The Official "WWWD?" Thread

[ArkieDukie]

I received 2 documents from Road Runner over the weekend; both were Specific Aims pages for upcoming NIH grant submissions. She put salary support for me on both. After sitting in on a phone conference for one of these projects, I sent an email to Road Runner, asking for her to provide specific details relating to my role in the projects. The response I received was a non-response (something along the lines of "these are a duplicate of earlier grants"). Is it just me, or is this an unreasonable response to a reasonable question? (and I think the non-answer tells me exactly what I wanted to know when I asked the question)

[lawgrad91]

Your question is reasonable, her response is not.

[lawgrad91]

I can't tell if her "response" is devious, stupid, or a combination of the two.

[ArkieDukie]

I can't tell if her "response" is devious, stupid, or a combination of the two.

Basically, I think I caught her. She thinks she's outwitting me by not answering my question. Whatever she says my role is supposed to be, it's written in very, very erasable pencil. If one of her people wants to take over something I'm doing, it's theirs. She's using my expertise to make her grant look better, but she will give her people the plum assignments when push comes to shove.

Based upon what has happened with another project, I think my role is to do whatever menial tasks her people don't want to do. On another project (one that we're doing for a small biotech/pharmaceutical company), she turned my normal tasks over to Boris because he wants to do it. Granted, he's very smart, but she's getting $$ from them for this job. Now, if you were paying, who would you rather have do the work: someone with several years experience and some training in the type of analysis being done, or someone who has never done the analysis before at all but knows the biology? Previous division of labor was that I did the number crunching and Boris worked out biological significance. He's phenomenal at that. Me, not so much. As I have zero training in the neuroscience end of things and he knows it inside and out, he has less training in the number crunching than I did when I started my job here. However, Boris wants to do the analysis and Road Runner wants to keep him happy, so she's letting him do the number crunching. I had to randomize his samples and build the instrument queue, something that any trained monkey can do but it's time consuming. That's exactly what's going to happen on these grants.

[DukieInKansas]

What kind of documentation do those writing the grants get as to how the funds are spent? It would seem to me that, if you are in the proposal as the person doing skill A and Boris as skill B, they would be a bit concerned if they find out that the skill set they thought they were getting was not what they got. What kind of follow up is done on the funds/work? If that is tracked, isn't RR and/or the institution running the risk of not getting future grants if this deviousness is discovered?

[Lavabe]

I received 2 documents from Road Runner over the weekend; both were Specific Aims pages for upcoming NIH grant submissions. She put salary support for me on both. After sitting in on a phone conference for one of these projects, I sent an email to Road Runner, asking for her to provide specific details relating to my role in the projects. The response I received was a non-response (something along the lines of "these are a duplicate of earlier grants"). Is it just me, or is this an unreasonable response to a reasonable question? (and I think the non-answer tells me exactly what I wanted to know when I asked the question)

Not knowing what was actually said, the immediate question for you is: which earlier grants? Is this significantly different from those specific grants?

[Very Duke Blue]

for a future great job for you.

[windsor]

I received 2 documents from Road Runner over the weekend; both were Specific Aims pages for upcoming NIH grant submissions. She put salary support for me on both. After sitting in on a phone conference for one of these projects, I sent an email to Road Runner, asking for her to provide specific details relating to my role in the projects. The response I received was a non-response (something along the lines of "these are a duplicate of earlier grants"). Is it just me, or is this an unreasonable response to a reasonable question? (and I think the non-answer tells me exactly what I wanted to know when I asked the question)

Not knowing what was actually said, the immediate question for you is: which earlier grants? Is this significantly different from those specific grants?

Yup...that would be my question. Which grants. I remember back in the day when clients had gov't contracts they were very particular about credentials of the folks performing the work. This whole thing just smells bad.

I am still shaking my head that your HR just calls up people and says "susie says you have a hostile work environment". That is wrong on so many levels.

I assume The Boss is pleased just to have some salary support there right?

[Lavabe]

I am still shaking my head that your HR just calls up people and says "susie says you have a hostile work environment". That is wrong on so many levels.

I assume The Boss is pleased just to have some salary support there right?

At a minimum, I would see if HR has publicly available the information about the relevant procedures.
WOw!

[DevilWearsPrada2.0]

2 pm today.......... Adam Silver addresses the Donald Sterling saga!

[Very Duke Blue]

[quote="DevilWearsPrada2.0"]2 pm today.......... Adam Silver addresses the Donald Sterling saga![/quote

[awhom111]

2 pm today.......... Adam Silver addresses the Donald Sterling saga!

I am a little confused here. Is the question "What would Windsor do if she was Adam Silver?" or "What would Windsor do if she was Donald Sterling's girlfriend?"

[windsor]

2 pm today.......... Adam Silver addresses the Donald Sterling saga!

I am a little confused here. Is the question "What would Windsor do if she was Adam Silver?" or "What would Windsor do if she was Donald Sterling's girlfriend?"

If I were Don Sterlings girlfriend I would have reached down his throat and ripped out his balls.

[DukePA]

I am a little confused here. Is the question "What would Windsor do if she was Adam Silver?" or "What would Windsor do if she was Donald Sterling's girlfriend?"

If I were Don Sterlings girlfriend I would have reached down his throat and ripped out his balls.

If I were Sterlng's wife, he wouldn't have any remaining balls for his girlfriend to rightfully rip out

[ArkieDukie]

What kind of documentation do those writing the grants get as to how the funds are spent? It would seem to me that, if you are in the proposal as the person doing skill A and Boris as skill B, they would be a bit concerned if they find out that the skill set they thought they were getting was not what they got. What kind of follow up is done on the funds/work? If that is tracked, isn't RR and/or the institution running the risk of not getting future grants if this deviousness is discovered?

Since it's funding from a private company, I'm not sure how much follow-up is being done. In the NIH world it wouldn't be such a big deal. Switching around personnel is done all the time. You may recall that Pointy-Haired Former Boss replaced me with NuBarbie on the big cancer grant after the whole Pushy PI/Minion data fraud thing.

[ArkieDukie]

Regarding grants, Road Runner did specify which ones she was referring to. The new grants appear to be somewhat similar to those. However, I never saw one of the two grants. I'm not sure what I was supposed to be doing on those, either, given the shift in climate.

Road Runner pulled another one on me yesterday. A few months ago, I was a reviewer for some internal pilot grants. We had something like 15 proposals with 4 to be funded. One of the proposals was from Road Runner and another colleague. The Boss was also present and asked me if I was going to be a part of the project. I said I assumed not, since they had not even spoken with me about the project. Flash forward to yesterday, when I received a meeting invitation to discuss the project. She and the other colleague are sharing a rotating grad student this summer (students do rotations in various labs before choosing a permanent home), and the purpose of the meeting is to map out his project. Apparently I'm going to be teaching the student how to do the data analysis. It really puts me in an awful position: I don't think I can say "no" because she does pay part of my salary, but she made me look like a liar. I think I need to talk to The Boss today about this and see what he thinks. IMO this also shows a basic lack of respect for me. She's planning work for me without even discussing it with me. At some point I'm going to have to call her on this.

[DukieInKansas]

Regarding grants, Road Runner did specify which ones she was referring to. The new grants appear to be somewhat similar to those. However, I never saw one of the two grants. I'm not sure what I was supposed to be doing on those, either, given the shift in climate.

Road Runner pulled another one on me yesterday. A few months ago, I was a reviewer for some internal pilot grants. We had something like 15 proposals with 4 to be funded. One of the proposals was from Road Runner and another colleague. The Boss was also present and asked me if I was going to be a part of the project. I said I assumed not, since they had not even spoken with me about the project. Flash forward to yesterday, when I received a meeting invitation to discuss the project. She and the other colleague are sharing a rotating grad student this summer (students do rotations in various labs before choosing a permanent home), and the purpose of the meeting is to map out his project. Apparently I'm going to be teaching the student how to do the data analysis. It really puts me in an awful position: I don't think I can say "no" because she does pay part of my salary, but she made me look like a liar. I think I need to talk to The Boss today about this and see what he thinks. IMO this also shows a basic lack of respect for me. She's planning work for me without even discussing it with me. At some point I'm going to have to call her on this.

I hope The Boss didn't have plans for your time this summer - or do I hope he did and RR gets put in the bad position of not keeping everyone in the loop.

[DevilWearsPrada2.0]

I am a little confused here. Is the question "What would Windsor do if she was Adam Silver?" or "What would Windsor do if she was Donald Sterling's girlfriend?"[/quote]


If I were Don Sterlings girlfriend I would have reached down his throat and ripped out his balls.[/quote]
If I were Sterlng's wife, he wouldn't have any remaining balls for his girlfriend to rightfully rip out [/quote]

Donald Sterling is 80 years old........... therefore I am sure His parts and balls don't function like they use too. But the Girlfriend was only interested in his money and the lavish cars, and expensive duplex he bought her, along with other gifts, etc.

[ArkieDukie]

BGS informed me this morning that Road Runner is now trashing my work privately to her group members. It probably goes beyond that as well. Maybe it's time to send that email to my former boss.

[Very Duke Blue]

BGS informed me this morning that Road Runner is now trashing my work privately to her group members. It probably goes beyond that as well. Maybe it's time to send that email to my former boss.

RR needs way more then shin kicks. What a creep.