From Federal News Network:
… SSA Commissioner Frank Bisignano told managers in a largely unscripted 90-minute address Wednesday that he has no plans for a Reduction in Force, but said AI will be a “great enabler” that helps employees handle a growing workload with its lowest headcount in 50 years.
“I have no intent to RIF people,” Bisignano told managers. “If I wake up and find out we can do all our work with 20,000 people — which I can’t see that right now — we’ll be 20,000. If I wake up and say, ‘We need 80,000,’ we’ll be 80,000. I’ve got to determine what the right staffing level is.” …
“We’ve got a lot of turmoil. I think we reassigned a lot of people,” Bisignano said. “I guarantee you, we’re going to get the job done, and my dream is to not have to let people go,” Bisignano said. “If we can’t get the job done, that’s a different problem. You guys don’t want people who don’t give an honest day’s work for an honest day’s pay, do you?” …
When it comes to rolling out new tools, Bisignano said his first tech priority is to deploy AI on the agency’s phone lines.
“The phone has to have artificial intelligence to do the work. We can all do this in a year, and then your jobs will be more enriching,” he said. “The reason we get so many phone calls is because half the people have to call twice.” …
Bisignano said he’s open to asking the Trump administration money for IT modernization, or more employees to lead his tech modernization plans, if the agency doesn’t already have the resources to do it. …
“A previous commissioner likes to talk about why we’re going to break this thing — why this thing can’t work. ‘It’s like the least amount of people we’ve ever had, it must break,’” Bisignano said. “You can’t just throw stuff out with me and make something up.” …
There’s a lot one could say about this. There’s the casual assumption that technology will save the day when’s there’s zero proof that it will or that you can afford it if it can. I’ve had the misfortune of trying to deal with a couple of large financial institutions lately. Whatever AI they were using was little more than annoying. Want to know account balance or payment due? They may be able to help you with AI. Anything else, forget it. Can anyone point me to ANY large institution that has a well functioning AI system that really does the job of answering their phones for anything other than the simplest transactions? He completely underestimates just how complex the calls coming in to Social Security actually are. The insinuation that employees aren’t giving an honest day’s work doesn’t endear you to agency employees who are working their tails off. He’s spouting off as if he understands the work and the workers when he doesn’t.
"AI" is the biggest scam in a world that is flush with them. There is potential for assistance but in general, the technology **is not there yet.**
ReplyDeleteEveryone who has ever called a business knows how frustrating it is to deal with robotic voices that might understand some of your words but cannot effectuate anything. We need people to do the work of the American people!
Compare his remarks to employees to his TV interview on Fox where his audience is 1 person (Trump). Which one is the real Frank? All things considered, consider the SSA staff a gaslighting session, the TV interview more of the truth.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.foxbusiness.com/video/6373170593112
The former leadership cited the concept of avoiding "analysis paralysis" to justify inflicting untested and inadvisable changes on staff and beneficiaries. This was a marked shift from a former policy of prudent testing and planning prior to deciding to adopt a change. Questions like "will this actually work" and "how might this hurt beneficiaries" that used to be asked before any change, are no longer that important. The policy staff who used to ask and study such questions are reportedly mostly gone now or re-assigned.
ReplyDeleteThe new Commissioner appears to be committed to heavy AI phone reliance before studying and testing if it will work and whether it might hurt beneficiaries. He appears unaware or unconcerned about the current AI phone bot debacle at SSA, where the AI bot frequently misdirects callers and fails to correctly answer their questions. Ironically, the only way for many callers to ultimately address their issues is to repeatedly tell the AI bot that they need to speak to an agent (a human).
I'll coin a new phrase, "analysis callousness." It represents a disdain for analyzing and testing the likely effects of a course of action before implementing it. It treats people who will be impacted by the change, in this case the public, as guinea pigs, with little concern for the hardship that the untested and unstudied change may cause them.
“I have no intent to RIF people,” Bisignano told managers. “If I wake up and find out we can do all our work with 20,000 people — which I can’t see that right now — we’ll be 20,000. If I wake up and say, ‘We need 80,000,’ we’ll be 80,000. I’ve got to determine what the right staffing level is.”
ReplyDeleteHe’s about to find out real quick that reporting to a boardroom is vastly different than reporting to Congress. If O’Malley, a career politician, couldn’t muster up enough support to provide SSA a budget big enough to do a mass hiring up to 80k employees, Frank has absolutely zero shot. He’s in the “find out” stage of “fuck around and find out”
I don't think his "intent" matters one iota. When the administration tells him to RIF people, he will get in line and do it!
DeleteMay 22 is the last day for commenting on the Schedule F proposal. As soon as tomorrow, Schedule F could be formalized thru an EO and in turn, SSA staff could be reclassified and fired for a pre-holiday Friday surprise. The WH and Vought control SSA staffing, not Bisignano.
DeleteThe problem with guys like Bisignano is that they're insulated from the "FO" part of "FAFO," so they're only ever around for the "FA."
DeleteHe is nearly a billionaire. He will benefit from capital-gains tax loopholes for his stint as Commissioner even if he quits tomorrow. If (when) he fails to deliver on promises to increase efficiency while improving public service, he and his other cronies have an endless queue of excuses to protect their egos:
"Biden left so much fraud, waste, and abuse, we couldn't save SSA."
"We right-sized the workforce, but were still sabotaged by deep-state bureaucrats."
"Congressional Democrats obstructed our agenda."
"Fake news. Everything's great, and the only people complaining are the fraudsters."
All this is crap, obviously, but the Administration's supporters are hard-wired to accept it. Bisignano can just break stuff, leave, and slink back to the shadows of the finance world. What's Saul doing these days? Did he run back to his father's investment firm? Nobody cares, but he's still filthy rich, and still funneling obscene amounts of money to the Trump Administration.
I wonder if Frank will reinstate telework for all since he claims to favor virtual work. He appears to be teleworking himself. If ALJs and OHO are more productive, so are many other agency components.
ReplyDeleteNo... He clearly stated that because he works all week and on Sat and Sunday too and gets up at 4 am, he will work from home so he can have work life balance and take his 15 yr old kid to baseball.... However, he explained that he expects in office work for all SSA staff because we need to build working relationships with one another. Still wants us to have work life balance. But don't take off too much.. this is pretty close to verbatim
DeleteHe was clear, not reinstating telework.
DeleteI would be stunned for a couple reasons.
DeleteFirst, Bisignano is a Project 2025 fundamentalist, and he and Vought agree that rank-and-file employees (private and public) are best motivated when they fear for their jobs and are constantly reminded that they're inferior and expendable.
Second, Bisignano was asked multiple questions about telework during the Senate confirmation process. He responded, word for word:
"If confirmed, I will expect SSA to work in the office. I am a deep believer in innovation, collaboration, and the other positive outcomes that are driven by in-office work."
Like most CEOs who slash/burn/delegate, Bisignano has only a very basic, high-level understanding of what his inferiors do. He hasn't bothered to learn which SSA jobs require in-person service, which ones require significant collaboration in an office setting, and which ones can be done in isolation and from anywhere. If he did care to learn those nuances, there's been no indication that he would go against the Republican orthodoxy and make telework exceptions for practical reasons.
The fact that Bisignano and other appointees work remotely while bashing the concept of remote work is a horrible look, but it won't dissuade them. They come from the private sector, where CEOs make rules that only the worker bees follow.
Frank works for the taxpayers not for his stock holders. Adjust or get out.
DeleteEvery big fish in a little pond thinks its a whale. Lets see how he swims with the big fish
ReplyDeleteThe expectation that employees are “disciples” to Frank is deeply disturbing.
ReplyDeleteAnd here I thought he was just one of the greediest sacks of human garbage on the planet. Now I learn he’s also one of the dumbest, which makes sense given his educational history and career in finance- the bloated industry whose sole purpose throughout the modern era has been to provide lazy white men of subaverage intelligence with a way to siphon money off those who actually work and produce things of value to society.
ReplyDeleteI think you’re a bit behind the times about diversity in financial services. Comments like these are not helpful
DeleteAs someone who worked at a teleservice center and who endlessly heard callers complain about the phone prompts just wait till AI takes over and just drones on and on with prompts designed to get people to hang up.
ReplyDeleteSo everyone of us who took reassignment under threat of being RIFed was lied too.
ReplyDeleteAre you shocked?
DeleteIt was a risk either way. Do you now wish a RIF upon those who stuck it out?
DeleteNo, basically everything from the mouths of Trump and his stooges is a lie. Whether any of those lies happens to come true at a future date is purely coincidence.
DeleteNo you didn’t. He literally said by implication he was willing to lay off more than half the agency (“If 20,000 gets the job done . . .”).
DeleteVoluntary reassignments were done under duress and as such are not legally binding. All should be null and void and SSA need to go back to pre-January internal structure. Support of the RO staffs are vital and need to be restored now. We are dying out here in the field. Please help us!!!
ReplyDeleteAI was tried. Our decision tree overwhelmed it. Let's see how Frank works out.
ReplyDelete