10/13/2000

October staff meetings will be to train with Project Reporting 2.2 - Our staff meetings in Jackson (10/17), Nashville (10/18), and Knoxville (10/20), will be limited to those who do Project Reporting. We'll spend the morning reviewing the new system and part of the afternoon keying in the first couple of weeks of October.

GIS Design Team- The GIS Design Team (John, Roy, Debbie, and Steve) will report to the management team on Monday, October 16. We'll have a report to everyone soon.

Library Design Team - The Library Design Team (Frances, Don, Warren, and Rick) will complete its work the end of this year. If you haven't already emailed Rick your library survey, now's the time.

Changes in Legal Services - On Wednesday, October 10, we mailed 1,113 letters describing our changes in legal services that start November 1. I'm writing this on Friday morning and so far, I've received only one phone call in objection. Either everyone accepts it or I'll get more calls as the post office delivers the letters. We'll see.

Recruitments - We combined the recruitment for the management consultant in Nashville and the management consultant in Jackson. We reissued the advertisement and expect to conduct the interviews for both positions in the middle of November. We are also still recruiting for:

a senior secretary in Knoxville to replace Laura Smith

an administrative services assistant to replace Sharon Merryman

the new position of computer information specialist in Knoxville to help all of us with our software.

Organization Chart -

OrgChart.xls

Here's a copy of our current organization chart. You can view it in Notes. You will get better results if you print it from Excel.

Library Weeding - I've learned that weeding is what it's called when we remove outdated items from the collection. For the last three months, Jim, Frances, and I (with occasional help from Warren, Brett, and Tom) have devoted two hours at a session to reviewing and weeding our books and our vertical files. Harriet and Sarah Clapp (student) removed all the items from the catalog. And, today we finished! Now, we move on to the periodicals and then, soon, we hope we'll update the catalog and make it available to everyone. Soon may be January, but we'll see.

Death Benefits - MEMORANDUM

DATE: October 9, 2000

TO: MTAS-ALL

FROM: Robert P. Schwartz

RE: UT Death Benefits

We have all had a very sad time with the loss of Jeff. I appreciate everyone’s concern and help.

One thing I’ve learned is that UT has some substantial death benefits for employees who die while employed. I hope none of us ever has to use them, but we should be prepared.

Here are several suggestions:

Complete this “Designation of Beneficiary” form and return it to Nancy. This will allow your survivors to receive prompt disbursement of certain UT benefits as outlined in Policy 307 that we have attached. In brief, this will allow your last paycheck and certain other benefits to be disbursed promptly.

Make a will. Or make sure your current will is up-to-date. Pamela, Donna, and Sid will conduct a short seminar on wills at our next staff retreat.

Wear your seatbelt.

Thanks.

Enclosures