Re: (erielack) Fwd: [NSTier] An open letter to Railpace Newsmagazine and the railfan community

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On Wed, 1 Dec 1999 "STEVEZ10_@_aol.com" wrote:

> I got this letter from a friend and I thought it should be read  by some of 
> the EL list users.
> It was very well written!

In reference to the NS flag waver's open letter, while he has a few valid
journalistic points, it does not erase the fact that NS has not only provided
poor rail service since the CR absorbtion, but also has stirred up quite a bit
of animosity in the ranks of ex-CR employees at all levels. I just got through
reading a first person account of the mess they created at Enola/Hbg. with
their clueless "overseers" (word used in last email I read on it) calling the
shots and ignoring the tried and true methods of the locally familiar
workforce. Apparently the "overseers" have departed Enola and things are
running more smoothly there now. That's just a typical example of NS arrogance
which certainly has existed on ex-CR lines since the split. Addressing the lack
of coverage of the CSX West Shore congestion, it has been covered by several
sources, but it is well known that NS has suffered far greater setbacks in
their integration plan than CSX has. That is due in no small part to NS
methodology, but in all fairness to NS, demographics has been a large factor in
their integration problems. Their pieces of the CR pie don't lend themselves to
as smooth an integration of services quite as well as CSX' and that has also
been discussed at length in print.

While corporate pride can be a good thing it can also be a source of subjective
viewpoints. I think that the fact that the vast majority of ex-CR workers bid
on positions with CSX (it was something akin to rats fleeing from a sinking 
ship!) says a lot about NS management's relationships with their workforce and
corporate philosophy. This has been improving, from an employee standpoint, in
recent months and is also well documented in the press.

Ranting about journalistic license will not erase the problems from which NS
has suffered and from which NS is still suffering. A corporate culture like NS'
does not change overnight and their upper echelon's resistance to an obvious
need for change and their PR spin doctors do not facilitate matters.

Interestingly, the poster's distaste for application of the term "arrogance" to
NS' handling of their ex-CR properties (a la Uncle Pete :) is in itself an
example of such arrogance within the ranks of NS management.

NS' failure to embrace the natural need for corporate evolution in order to
maintain homeostasis within a vastly changed and much larger railroad system
has set them back many months, if not years, in their quest for a smoothly
functioning business model. 

I have no doubt that NS will recover and once again elevate themselves to a
high level of corporate excellence, but at what cost to those who have put
their hearts and souls into making CR the success story it has become?

It is without a doubt a painful lesson, one which NS has not quite finished
learning yet...

J. Henry Priebe Jr.       Blue Moon President & Network Administrator
"root_@_bluemoon.net"         net.bluemoon.net - Blue Moon Online System
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