Brent Nyitray
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Let the mutherfuker burn!
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Kevin S. Willis
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quarterback
ScottC
yellojktI read the following story and I figured that it was a good way to cap off a week. It’s one of those things that I find funny even though there are financial implications to it… The title of it:
This Is Not a Joke: Government Issues Study of a Study About Studies
The Pentagon was inundated with so many studies in 2010 that it commissioned a study to determined how much it cost to produce all those studies.
Now the Government’s Accounting Office has reviewed the Pentagon’s study and concluded in a report this week that it’s a flop.
The study of a study of studies began in 2010 when Defense Secretary Robert Gates complained that his department was “awash in taskings for reports and studies.” He wanted to know how much they cost.
Two years later, the Pentagon review is still continuing, which prompted Congress to ask the GAO to look over the Pentagon’s shoulder. What they found lacked military precision.
The GAO found only nine studies that had been scrutinized by the Pentagon review, but the military was unable to “readily retrieve documentation” for six of the reports.
The Department of Defense’s “approach is not fully consistent with relevant cost estimating best practices and cost accounting standards,” the GAO concluded. In fact, they often did not include items like manpower, the report found.
The Pentagon “partially concurs” with the GAO’s report.
The cost of the study of the study of the studies was not immediately available from the GAO.
All Things in Moderation 
Perhaps one small corner of the dod that we can agree can be cut.
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Then there was this (depressing) story – Taking A Two-Week Vacation May Be A Career-Killer. Personally, in all my jobs, people take 2 week plus vacations all the time. I have never seen it affect someones career. A couple years after I began my career, I had built up several hundred hours of vacation by working a whole lot. I took a 30 day vacation and drove around the country, 2 weeks of it with one of my brothers and my future wife to be. Changed my life and made me a better employee and a better person. These people see it different…
“According to Penelope Trunk, founder of Brazen Careerist, it comes down to your spot on the totem pole.
“If they’re not going to fire you because you’re valuable, then if you don’t take the vacation you’ll look like you’re scared that you’re not valuable,” she said. “Then again, if you’re an entry-level person it’s not worth it to pay for the vacation.”
Also, anyone with “real responsibility” would find it pretty difficult to take two weeks off. And while those with the least amount of responsibility might find it easier to do, they’re better off focusing on their career
“If you’re entry-level, then the right time to take a vacation is in between jobs,” Trunk said, adding that job-hopping is crucial for climbing the career ladder in your 20s. “If you’re not there for two weeks, you’re not getting your work done. If you’re at a higher level, you can still hit the deadlines you’re not there for.”
However, Samantha Zupan, career expert with Glassdoor.com feels differently: “I think bottom-line that if you have that vacation time, that’s your vacation time,” she told Your Money.
But what if the buck stops with you?
“In this case you’ll likely have a team and set an example,” Zupan said. “You should build a strong team so they can carry things through, making sure they’re armed and equipped to handle any rough patches without you there.”
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Dave:
Taking A Two-Week Vacation May Be A Career-Killer.
For me failure to take a two-week vacation is a career killer. Federal regulations stipulate that, by law, I must take one continuous 2 week vacation every year, during which I am not allowed to send or receive e-mails via the company e-mail system nor am I allowed access to my work computer or any of the systems on it.
I don’t know the source of this particular regulation, but I am guessing that at some point some employee at some financial institution somewhere perpetrated a fraud which required him to never take a vacation longer than a couple days in order to maintain the fraud. The regulators discovered this and, in their genius, decided that the best way to prevent such fraud was to force every employee of a regulated financial institution to take a mandatory vacation of at least 10 consecutive business days. No doubt this regulation has prevented untold amounts of banking fraud.
At least I don’t have to feel guilty about either taking 2 weeks or ignoring my blackberry while I am on it.
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Or i guess i could have written about the 70 year old virgin, Pam Shaw, who decided it was time to step up the effort to find a guy.
“Now’s the time. I’m ready to take the plunge for the right bloke. My standards are still very high, though. I’m hoping to bag a tall, dark and handsome millionaire.”
Shaw said that she didn’t want to have sex before marriage and she has always been too focused on her career as a cabaret dancer to find a suitable husband.
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Nice. I always knew bureaucracies were self-propagating, but this is beautifully ironic.
Speaking of bureaucracies, I just had a chemical hazard safety training course which was neither training nor a course. The people running the session didn’t even know what metrics to use to judge whether we were properly trained in hazardous chemical use. But at least I got a certificate to show that I was there, so I don’t have to do it again until next year.
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“ScottC, on May 11, 2012 at 1:28 pm said:
At least I don’t have to feel guilty about either taking 2 weeks or ignoring my blackberry while I am on it.”
I bet you save them millions in vacation non-compliance fines and penalties as well by doing this.
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One of my dreams is to take a year and do a round-the-world trip. thinking maybe when NoVa jr. is in 7th or 8th grade.
[also — i’m out for a couple of days. off to that libertarian paradise of
SomoliaLas Vegas]LikeLike
jnc:
I bet you save them millions in vacation non-compliance fines and penalties as well by doing this.
Definitely. Some might say I do more for the company when I am on vaca than when I am working. (Over the course of the last 2 weeks even I would say that. Ugh.)
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” One of my dreams is to take a year and do a round-the-world trip. thinking maybe when NoVa jr. is in 7th or 8th grade.”
I can’t recommend it enough. I took a year off at 29 & am now waiting for the kids to get old enough to do it again.
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bsimon –would love to hear all about it sometime.
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