Just look at PREA and the mess it is, especially when they first incorporated it. I remember them putting in all these alarms and telling all females( I work at an all male prison) that not only do they have to announce their arrival in a pod(idiotic in and of itself), they also had to sound the alarm. Basically, it turned out to be a jack alert, and after writing more jack tickets than anyone cold imagine, they finally did away with them. We had warned them from the beginning, the CO’s that is, about this very thing, but no one listened. Same can be said about us shaking down inmates, once PREA was initiated, all of us CO’s were hit with PREA infractions from the I/M’s that wasted a lot of time and resources. When they finally made a penalty for filing a false claim, it finally slowed down. We’re becoming glorified day care centers, mainly because of all the rules and regulations imposed by idiots who haven’t spent an hour in a state prison. Just my 2 cents……

Ladies and gentleman,
I have to agree with SGT43OHIO and especially Mudflap, most Stupidvisors don’t like to hear that their idea won’t work. You will find the best leaders started from the ground up and if they don’t fall into that politics of the job, he/she will not only listen but ask the front line troops what to look for. Many soldiers that started as enlisted men/woman become great leaders in the field of battle. The long and short of it is this, play their game and go home safe. An correction officer from new york told this some time ago and it makes sense. The more the monkey climbs the more you see his ass, great words of wisdom.

Perhaps formulating a fool proof alternative option might work. Let me explain. First as a supervisor, the last thing I want to hear is complaints about my new idea. What I would prefer to hear is how my idea could be made better or how it could save more money, run more efficient so on and on and on…

See, leaders like people to bring them problems accompanied with alternatives. Don’t just run to a superviosr and say, “This doesn’t work.” or “I can’t do this” Tell them why. Offer a better way, be innovative and think about more than just yourself. In the end, if you can substantiate that several criteria will be met, you are almost guaranteed success with your idea. The criteria? Here goes…. You must: prove the alternate way will; 1) Save money, 2) Be safe® 3) Remain efficient

What supervisor wouldn’t want to attach their name to that?
Hope this helps.

That’s a typical complaint. Not much you CAN do. If you honestly think the brass are sitting in their ivory tower drinking coffee and scheming how to make the job more difficult, there certainly is nothing you can do about it. File a grievance. Live with it or leave. Their way or the highway. What other option is there? We often have changes that don’t make sense to us. (One of my complaints is that the brass doesn’t give a reason for most of the changes… they just say “do it”. Even if I don’t agree with their reasoning it helps me implement the changes if I understand why they want it done.)

I’m only a lowly CO and have been told not to think above my pay grade, but I’m going to play the devil’s advocate here and suggest that there could be a reason for the change. Perhaps the Laundry Coordinator simply needs the afternoons off for a while. Perhaps there are water issues later in the day (pressure or demand) that you’re not aware of. Perhaps they want the laundry finished earlier in the day, and a earlier start time would mean an earlier end time. If laundry is normally completed early in the evening, it’s even possible that the evening shift supervisor wanted it to be completed earlier in the afternoon to get the inmates out of there. Besides, the brass might not think it’s a problem to release laundry workers in the wee hours since the officers are already getting inmates ready for out count and/or meds and/or other reasons.

You can certainly take your concerns about the confusion to your supervisor and see if he/she will push them up the food chain, but upper management tends to view us questioning their orders a lot like we view an inmate questioning ours, so don’t hold your breath while waiting for them to have an epiphany.

This is typical of the suits that have never worked on the floor. A prime example was when they were designing new padded cells in my prison. When they were building them I was Officer I/C of that section. I pulled one of the Architects aside and told him that what they had designed and were in the process of building was a disaster waiting to happen and totally unpracticable. His reply was what did I know. I was only an Officer he was the Architect. So they were built and the first inmate into them caused $5000 damage to them and caused the injury of 2 Officers trying to extract him. They ended up rebuilding them the way that was suggested by us in the first place. So in the end it cost not only the original price but the cost of the rebuild and the wages of two Officers out sick. And did they learn from this. No.

What do you do when your facility is being ran by people who have no idea how it physcially runs. They sit in their offices all day watching mointors or drinking coffee and come up with some of the unreasonable ideas you ever heard. For example, they recently came up with the idea of bringing in laundry at 0430hrs, sounds good on paper but they don’t take in consideration that the officers are doing medication, feeding and getting inmates out for court all at the same time. There is enough confusion without adding to it, when confronted with their descison were told to just deal with it. Do they know all that could happen during this confusion or even care. I hope you have an idea.
Submitted to Corrections.com via email: by vernofcca