LaHood, Asleep On The Job

Ray LaHood is providing a case study in governmental appointee, Department of Transportation Secretary, who can’t see his way in the dark. The public safety and airline industry are in dire need of leadership that can step up to issues, take in the advice and recommendations of experts, and reach an informed and rational decision. This of course rarely happens because like their political superiors, a positional reference term that has nothing to do with higher levels of ability, governmental department heads rely upon policies and polls that guide their decision process. Administration leadership has nothing to do with delivering value to the American people, but in bending to the risk that it may appear to be unpopular and cause a popularity problem.

LaHood and his FAA administrator (Randy Babbitt) refuse to acknowledge that finding a way to accommodate solutions for handling on the job fatigue. Having stated strongly and uncompromisingly that “we don’t pay people to sleep at work” LaHood and Babbitt have closed off the possibility that the correct thing to do may require knowledge, reason, understanding and creativity in dealing with the problem that they are specifically responsible for, are charged with addressing and took an oath to perform. If LaHood and Babbitt cannot see how to accept the results and recommendations of their own research, the research of other experts from other industries, the work done by the US military over a half century ago and since, and some little know guys who work for NASA (not that they’re rocket scientists or anything) then are they awake on the job? They may not be asleep at the switch I suppose, they may just be lost in the dark with their bureaucratic heads stuck to far up their backside to be able to see, hear or read any such information. If they did, it would tell them conclusively that nightshifts and fatigue are significant workplace issues that must be dealt with properly or you are actively responsible for and personally accepting the predictable consequences from doing effectively nothing. Attentiveness and cognitive diligence are severely degraded when fatigues, the very competencies required by air-traffic controllers to fulfill their jobs.

There are always ways to use knowledge and information about a problem to then solve it. If someone would just go wake up LaHood and tell him it’s time to go to work. We aren’t paying for people to sleep around here! Oh, his boss should probably fire his ass! Not because he is unconscious at work but because he doesn’t know how to run his department. If he doesn’t like the concept of “paying to sleep or nap” then maybe he should ask someone how to avoid the perception that that is what he is doing. Until he does something useful, or is fired, Mr. LaHood should be mandated to fly only late at night and to take at least one trip a week. Oh, and no special precautions or warning by the FAA that he is on a flight.