SERCO Baghdad

[prascho]

Farell once again,
Why do u waste our time and what the connection with Baghdad is. Read the topic again also.

I'm not responsible that many my colleagues found out that Oman is not a good enough place for them too late, and leaving or have already left, and u need new ATCOs again.
And who told u that more than 2 years latter I need a new job.

Just stop. The SWW is finished m8.
let's be friends and HAPPY NEW YEAR again!

PRASCHO

[Bengal Lancer]

prascho......or should it be prat atco?

FYI Farrell is the person holding things together in ATC training in Oman......among his responsibilities one could list maintaining an appropriate level of competency in the English Language.....something you appear to struggle with!

Your comments are quite pathetic......no wonder you have no job,and if you continue to display such an attitude I have no doubt that this will remain the case!

Farrell is an aviation professional with qualifications way beyond just being a 'teacher'......so may I suggest that you take his advice and wind your neck in and stop posting garbage on this forum.

BL

[knuckels]

Mismanagement in Baghdad?

SERCO Baghdad is on the warpath for one of our controllers. They are fabricating a story of sector abandonment. They are doing this even when the ICAA has exonerated the controller and there are numerous statements testifying to this controllers professionalism. In reality, Management jumped the gun, and put themselves in the awkward position of trying to save face. By not using the time tested method of just asking the controller what happened, they have let things snowball into Avalanche proportions. Now the incompetent, should have retired long ago Ops Manager, has put himself into a corner where he feels he must fire the employee to save his own hairless ass. Stay tuned for updates. Be very careful of SERCO Middle East. In Baghdad, SERCO management thinks that their remoteness makes them invisible. If they could they would keep all problems in-house so they can make them vanish.

[Sam Asama]

Sadly, SERCO's behaviour, and treament of RS, is not simply unfair, it's typical. It has everything to do with face-saving and nothing to do with justice.

Anagrams are interesting things. "SERCO Safety" becomes:"A Feces Story"

Coincidence? I think not...

Sam

[Kattar Kid]

@knuckels

Friends told me that too many of the high level controllers are finishing soon?
Is this to do with the work or management or both?
How will this effect the service?



@ Sam
I like the anagram for SERCO.

Our competition Emirates Airlines becomes;

Eliminate arse sir

[knuckels]

Friends told me that too many of the high level controllers are finishing soon?
Is this to do with the work or management or both?
How will this effect the service?

Both. No support from Management is certainly not an incentive to stay. Knowing that a run in with the ICAA can happen at any time, and SERCO Management will not support you, is not a reassuring environment. Most people would rather depart on their own terms. There is a lot of discontent with SERCO Management. Most have lost confidence. Quite a few are actively job searching and weighing their options. Change is needed. Sitting around for near a month waiting to find the results of a nuisance investigation is very stressful. The departure of high level experience also has to do with the fact that "when it's time, It's time". You can only take so much isolation and time away from friends and family. Service will be effected in the very short term as newer ATCO's gain local experience. But, with the high experience level of all of the ATCO's new and old this is very, very short term.

[clipped_wings]

SERCO is a FTSE 100 company. As such there will be formal grievance and disciplinary procedures in place with right of appeal.

Make sure you know your rights.

[knuckels]

Rights, You've got no stinkin' rights.

SERCO is a FTSE 100 company. As such there will be formal grievance and disciplinary procedures in place with right of appeal.

Make sure you know your rights.

Rights, as well as a fair and speedy process, do not exist in SERCO Baghdad. SERCO Baghdad Management is running a black ops, rogue operation the way that they handle management oversight. I am sure the home office would not approve of.

[Ibin liedtu]

Serco BIAP is bad

Knuckles is on the money. I have been at BIAP initially with WCG and now with SERCO. WCG has much nicer facilities and finally, better food. But I at least thought that WCG Management watched out for you. With SERCO's inept Management running the show, I have seen many of our controllers put on the side lines for weeks and months at a time for no reason. All because SERCO Management refuses to make a decision or take control of their own workers. They are so afraid of hurting the ICAA's feelings, they don't dare stand up and support one of their controllers. I do disagree with Knuckles on 1 point. Mismanagement is causing controllers to leave. I know of 3 controllers that left here disgusted with Management and another 1 due to leave soon. I am surprised that the high turnover rate has not raised a flag at SERCO International. They need to fly in with the big broom in hand, and clean house!
Hang tough RS.

[Cuddles]

How's the perpetually overjoyed pict getting on?

[Red Dragon]

Serco management in Baghdad is not the be all and end all. Clipped Wings is right - the standards and policies of the company apply to all. The way that management there are behaving may well lead you to believe otherwise, but if you're not getting satisfaction there - go higher. Every manager reports to someone and the negative sentiment towards the company evident and being broadcast on here WILL matter to someone in the food chain, trust me.

If you have genuine grievances on issues that should have been handled better, then let it be known.

[Ibin liedtu]

Serco management in Baghdad is not the be all and end all. Clipped Wings is right - the standards and policies of the company apply to all. The way that management there are behaving may well lead you to believe otherwise, but if you're not getting satisfaction there - go higher. Every manager reports to someone and the negative sentiment towards the company evident and being broadcast on here WILL matter to someone in the food chain, trust me.

If you have genuine grievances on issues that should have been handled better, then let it be known.

There is fear of retribution from SERCO MGMT if the chain of management is jumped. The contract Manager recently sent out a threatening email to an ATCO. The ATCO had emailed other staff in the camp, and encouraged them to direct their displeasure with the way that an investigation of one of their peers was being handled to higher HR and Management levels outside of SERCO BIAP. In his email, theContractManager went on to discuss details of the investigation in an attempt to justify the shaft that he was giving to the ATCO under investigation. Don't know if it was a dumb mistake or intentional, but the threatening email was sent to all SERCO staff. Maybe he hit the "reply all" link by mistake? The ATCO was threatened for encouraging staff to report irregularities to higher levels outside of BIAP. Now, anyone that did not know of the investigation knows, and curiosity has peaked. Chatter has tripled. I feel sorry for the individual under suspicion. No persons privacy during an investigation should be displayed in public, especially by the Contract Manager. You would think that a FTSE 500 company would not allow this to occur.

[cant standit]

Enough

I was on this site to see what everyone at work and in the camp were talking about. I had no Idea. Such a firestorm. Such disruption.

The actions of Mr. W should not surprise anyone. Did he not say in a meeting in mid December that we would have in house medical care before Christmas. This has been an ongoing complaint for months. "We are signing the contract as we speak" he said. Still no in-house medical care. Surprising since 2 ATCO's almost lost an eye due to delays in treatment. SERCO Ltd would have paid dearly. What is the going rate for negligence and the lost of an eye?

Did he not direct a security committee to develop ideas on increasing camp security, only to order the committee disbanded when he did not like the ideas that were proposed 2 days later?

Has there been any movement on the idea to develop and allow job sharing that he was looking into for 4 months? Many ATCO's would have stayed if this were permitted. Horrendous personnel turn over rate, how can SERCO Ltd. not see the effects of this one man wrecking crew?

Doesn't SERCO Ltd care that their reputation is being tarnished by this Management team?

[Sam Asama]

Red Dragon

No, Clipped Wings is not correct. And neither are you. I assume you haven't worked for Serco in BIAP. Whatever Serco is or does in other locations has little, if anything, to do with how they operate in Iraq.

Serco did not do adequate "due diligence" in preparation for this contract (as one of the senior managers from DXB will happily and sloppily confirm when he's had a few too many drinks). They under-estimated the tasks and under-bid by millions.

More importantly, despite the other locations where they operate, they didn't (and still don't) comprehend their responsibilities and culpabilities with respect to safety. When the day comes that someone compares their stated corporate policies, procedures and responsibilities to what they are doing, and aren't doing, in their Iraq Ops, they are in deep deep trouble. If that knowledge comes to light as a result of an accident, the damage to Serco could well be fatal.

Happy to discuss specifics if you wish.

Sam

[Sercobiap]

More thoughts on Project Manager

My last post was deleted so I'm editing this one so as not to overly offend anyone. Mr. W, the project manager, has mislead all of us since his meeting in Dec. 2010. We were told whatever it would take to keep us here to make the system work. We were told that increased days off would be in the future - not. Since then we were told the new camp would have armed Gurkha guards - not. Btw we are the only camp on BIAP without armed guards. Our guards are unarmed, untrained locals. We were promised an evacuation plan months ago - not. Also months ago, we were promised safety wardens on all shifts -not. It takes days to get emergency exit visas, unless of course you are one of the management team - they have multiple exit/entry visas that were promised to al of us months ago. If you are one of Mr. W's special employees, he has one in particular, then you receive special attention and benefits. The rest of us get the shaft. It's time for Serco Middle East, Shrin and Zafar (sp) to make some management changes. The local HR dictator needs to go as well. Morale is at an all time low.

[knuckels]

More importantly, despite the other locations where they operate, they didn't (and still don't) comprehend their responsibilities and culpabilities with respect to safety. When the day comes that someone compares their stated corporate policies, procedures and responsibilities to what they are doing, and aren't doing, in their Iraq Ops, they are in deep deep trouble. If that knowledge comes to light as a result of an accident, the damage to Serco could well be fatal.

Happy to discuss specifics if you wish.

Sam

Sam, speak away. You seem to be very wise. I have overheard that ATCO's in the approach environment mention many deficiencies in the area of administrative direction, and operational instruction. You seem to have heard the same. Management does not seem to take charge of Administrative operations that would improve safety. There does not seem to be any plan to advance operations. The ability to give the appearance that the ICAA can actually control traffic without non-ICAA help seems to be very important.

[Vercingetorix]

Sam Asama

You are correct re due diligence. Serco is supine in the face of the ICAA. Witness the recent 'Audit'. Serco will do whatever it can to keep a contract. If the ICAA wants a controller gone Serco will oblige them.
However, in Serco's favour they have and do try to place controllers at their other facilities, assuming a suitable vacancy is available.

Cheers

[Frostie]

How long is the SERCO contract in Iraq?

If they under bid the contract, why did they increase the pay?

[grizzled]

The increase in pay was (mostly) to compensate for the fact that the controllers are still working the same shift pattern that they started with a year ago -- even though they were promised a 6-3, and then a 6-4.

Serco is stuck with the staffing numbers that were submitted in the bid, though those numbers are unrealistic, hence the staff are working longer hours at position, and more days of work in a month, in order for the system to operate. So Serco had to offer more in order to prevent the slow leak of departing controllers from becoming a major flood. A 10% increase in pay is much more affordable than the penalties for breach of contract.

Will that alone be enough? Insh Allah...

[Sam Asama]

RS was "fired" today. This incredibly poor decision by Serco (and the ICAA) will prove to be a BIG mistake.

Good luck RS, and a safe flight home. You will find something better. You deserve something better.

Sam