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Post by nylawyer on Jan 30, 2021 20:58:22 GMT -5
In today’s world everything is recorded. If you have a middle schooler, as I do, it’s pretty clear that privacy as we know it is a dying concept. Other than the obvious danger of editing, which can be addressed by the “official” recording, not sure why people are so concerned. Plus, it might kick off a successful YouTube career. I've long been a discovery waiting to happen. But that's both good and bad. |
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Post by jagvet on Jan 30, 2021 22:07:54 GMT -5
When I first came aboard 5 years ago, my "EBB mentor," a nice guy, advised me to print out the cover sheet in DGS, take handwritten notes on it and scan it back in to the efolder. That seemed to make sense, but it took a lot of time and sometimes HMs would forget to scan them, and I had piles of them in a drawer for supplementals. Necessity is the mother of invention, so exiled home in March, I was forced to try the DGS worksheets and write much more in Hearing notes. Then I sent the worksheets to efolder myself.
Guess what? This is MUCH better. Nothing gets lost or shredded. I say this because much as I detest the idea of the video hearings, we had one office call on MS Teams, and it works much better than Zoom. The Brave New WOrld might not be so bad.
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Post by okthen on Jan 31, 2021 21:54:28 GMT -5
Have already had my mock hearing. It was great. Sound quality was good (so much better than Avaya). Video was good enough.
I realize it’s not for everybody, but the possibilities it creates are tremendous in my book. Quality of life for judges. And for the other side, the reps - some reps put 40k miles a year (or more) on their cars. This could allow them more time on their cases, and hopefully do a better job for their clients. I was previously skeptical of reps not being with their clients, but people have adapted and things appear to work for the most part from what I can tell.
If I was running the agency, I would scoop up the judges that like it, tell them they can work from home, but that they would need to agree to take hearings from all over the country (wherever there is a need). Flexibility from both labor and management - win win...
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Post by nylawyer on Jan 31, 2021 22:41:19 GMT -5
Have already had my mock hearing. It was great. Sound quality was good (so much better than Avaya). Video was good enough. I realize it’s not for everybody, but the possibilities it creates are tremendous in my book. Quality of life for judges. And for the other side, the reps - some reps put 40k miles a year (or more) on their cars. This could allow them more time on their cases, and hopefully do a better job for their clients. I was previously skeptical of reps not being with their clients, but people have adapted and things appear to work for the most part from what I can tell. If I was running the agency, I would scoop up the judges that like it, tell them they can work from home, but that they would need to agree to take hearings from all over the country (wherever there is a need). Flexibility from both labor and management - win win... Are they having a participant who is working off of a cell phone or tablet? If not, then I am not sure you can really judge the sound quality. That's where the problem is most likely to be- on the claimant's side. Your proposal makes perfect sense, but the devil would be in the details. I suppose they could move all of the NHC ALJs out. |
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Post by SPN Lifer on Jan 31, 2021 23:38:38 GMT -5
What about judges who prefer to work from their office?
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Post by okthen on Feb 1, 2021 10:02:30 GMT -5
What about judges who prefer to work from their office? Once it is safe, let them. Some people truly believe in-person is different from video. I have not found that to be the case, but different strokes for different folks. Those people could be primary coverage for in person requests. Also, some people just like to go into the office to get away from their home. That’s fine too. Again, if I were king for a day, I would start a massive footprint shrink. It would take 5-10 years to be fully realized though given current lease situations, but you have to start it sometime. Would downsize to about 25% of current office sizes, saving millions per year once it’s realized (my back of the envelope math would be about a 35 million dollars per year savings). Would move writers to full time TW with like 1-2 hoteling situation offices for those rare occasions they are needed. Could do something similar with judges. I would be happy to give up my office for WFH. If needed in the office, have a hoteling office set up for those judges too. Same concept for office staff, though they would need to rotate through the office a bit more than a writer would. |
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Post by okthen on Feb 1, 2021 10:05:12 GMT -5
Have already had my mock hearing. It was great. Sound quality was good (so much better than Avaya). Video was good enough. I realize it’s not for everybody, but the possibilities it creates are tremendous in my book. Quality of life for judges. And for the other side, the reps - some reps put 40k miles a year (or more) on their cars. This could allow them more time on their cases, and hopefully do a better job for their clients. I was previously skeptical of reps not being with their clients, but people have adapted and things appear to work for the most part from what I can tell. If I was running the agency, I would scoop up the judges that like it, tell them they can work from home, but that they would need to agree to take hearings from all over the country (wherever there is a need). Flexibility from both labor and management - win win... Are they having a participant who is working off of a cell phone or tablet? If not, then I am not sure you can really judge the sound quality. That's where the problem is most likely to be- on the claimant's side. Your proposal makes perfect sense, but the devil would be in the details. I suppose they could move all of the NHC ALJs out. We did have people on different technologies. Thought the Apple headphones person had the worst sound to my ear. Not sure everybody is doing the different tech though. |
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Post by nylawyer on Feb 1, 2021 10:32:46 GMT -5
For the purposes of the mock hearings I don't know that they really to be testing different devices that reps or claimants will be using- presumably that has already happened before rolling it out. I just meant that we won't really know about the sound or picture quality until we are doing it with an actual claimant on the line.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 2, 2021 10:09:22 GMT -5
For the purposes of the mock hearings I don't know that they really to be testing different devices that reps or claimants will be using- presumably that has already happened before rolling it out. I just meant that we won't really know about the sound or picture quality until we are doing it with an actual claimant on the line. Try it yourself. Download the Teams app to your personal device and do a meeting (or mock hearing) from that personal device. At least that is one way to see what the perspective is like for someone coming in from the "outside."
And, my understanding from the training is that testing of external personal devices has been done and hearings have been done with claimants/reps using personal devices.
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Post by redsox1 on Feb 2, 2021 19:15:20 GMT -5
What about judges who prefer to work from their office? Once it is safe, let them. Some people truly believe in-person is different from video. I have not found that to be the case, but different strokes for different folks. Those people could be primary coverage for in person requests. Also, some people just like to go into the office to get away from their home. That’s fine too. Again, if I were king for a day, I would start a massive footprint shrink. It would take 5-10 years to be fully realized though given current lease situations, but you have to start it sometime. Would downsize to about 25% of current office sizes, saving millions per year once it’s realized (my back of the envelope math would be about a 35 million dollars per year savings). Would move writers to full time TW with like 1-2 hoteling situation offices for those rare occasions they are needed. Could do something similar with judges. I would be happy to give up my office for WFH. If needed in the office, have a hoteling office set up for those judges too. Same concept for office staff, though they would need to rotate through the office a bit more than a writer would. I would jump on FT work at home. Personally, I think very few judges would agree to work in the office. I guess you could let them work ADS as we were doing before the pandemic. I also suspect that there would be HUGE pushback from middle management like GS’s and HOD’s. |
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Post by Rabbit Bat Reindeer on Feb 8, 2021 20:21:09 GMT -5
Also did my mock hearing a week or two ago and was pleasantly surprised by the quality of the video and audio. I thought it would be much, much worse given that the Avaya softphone we now use for hearings constantly crashes (or just doesn't connect at all).
I don't think we're supposed to do video hearings until early summer but I'm at least hopeful.
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Post by hopefalj on Feb 8, 2021 20:57:16 GMT -5
Also did my mock hearing a week or two ago and was pleasantly surprised by the quality of the video and audio. I thought it would be much, much worse given that the Avaya softphone we now use for hearings constantly crashes (or just doesn't connect at all). I don't think we're supposed to do video hearings until early summer but I'm at least hopeful. I believe they’ve already started reaching out to representatives to gauge interest in some already scheduled hearings, but I could have misinterpreted what I heard. |
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Post by redsox1 on Feb 8, 2021 21:24:56 GMT -5
Also did my mock hearing a week or two ago and was pleasantly surprised by the quality of the video and audio. I thought it would be much, much worse given that the Avaya softphone we now use for hearings constantly crashes (or just doesn't connect at all). I don't think we're supposed to do video hearings until early summer but I'm at least hopeful. I believe they’ve already started reaching out to representatives to gauge interest in some already scheduled hearings, but I could have misinterpreted what I heard. I have my first video hearing at the end of March. |
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Post by Topperlaw on Feb 9, 2021 7:15:26 GMT -5
[/quote]
I have my first video hearing at the end of March. [/quote]
is there a special code on the itenerary screen on CPMS that signals that the Hearing is on MSTeams?
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Post by redsox1 on Feb 9, 2021 21:08:36 GMT -5
I have my first video hearing at the end of March. [/quote] is there a special code on the itenerary screen on CPMS that signals that the Hearing is on MSTeams?[/quote] Possibly but I received an invite by email. |
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Post by johnthornton on Feb 10, 2021 8:27:12 GMT -5
I have my first video hearing at the end of March. [/quote] is there a special code on the itenerary screen on CPMS that signals that the Hearing is on MSTeams?[/quote] I believe that they said that the Hearing site code on the itinerary had a T at the end of it. My non-teams cases have a V at the end of the code. |
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Post by ALonerDottie on Feb 10, 2021 14:08:35 GMT -5
Yes, there the hearing site changes if it is OVH. A case characteristic is also added that MS Teams was accepted. And as they roll out, I'm sure the hearing offices will be alerting the ALJs/VHRs to these cases until everyone is used to them. Looks like end of March is where we are starting to see them stack up currently.
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Post by southerner on Feb 15, 2021 8:58:15 GMT -5
I am one of those that looks forward to return to the office. I prefer the interactions and like live hearings over video and certainly over phone ones. I would be fine with being entirely at office as well as allowing those who want to work at home exclusively or split between office and home. As for travel dockets, that might not resume or be reduced, I enjoyed getting away 3-6 weeks a year. It made for a nice change.
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Post by southerner on Feb 15, 2021 9:04:19 GMT -5
Judges in my office have been wondering that notwithstanding all these mock hearings and prep, given that the agency is now set to negotiate video hearings, is all this work and effort not rather premature? These video hearings might never take place, they might be pushed back by many months, and if going forward how will the concept or practices be modified a bit or greatly by negotiations?
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Post by redsox1 on Feb 15, 2021 10:06:34 GMT -5
Not much to negotiate. IMO negotiations will not slow down the roll out.
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