PsychotI've seen it in every type of organization: military, government, non-profit, and private sector. If you make middle managers' careers dependent on metrics, they will inevitably find a way to game the metrics. But as SD70 said, it's hard to blame them if their continued employment depends on it.
At ANY LEVEL where metrics will be the criteria for one's job performance - the metrics will be 'managed' to any and all extents possible.
With CSX, since EHH was the boss and could not get the established metrics to tell the story he wanted, he canned those metrics and created his own.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
Sales manager: So how is the new sales associate working out?
Sales associate: He is really difficult to work with and disruptive of our team. Anytime he disagrees with you, he tells you to "go jump in the lake!" If we tell him that we will discuss his disruptive behavior with you, he says that you can go jump in the lake.
Sales manager: Hmm, let me look up his record. It shows here than since joining us a month ago, he has sold 5 million dollars worth of our company product. I don't know how you and your fellow team members feel, but my take is that for the money he is bringing in, I can always go buy a new suit.
If GM "killed the electric car", what am I doing standing next to an EV-1, a half a block from the WSOR tracks?
I've seen it in every type of organization: military, government, non-profit, and private sector. If you make middle managers' careers dependent on metrics, they will inevitably find a way to game the metrics. But as SD70 said, it's hard to blame them if their continued employment depends on it.
BaltACDMy contacts that are still working indicate PSR broke all those measurement systems.
Yep. Same at NS. Now that Sanborn is there, they are relearning what a lot of us knew before the PSR guys showed up. Sigh...
-Don (Random stuff, mostly about trains - what else? http://blerfblog.blogspot.com/)
It happens, but not very often. It happened A LOT just after the Conrail split since the old-NS system and remnant of the CR system still in use got out of sync.
Misrouted cars are a thing that's measured.
Up until the PSR folk took over NS, NS cared about which train a car departed on after classification. You send it out on the wrong train - missed connection - period.
When a car departs on the wrong train, the classification system will find a new route to get it where it's going and a new trip plan will be generated. If the classification system can't find a route (really rare), it gets send to a queue to see why and fix the problem.
Many of them originated in various places down south, and trust me they are not missed in the great white north, Montreal already has enough mafia problems.
As for gaming the system and fudging numbers, all the stories you hear are true. Cars would get dragged out of the yard so the scanner would show them leaving, only for it to mysteriously miss them re-entering the same yard a few minutes later.
I can't say I blame the low level supervisors who use these sort of tactics, all too often they are told to improve the numbers or else, and if they don't the 'mafia' will find someone who will....
Greetings from Alberta
-an Articulate Malcontent
My contacts still employed by CSX refer to the post EHH days at being invaded by the Canadian Mafia. That use mafia style tactics, with the 'hit men' putting their 'bodies' on the unemployment rolls instead of cemetries.
Sometime in the past few months; I seem to recollect a piece of equipment destined to either a museum or historical group in Ohio; managed to make something like four passes by the Elkhart, IN Virtual Railfan webcam before NS finally got it all figured out.
CW
Shadow the Cats owner Literally having cars 60 miles away sent back 500 miles because it made a yard masters stats look better.
I've heard stories of cars shuttling back and forth between two points because no one knew what to do with them...
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
I can tell you this much from being a customer for a pair of railroads that practice PSR in the real world what it means. The BNSF were the majority of our resins come from has met our expectations as much as possible. The UP and NS however they play such games with the metrics of when and where our cars are in their systems and just when we can expect to get them interchanged to the BNSF for the UPs case and on the NS just when they're going to be here at all. Literally having cars 60 miles away sent back 500 miles because it made a yard masters stats look better. Or as it's happened several times on the UP sending them on a round robin of their system to avoid dwell time. We literally had 5 cars shipped out of Houston for Kansas city end up being interchanged in freaking Seattle. Just how good is PSR in our eyes as a customer.
tree68 BaltACD My contacts that are still working indicate PSR broke all those measurement systems. I would opine that it's because they didn't contribute enough to the bottom line... Providing quality service costs money.
BaltACD My contacts that are still working indicate PSR broke all those measurement systems.
I would opine that it's because they didn't contribute enough to the bottom line...
Providing quality service costs money.
CSX was reporting a standard set of metrics to the STB that were originated out of their service deficiencies steming from the ConRail acquisition in 1999. Shortly after EHH got on the property those metrics were sh.tcanned and he implemented his own set. Not having worked with the EHH metrics I have no idea what or how well they are measuring anything.
As we are well aware the past five years in the country have been rife with all manner of lying and obstruction of factual information from all levels of society.
daveklepperPsychat: I'm certain BNSF's managemenyt has some very good answers to that question. Again, judging by results, including shipper evalluations, not just stock prices, PSR isn't PSR. All good railroading should be Precision Scheduled. Every car should have a specific trip plan, and modern computer technology makes that feasible and doable. What people call PSR is really Assett Utilization Railroading. I believe BNSF is still trying to be Customer Responsive Railroading. I hope they continue. With every car having a trip plan.
Again, judging by results, including shipper evalluations, not just stock prices, PSR isn't PSR. All good railroading should be Precision Scheduled. Every car should have a specific trip plan, and modern computer technology makes that feasible and doable.
What people call PSR is really Assett Utilization Railroading. I believe BNSF is still trying to be Customer Responsive Railroading. I hope they continue. With every car having a trip plan.
While the implementation of PSR happened after I retired. While I was working CSX did have trip plans for every manifest car on the system. The measure of all those individual trip plans was the metric 'Right Car/Right Train'. RCRT was then coupled with the performance of scheduled trains in maintaining their schedules.
Bulk Commodity trains ran to their own individual trip plans.
My contacts that are still working indicate PSR broke all those measurement systems.
Dave; unless something has changed in the two years since I retired, each of the Class 1's create trip plans for every shipment. Keeping a shipment moving according to that plan is where the railroads generally tend to fall short. And psr has done nothing to improve that if one accepts the adherence to plan metrics the railroads themselves make public.
Psychat: I'm certain BNSF's managemenyt has some very good answers to that question.
MidlandMike Psychot It's very useful to have a privately-owned Class 1 like BNSF around because it provides a measuring stick to compare long-term vs. short-term investing mentalities. While BNSF is certainly using some PSR principles, it also seems to be focusing more on marketing and customer service. BNSF is owned by Berkshare-Hathaway, which has stockholders. The largest stockholder, Warren Buffett, is easing into retirement, and his hand picked replacement is asking BNSF why they aren't more like the other PSR railroads.
Psychot It's very useful to have a privately-owned Class 1 like BNSF around because it provides a measuring stick to compare long-term vs. short-term investing mentalities. While BNSF is certainly using some PSR principles, it also seems to be focusing more on marketing and customer service.
BNSF is owned by Berkshare-Hathaway, which has stockholders. The largest stockholder, Warren Buffett, is easing into retirement, and his hand picked replacement is asking BNSF why they aren't more like the other PSR railroads.
Yes, I know Berkshire Hathaway has shareholders, but the ownership dynamic with BH is quite different than that of the other Class 1's. You may recall that Buffett told Matt Rose to manage BNSF like BH would own it for the next 100 years. That's quite a bit different than Wall Street short-termism.
Having said that, I wasn't aware that Buffet's successor is pushing PSR.
Yep! Berkshire-Hathaway A shares closed at $417,000 today. Think I'll buy 1K shares. [/sarcasm]
PsychotIt's very useful to have a privately-owned Class 1 like BNSF around because it provides a measuring stick to compare long-term vs. short-term investing mentalities. While BNSF is certainly using some PSR principles, it also seems to be focusing more on marketing and customer service.
Nationalization just throwing that out there been done twice ww1 and Conrail..Amtrak
Ron Baron, who used to manage Baron Asset Fund, used to brag that he invested for the long term. After he retired, the focus started changing and I sold my shares.
Remember - The Recession/Depression/Financial Panic of 2007-09 was not caused by a increase in the Minimum Wage.
In playing the financial numbers game and the flawed short term logic that the Wall Street trash continue to push, the railroad's stewardship obligations are being ignored (an unwanted expense). With congress now investigating the evils of PSR and the howls from small government (some justified, most not), the failed stewardship issues and public obligations may be the reformation trigger needed with the threat of re-regulation being the big stick that gets the industry off the financial kool-aid and makes the coffee kick-in.
CSSHEGEWISCHShort-term investors are not the only problem. It's pretty well known that PRR paid dividends it couldn't justify or afford to keep the stock price high for the benefit of the wealthy investors on the Main Line.
Financial chicanery is as old as time. Someone is always looking to tip the scales in their favor to the exclusion of others.
We at this site talk about investors as individuals. Actually individual investors, I am one as are several of us here, do not have any substantial affect on the price of a stock when we trade. The large funds, including labor union funds, are what drive changes in stock prices when they sell or buy 1000's of shares in one trading day.
Short-term investors are not the only problem. It's pretty well known that PRR paid dividends it couldn't justify or afford to keep the stock price high for the benefit of the wealthy investors on the Main Line.
BaltACD tree68 Psychot Does the efficiency really "benefit our overall population" if it comes at the cost of terrible customer service and railroads effectively shirking their role as common carriers? Seems to me it benefits Wall Street much more than it does the economy writ large. Somewhere in there is a happy medium where the customers get the service they need and the investors get their dividends. Unfortunately, right now it appears that there is more interest in the investors getting their dividends than in the customers getting service. Sometimes I wonder if the investors are seeing the customers as being a drain on their dividends... While there are long term investors, I wonder if the short-term investors, who can't seem to see much past the end of the next quarter, aren't running the show. Short term investors have been wagging the tale of Wall Street for decades. As computerization has made more metrics available to more investors - EVERYBODY wants each quarters results to be better than the previous quarter. With Hedge Funds having leveraged buy ins - if more money isn't siphoned into the investors pockets - heads will roll. In the view of Hedge Funds - long term is for losers. Remember, hedge funds will buy into a company for several years and then sell of and move on the the next target. Yes several years is longer than 'next quarter' , bu that next quarter pressure gets amped up every quarter.
tree68 Psychot Does the efficiency really "benefit our overall population" if it comes at the cost of terrible customer service and railroads effectively shirking their role as common carriers? Seems to me it benefits Wall Street much more than it does the economy writ large. Somewhere in there is a happy medium where the customers get the service they need and the investors get their dividends. Unfortunately, right now it appears that there is more interest in the investors getting their dividends than in the customers getting service. Sometimes I wonder if the investors are seeing the customers as being a drain on their dividends... While there are long term investors, I wonder if the short-term investors, who can't seem to see much past the end of the next quarter, aren't running the show.
Psychot Does the efficiency really "benefit our overall population" if it comes at the cost of terrible customer service and railroads effectively shirking their role as common carriers? Seems to me it benefits Wall Street much more than it does the economy writ large.
Does the efficiency really "benefit our overall population" if it comes at the cost of terrible customer service and railroads effectively shirking their role as common carriers? Seems to me it benefits Wall Street much more than it does the economy writ large.
Somewhere in there is a happy medium where the customers get the service they need and the investors get their dividends.
Unfortunately, right now it appears that there is more interest in the investors getting their dividends than in the customers getting service.
Sometimes I wonder if the investors are seeing the customers as being a drain on their dividends...
While there are long term investors, I wonder if the short-term investors, who can't seem to see much past the end of the next quarter, aren't running the show.
Short term investors have been wagging the tale of Wall Street for decades. As computerization has made more metrics available to more investors - EVERYBODY wants each quarters results to be better than the previous quarter. With Hedge Funds having leveraged buy ins - if more money isn't siphoned into the investors pockets - heads will roll.
In the view of Hedge Funds - long term is for losers. Remember, hedge funds will buy into a company for several years and then sell of and move on the the next target. Yes several years is longer than 'next quarter' , bu that next quarter pressure gets amped up every quarter.
It's very useful to have a privately-owned Class 1 like BNSF around because it provides a measuring stick to compare long-term vs. short-term investing mentalities. While BNSF is certainly using some PSR principles, it also seems to be focusing more on marketing and customer service.
greyhounds Juniata Man The most telling aspect of Bill's article was the comparison between psr railroads and BNSF. Despite all the slash and burn at UP, NS and KCS, their average OR in 2020 was 60.6 versus 61.6 for BNSF. BNSF is doing “PSR Like” things. See the Trains News Wire: Pandemic accelerates operational changes at BNSF Railway - Trains I know the unions and employees don’t like the reduction in force. Handling 7% more volume with 11% less T&E employees is wonderful for efficiency, but it reduces employment and union dues. The railroad’s purpose is not to provide employment or create union dues. The railroad’s purpose is to move freight efficiently. A goal of PSR is to use assets more efficiently. Using fewer freight cars and fewer employees to produce more ton miles, which is what is happening, improves efficiency. This benefits our overall population. But it sure sucks if you’re a furloughed railroad employee.
Juniata Man The most telling aspect of Bill's article was the comparison between psr railroads and BNSF. Despite all the slash and burn at UP, NS and KCS, their average OR in 2020 was 60.6 versus 61.6 for BNSF.
Our community is FREE to join. To participate you must either login or register for an account.