forwarding to the Secretary General. Before
concluding discussion of this topic, the President announced that Mr.
Milton Castillo had donated five books on harassment in the workplace to
the subcommittee, as reference material.
With respect to the Management Study, no
subcommittee had yet been formed on the subject. It was then installed as
follows: René Gutierrez, Gladys Berly, Juan Carlos García and Miguel Angel
Merino. It was agreed that the first step would be to request a meeting
with the consulting firm of Messrs. Deloitte & Touche.
Vacancy and reclassification announcements
The President said that staff had already
been told the difference between an internal and external competition. As
regards reclassifications, he said that the fact that these posts are now
announced as open to competition is due to a petition to that effect by the
Staff Association some years back. This step was taken in order to do away
with favoritism and achieve greater transparency in the process. However,
we should ask the Secretary General not to make reclassified positions
subject to open competition. We could also request that when a position is
announced, it should also be stated whether a candidate exists for the job.
AROAS
The President said he had had a meeting
with the Chair of AROAS, Domingo Acevedo, who offered to provide legal
advice to the Staff Committee. The President indicated that the “Loyalty
Benefit” idea was going to be forwarded to the members of AROAS for them to
examine the idea and how it might be implemented.
Meeting with Deloitte & Touche
According to plan, the members met to
discuss the topics to be addressed with the representatives of Deloitte &
Touche, before they arrived. Then the President welcomed the three
representatives of that firm and asked each of the members of the Committee
to introduce themselves. Once the introductions were over, Deloitte &
Touche’s Gregg Prillaman commented that he had already spoken to over 400
people about what the firm was working on and not working on in the
Organization, about the financial projects, the financial process, and the
technological means at its disposal. He said member states were keen to
raise OAS productivity; that is why they had hired the consulting firm and
why it would have to present the Management Study to propose some solution.
He said that the firm had already handed in a summary to the Consultative
Committee in order for the Committee to say whether the firm was moving in
the right direction; apparently, the Committee thought it was.
Consequently, they now had to submit an analysis, followed by a
recommendation, indicating what was being done well and what needed to be
changed.
Then a number of different topics were
addressed such as the lack of funds, reclassifications, priorities, staff
training, the budget, the Offices of the General Secretariat away from
headquarters, etc.
At the end of the meeting, the
representatives of Deloitte & Touche asked what we, as a Committee,
expected to find in the report they would submit. They were asked to be
transparent and fair and to place the issues in a healthy context .
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