22:29 - 08.12.05
furniture
Our training supplies arrived yesterday - hundreds of boxes. I think it took the postman an hour to haul everything in. Two candidates called to see if they could book time to come and file their papers for approval. Lucky the documents for that endeavour arrived in the same batch of boxes. I spent some time checking the manifests and trying to figure out what steps I could take to move the next part of the project ahead. We can now work on assigning polling stations based on more current data and that is good new. The voter information cards can't be printed off until that step is complete. That needs to be done by Christmas Eve. Not that long. Thinking of last time we had about 30 people working on that project over a two day period - about 16 hours. I wonder if we can find that many people so close to Christmas who want to spend time labelling those cards.
Spent some time with my tech specialist discussing the logistics, but the breakin yesterday morning really messed up any forward motion. I also spent about an hour working with the technical staff from headquarters around the supper hour trying to get our two printers to work. They have been misfiring from day one of set up and getting worse each day. I told them about the break in and my concern about a breach of security around their systems. I got the feeling that part of the work we did while fixing the printers had more to do with assessing that issue than about the printers themselves. They didn't need that much time to do those simple tasks. I think my AC thought the same thing based on a joke he sent me later.
Reviewing the new maps that Elections Canada sent after they reinstated the two polling divisions they voided is now a critical task, since there were additional polling divisions added in addition to the two voided and apparently several boundary changes were made to other polls. It seemed everytime I tried to sit down and work on it there was someone else wanting to complain or wanting their hand held while they did their job. I know that is a crummy attitude, but lack of respect for my priorities isn't acceptable either. Their workflow is dependent, to a large degree, in my being able to make conditions favorable so they can move forward. The constant foot dragging harms them even more than me but they can't seem to think about the project other than one day at a time.
This morning the pressure was greatest at the beginning of the day, but a lot fo that was self inflicted. Each pair of panthose I put on sprang an enormous hole in a place that was visible ata about the time the waistline was reached. Fortuneately it was warm enough that heat wasn't a reason for wearing them - just decorum when one is the "boss". Stopped at the store to try and pick up a proper map to use for comparing the new maps with the old and also to grab the stockings at the same time. Arrived at the office at 9:01 to find the furniture rental van waiting for us. Bonus. The one male was really crowding me in at the door so I couldn't even see or move enough in my purse to find my keys. That has happened a lot lately - males getting too close and it was the theme again today. Don't like it. Again there was the constant "I want.." thing going on with the staff but today instead of trying to accommodate each person as they lined up I just told them all that they would have to wait. When my assistant wandered in to advocate for a couple of them I just noted that I didn't have time to babysit anyone at the moment. They were offered their positions on the basis that I felt they were capable of doing the work. I think that finally sank in. It could also be that everyone was focussed on arranging their work areas to suit themselves too I suppose. Being able to sit down and work on paperwork at the level of a desk may have been a reason for greater contentment too.
I tried to catch up on emails and phone calls - all those ones missed because of the secrity issues yesterday. I received final approval for the cost of the new quote for an alarm system followed immediately after by approval to get the cleaing completed that I had requested over a week ago. Good thing since it is already done, eh? Next up another call from one of the community relations guys. The media wanted to know when we would be visiting certain spots for the youth campaign. Well given I've only really had phone service for a couple of days and that there has been no material received to carry out that campaign before yesterday, I really couldn't say. My own feeling is that a blitz at the beginning of the new year might be more effective anyway. Our phones are so quiet that it is clear that very few people are raeally paying attention to things electoral right now. After the holidays any work we do will likely have a much greater profile in people's minds. For one thing we will be advertising the event in the same year that it occurs.
I worked on staffing and on training early in the day then switched over to getting myself organized around the desk and filing cabinet I received. Amazing how much easier things are when one doesn't have to work through paperwork sitting in piles on the floor just to find something. One candidate arrived mid afternoon to file his papres but they are a mess. Unless he can pull some things together for me early tomorrow, I may have to get him to start at the beginning again. Not good for either of us. Got him out the door with a team working on validating the names submitted. Really sloppy work all told but I think they wanted their names to be first on the list of filers. Talk to them early in the morning to see what I can do to get them through the process successfully. Just got that under control when a gentleman walked in to see me. He is heading up the Irai vote that is due next week in our city. They have offices just across the street and he said it would mean increased police presence in the area. The timing is great given what happened to us yesterday. He talked about his work a bit with respect to international initiatives and I told him about mine. He had been in policing before getting in to that line of work so the way he thought about approaching and solving problems was fascinating. Not what I would do, but then again I have never had to try enforcement of the law - just administration. He invited me to visit their operation over the course of the voting and I really hope I can find the time to do it.
The evening was very quiet - too quiet. I called Ottawa to tell them that I felt maybe there was a problem with our telephone system. There were just no calls for about six hours. That just isn't normal. They started testing lines immediately, trying to determine where the system was hanging fire. Drove my trainers for revising the voter's list crazy. Can't say I blame them. Their phones going off ringing one after another was very distracting to the class they were trying to teach. The problem was they were half way through their presentation and moving all their teaching materials didn't make sense - even if we had had the space. Guess it's just the way the work is going to unfold this time around. I'm getting serious about those packages of antidepressants being included in our shipments. I might need one sometime between now and the election.
�
�
