May 28, 2009
From the Chair’s Corner
CU IS AT A CROSSROAD
I have been a CU employee and a Guild activist for 36 years. During that time, I have written many Guild shop papers - this one is different. I am not writing to you as the Chair of our union, I am writing as a concerned CU employee. The opinions expressed are my own; however I know that my opinions are shared by many other concerned staff members. I am writing out of a sense of gratitude to and concern for an organization and its mission which I have grown to love.
Within the top levels of management, the crossroad CU is facing is financial. Credit must be given to CU’s financial team which has kept the organization financially stable and secure for so long. No one could have foreseen the world-wide economic collapse or the impact it would have on the organization. We should be grateful for a group of such talented and dedicated individuals. That being said, I still have grave concerns for CU’s future under the Currency and Completeness initiative. It is with this initiative that I feel CU is at a crossroad of purpose and direction. What must we do to insure CU survives the current recession and remains a viable entity in the Internet Age? How will CU maintain its trusted name and reputation for unbiased product testing and reporting in the age of instant communication?
What is so troubling about Executive Vice President John Sateja’s Currency and Completeness Initiative? There are several areas of concern with CU’s plan. In my opinion, one of the most troubling issues is a mandated transition from magazine publishing to primarily digital publishing. Consumer Reports (CR) magazine is our flagship product. It is our public identity, and is the most recognized, respected and trusted product produced by the organization. In addition, the magazine currently has approximately 4 million subscribers. What will become of those subscribers in the transition to digital? Sure, President and CEO Jim Guest has assured me personally that CU has no plan to discontinue publishing CR in the near future. And he stressed that publicly in no uncertain terms at the all-staff meeting Wednesday. But my concern is that, in implementing this initiative, the end result will be exactly that.
The current trend in the Editorial Department is to relegate working on CR to the lowest priority and spiraling blogging to the highest priority. CR can not sustain itself as a viable magazine without sufficient input from both the Editorial and Technical Departments. Unless CU allots the necessary resources to keep the magazine relevant to its subscribers and other consumers, the financial and promotional support to expand subscriptions and renewals, and the effort to publish information that caters to issues of interest to its readers, the magazine will become irrelevant. If this happens, CR will die from corporate neglect not because of the trend toward digital information.
I am also concerned by what I see as the further erosion in the quantity of tests we conduct as well as the testing protocols. First some background:
CU has been struggling with the currency issue for more than a decade. Those of us who were working here in the mid-nineties recall how a previous administration dealt with this issue. Within a short period of time, CU implemented initiative after initiative - (FastTrak, ACE, E3, CDT, IMP, and Streamline) in attempts to meet various currency objectives. Test sample purchasing restrictions were loosened to allow early sample purchases sometimes directly from manufacturers, some product testing was eliminated, test protocols were shortened, the number of samples per project increased, project deadlines were shortened and mandatory overtime was required to meet accelerated initiative deadlines. However, with the attempt to streamline the
workflow, additional work was implemented such as first looks, carryover and similar models. When Jim Guest came on board and it was financially feasible, CU increased the size of the staff in order to meet the various currency objectives. According to Jeff Asher, the former Technical Director, these initiatives resulted in a 100% increase in productivity. How can we improve on a 100% increase in productivity?
Though all the past currency initiatives brought us closer to our goals, we are still not as current as management perceives we need to be. This new initiative in many ways mimics the past initiatives. Oftentimes it seems as though everything we do to meet ever-more demanding currency objectives comes at the expense of the technical procedures which protect us in the event of frivolous lawsuits claiming malice. My concern is that top-level management fails to recognize that testing and checking publishing schedules can never compete with the publishing schedules of non-testing web-based publishers. Is CU really willing to risk its reputation by abandoning comprehensive product testing and reporting in exchange for meeting their currency objectives?
Another concern with the initiative is reducing the scope of our presence in the consumer market. While several product lines have been scheduled for elimination, I would like to discuss the audio line as an example of the potential impact on our organization. Since audio testing has been eliminated, CU will no longer have a presence in the consumer audio marketplace. (Mr. Bose of Bose Corporation fame will be especially pleased with this decision). This is just one example of projects across the Technical Division that are being eliminated which once represented our voice in the consumer marketplace.
I wish that top-level management would better communicate with front-line managers to avoid unnecessary expenses. The Electronics Department would have never spent thousands of dollars reconstructing and recalibrating the audio lab if it was aware that the audio testing program was about to be eliminated.
We conduct tours with visitors from around the world. The Anechoic Chamber is one of the most popular stops on these tours. It is a symbol of this organization, our prowess and commitment to comprehensive testing and the most expensive piece of testing equipment on the premises. It is used during both fundraising tours and as part of the annual meeting. Are we going to continue to showcase the Audio Lab and the Anechoic Chamber to tour groups and our members while they are no longer active testing labs?
CU is at a crossroad today. At stake is our trusted name and our reputation for independent product testing and reporting. Each time we compromise our testing and checking procedures we run the risk of damaging our reputation. We prided ourselves on the fact that CU did not purchase samples directly from manufacturers. We do now for the sake of currency under special circumstances. One of CU’s prime objectives was to challenge manufacturer’s literature and claims through product testing and sample analysis. Today we hire outside vendors to develop brand lists based solely on information provided by the manufacturers to the consultant firms. This information is then published third-hand by CU. How many of CU’s founding principles are we prepared to sacrifice for the sake of currency?
The current financial problems CU is experiencing are solely a product of the current recession. They are not the result of errors or complacency with regard to publishing. There has not been a substantial decrease in circulation of either CR or CRO. The current combined product subscription rate is over 8 million. This recession will end and the American economy will recover. When it does, CU should reap the harvest without damaging our reputation or eliminating product testing because it interferes with CU’s attempt to keep pace with non-testing based competitors.
In Solidarity,
Bill South
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5/28/09