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My First Post as a New Member

Dotey OT

Cyclops Duck of the North - BEWARE
It is a Class V org with an SO mission.

The field was decimated over the last 20 years, while the org was struggling and during the fundraising evolution. Now a lot of the BIS is paying staff doing their services. I was counting public back in 2005 and started doing the math in my head, and the numbers that the church were giving for worldwide Scn'ists wasn't adding up. But I didn't do anything about that and just parked it next to all the other pieces of data that didn't fit.
 

Wilbur

Patron Meritorious
For the first few months it was pretty routine to have the GI above 60k for each org, day and foundation.
That sounds like quite a big org. The org that I was at only grossed £3k-8k at best. AOSH UK used to gross about £200k a week in the early 90s, if I recall correctly.
 

Enthetan

Master of Disaster
But who really cares in the end when you have a bottomless resource, hypnotized donors!!!
That was the attitude. Get whatever management demanded, and disregard the cost in both money and people.

My major peeve was how much money the org was wasting on bulk mail to bad addresses. The execs didn't want to do an address correction mailing, because that would show exactly how much of our addresses were no good, and if the Addo guy threw out the bad addresses, the Bulk Mail Out stat would go down. So they never approved funding for address correction.

Then when a mission arrived and discovered how bad the mailing list was, they comm-ev'ed the Addo guy, and told him HE should have paid for address correction out of his own pocket. Really, they told him that.
 

Type4_PTS

Diamond Invictus SP
No, these were not all OT committee members. They recruit for ideal orgs now from all four corners of the earth. Promising everything, daycare, housing, training, wiped off org debt (freeloaders), and many others. They will give you an example of staff pay, which isn't really true, of course. Staff with bad credit were being helped by staff with goid credit. Personal loans were being arranged. I'm certain that there are guys holding the bag, as staff that got the loans can't pay. I've heard specifically that many orgs have hired quite a few NOI folks. They get CSW's to handle Ramadan, etc. My only point on that is these guys aren't really Scn'ists, just recruited under pressure and say yes, then suffer the consequences. We had failed staff from other orgs with unhandled ethics, then they came to our org and just caused more problems.

And yes, this org opened with a mission of SO folks, a large number. It was essentially opened with a full on bypass in most areas. Div 2, Div 7, Div 6, HGC operations were all essentially being run, or poorly run by SO. This is less so now but still happening. From what I saw, the most widely used tech was bait and badger, and poor 8-C on staff. Nothing really long term was being done or created, it was get the GI up. A very one sided view of business operation. Doesn't work in the long run.

Maybe even larger of a departure is the musical chair scene. Non-standard demotions, transfers, willy-nilly style sort of a fill this post du-jour. Like the Tech Sec post being held by four different people in a year. That's just one.

Now for the courserooms. Any old tech folks will appreciate how screwed up it is to have Div 6 students in the academy. It took only several months for Div 6 courseroom students to be in the academy. Transfers, people leaving staff, etc. brought that on. No one in management sees that as bad enough to correct. Not that I now really care, but they aren't even really trying to play by they're own rules.

I could keep going...
Wow, what happened to the Orgs promising training and auditing in exchange for their work as a staff member, instead of just regging staff for those services?

Back when I was on staff (during the 1980's) there was *some* of this internal regging going on, but it was relatively rare, as compared to the scene in which you described.

Oh, and Dotey…

:welcome2:
 

Dotey OT

Cyclops Duck of the North - BEWARE
I know, back in the days gone by, very little regging of staff occurred. Not the standard now. Of course we were lucky to make $ 25 in a week. Staff taken off post to be regged, staff taken off post to go into session, anything to keep the stat up. Really the definition of "taking in it's own laundry ". I remember one Monday morning long ago where an exec wandered into a courseroom where several staff were on course and pitched a fit and had them pulled back onto post. Kind of the opposite now to a certain extent.
 

Dotey OT

Cyclops Duck of the North - BEWARE
Now I think the org management responds to upper management without a thought other than getting their asses reamed. Like upper management saying "get the such and such post filled", and local management moves a guy from a post he or she has been on for a couple months onto the post in question. Nothing that you would see in an "unenlightened" wog business, because if it occurred frequently the business couldn't run well. I think the SO datum of "you don't need to be hatted" is being used, that is they are willing to put guys instantly on a new post and expect them to operate as a professional on that post immediately.

I always felt there was a huge disconnect from upper management and orgs, and I now think this is systemic in SCN.

We watched a video of COB briefing org execs as part of exec training, where he said "do the usual" maybe 20 times. When you go back to the org it is nothing like that. It's like that was total BS or the management team doesn't know what the usual is.
 

Enthetan

Master of Disaster
Now I think the org management responds to upper management without a thought other than getting their asses reamed. Like upper management saying "get the such and such post filled", and local management moves a guy from a post he or she has been on for a couple months onto the post in question. Nothing that you would see in an "unenlightened" wog business, because if it occurred frequently the business couldn't run well. I think the SO datum of "you don't need to be hatted" is being used, that is they are willing to put guys instantly on a new post and expect them to operate as a professional on that post immediately.

I always felt there was a huge disconnect from upper management and orgs, and I now think this is systemic in SCN.

We watched a video of COB briefing org execs as part of exec training, where he said "do the usual" maybe 20 times. When you go back to the org it is nothing like that. It's like that was total BS or the management team doesn't know what the usual is.
I was in Flag Bureaux in the 1980's. I've often remarked that most of the people there, myself included, were not qualified to manage a supermarket.

But, yet, there we were.
 

Wilbur

Patron Meritorious
Now I think the org management responds to upper management without a thought other than getting their asses reamed. Like upper management saying "get the such and such post filled", and local management moves a guy from a post he or she has been on for a couple months onto the post in question. Nothing that you would see in an "unenlightened" wog business, because if it occurred frequently the business couldn't run well. I think the SO datum of "you don't need to be hatted" is being used, that is they are willing to put guys instantly on a new post and expect them to operate as a professional on that post immediately.

I always felt there was a huge disconnect from upper management and orgs, and I now think this is systemic in SCN.

We watched a video of COB briefing org execs as part of exec training, where he said "do the usual" maybe 20 times. When you go back to the org it is nothing like that. It's like that was total BS or the management team doesn't know what the usual is.
When I was on Cl V Org staff, we had a Flag Rep from CLO pushing us to write Compliance Reports on Programmes that had been sent to the org from middle management. The programmes were bullshit. Every Thursday after 2pm, we would look at the targets, try to find easy ones that we could comply with, and then have to take photos of the evidence that we had done it. So you would put up a poster in Div 6, take a photo of it, then take it down again. Or put up a book display somewhere, take a photo of it, then take it down again. An UTTER waste of time. The targets also didn't really seem to apply very well to what we were actually doing, as I recall. So we never ACTUALLY followed the programme. It shocked me that people in the org even bothered to pretend. My attitude was, "this is bullshit, so why even bother doing it?" But I was the new kid on the block, so I had to sort of go along with the bullshit. I noticed very quickly that there was a lot of counter-productive nonsense going on that passed for 'management'. I couldn't believe it really. And the Thursdad 2pm thing seemed counter-productive in the extreme. There was no long-term planning at all. It was all about dismantling whatever you had built last week (goodwill with public, or whatever) to get this week's stats.

The same logic flowed into dealing with getting public up the Bridge. Rather than having someone plan their finances, and figure out how they were going to systematically get together £300,000 over the next 6 years and get to the top of the Bridge, or whatever, it was all about THIS WEEK. Buy a few intensives on your credit card (and end up paying the same amount in interest as you'd paid for the service), instead of planning and paying for Bridge out of earnings. I found it absolutely ridiculous.
 

Dotey OT

Cyclops Duck of the North - BEWARE
That
I was in Flag Bureaux in the 1980's. I've often remarked that most of the people there, myself included, were not qualified to manage a supermarket.

But, yet, there we were.

That's awesome !!! Lol !

We had FEBC OEC folks around. Always an adventure waiting to see what they came up with. Like how to pay the rent.

What I've noticed is that people with little business experience get partially hatted on some admin tech datum, but not really understanding it, poorly apply it and there it all goes to hell. Then those same people go to some business and apply that same data and oops, another failure.

I always liked the FBO doing some analysis, and announcing the results to staff. We sat there and said to ourselves, what do we do with that? And then your pay for the next month totals $ 10.

Total disconnect from the world and how to run a business, but you've got LRH Admin Tech!! What could go wrong?
 

Wilbur

Patron Meritorious
That


That's awesome !!! Lol !

We had FEBC OEC folks around. Always an adventure waiting to see what they came up with. Like how to pay the rent.

What I've noticed is that people with little business experience get partially hatted on some admin tech datum, but not really understanding it, poorly apply it and there it all goes to hell. Then those same people go to some business and apply that same data and oops, another failure.

I always liked the FBO doing some analysis, and announcing the results to staff. We sat there and said to ourselves, what do we do with that? And then your pay for the next month totals $ 10.

Total disconnect from the world and how to run a business, but you've got LRH Admin Tech!! What could go wrong?
I always liked the policy letters on Time Machines. Given the way staff followed the letter of whatever policy letter they were focusing on this week after they'd imbibed OEC management tech for several years, it always surprised me that nobody set up a time machine in the Org. It seemed to be the one piece of management tech that people instinctively thought "nah, that's bullshit" and didn't try to implement.

If I was in org management now, just for a laugh, I'd INSIST on all the goofier policy letters being applied. I'd be collecting together all the addresses from the last 70 years and sending them bulk mail, and letters saying "so, you bought a Dianetics book in 1963. When are you coming in for your next service?" A time machine in the OIC area. And I'd have a COB bust in the LRH office. The LRH office would be moved into the biggest room in the org. If it meant that the courseroom had to be moved into the old LRH office, then so be it.

I'd also have HUGE COB portraits on every wall. Who's going to demand they be taken down? And if someone does, I'll query it with RTC.
 

Clay Pigeon

Gold Meritorious Patron
Wow, thanks for all the welcomes !!

I will start with the ideal org "strategy", and opening ideal orgs.

I noticed in the midst of the fundraising for the org I was involved in that service and delivery, the actual functioning of an org took a very big hit in regards to priority. It was ok to have a miserable, failing org during the evolution of fundraising. This bothered me as a gung ho scn. But god forbid, you couldn't say that. This org didn't even have a C/S for a long while. But they did have a group of "say anything and do anything " recruiters from the SO.

Then there was the reging. Unbelievable amounts of off policy, financial irregularities.

I will say that when I talk about things, you might note that I speak as a scn'ist when I describe something while I was inside and a part of the "church". Part of my complaint was the willingness for that group to go by the obvious things that were wrong. But as a whole now I see the current church as a HUGE FINANCIAL IRREGULARITY !!!

I had a friend that had vast experience in the construction and development game. It was explained to me that the way that they were going about the whole evolution, start to finish was incredibly stupid and expensive. Partly because it was being run by a group of novices, snotty nosed SO kids with a bit of "training", and a utter disregard to cost that could only be compared to a government. If you really want to screw something up, have it controlled by a government, or the Church of Scientology!!!!! Just notice the horror stories around that exist in last minute disasters. I've heard a few and seen a few, and these cost donors lots of money, and many were avoidable by building selection, handling by smart experienced builders, contractors. But who really cares in the end when you have a bottomless resource, hypnotized donors!!! There is a term in construction called Value Engineering. I'm not an expert, but essentially if you know how to build anything, there are several ways to do it, some are less expensive than others, and the eye can't even really tell what was done. But you have to build with an eye on that at all times. There wasn't an effort by the church to limit costs, that we could see. I know you could watch those painful videos, how the church was so smart and buying in volume from manufacturers, I'm actually not sure I believe that bull shit, because they didn't do it in building their buildings.

Then there was the "Exec Training" in LA. That's a farce.

More later...
Yeah, back in the early 70's orgs were much more kosher in their conduct

And there were still crappy things going on
 

JustSheila

Crusader
Yeah, back in the early 70's orgs were much more kosher in their conduct

And there were still crappy things going on
I supposed that's possible, but what org are you thinking of that was more kosher in its conduct? Was there one in particular that you know about?

Not the Sea Org in LA.

In the early 70s, when ASHO and AOLA weren't at the complex yet Sea Org members left their children at the Melrose Org slum building all night long. That went on for years and years. Parents weren't ever allowed to bring their children home. They saw them for hygiene time or liberty (every other week if stats were up) and :45 family time daily. The children weren't even allowed to eat with the parents because they were only paid to eat at the Melrose. That practice didn't end until 1977 or 1978 when they were moved to the Fountain Avenue building.

L Ron Hubbard customarily sent married couples to work in different orgs for months or even years at a time, too. Sea Org members sent on Mission often didn't see their children at all during the mission, which could last a year or more.

The Melrose building was an overcrowded, rat and cockroach infested slum and the children rarely ever got out of their playpens. Some were 2 or 3 years old before they saw grass for the first time. I saw it.

ASHO and AOLA weren't better in the early 70s. Which orgs do you mean?
 

screamer2

Idiot Bastardson
Yeah, back in the early 70's orgs were much more kosher in their conduct

And there were still crappy things going on
Where the fuck were you whenever there weren't a shitload of crappy non-kosher things going on?

I wish I had known you then, we could have gone there together had it been true. I would have taken all my friends and lovers...

But I don't believe it ever was true.

I believe you are promulgating bullshit.
 
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Clay Pigeon

Gold Meritorious Patron
I supposed that's possible, but what org are you thinking of that was more kosher in its conduct? Was there one in particular that you know about?

Not the Sea Org in LA.

In the early 70s, when ASHO and AOLA weren't at the complex yet Sea Org members left their children at the Melrose Org slum building all night long. That went on for years and years. Parents weren't ever allowed to bring their children home. They saw them for hygiene time or liberty (every other week if stats were up) and :45 family time daily. The children weren't even allowed to eat with the parents because they were only paid to eat at the Melrose. That practice didn't end until 1977 or 1978 when they were moved to the Fountain Avenue building.

L Ron Hubbard customarily sent married couples to work in different orgs for months or even years at a time, too. Sea Org members sent on Mission often didn't see their children at all during the mission, which could last a year or more.

The Melrose building was an overcrowded, rat and cockroach infested slum and the children rarely ever got out of their playpens. Some were 2 or 3 years old before they saw grass for the first time. I saw it.

ASHO and AOLA weren't better in the early 70s. Which orgs do you mean?
I started in San Francisco in 1971. It had just become a CLIV org in 1968. There were a number of pretty groovy old-timers from ARCBA which had formed in Oakland when Ron had lectured there in 1950. Then I was on staff at FCDC from 1972-74 which was groovy as the office of LRH was the actual office where he had worked in the fifties with the original Sequoia University PhD on the wall. I used to audit in his bedroom sometimes. The worst I'd say of day to day was children were treated well enough, but just barely...
 

JustSheila

Crusader
I started in San Francisco in 1971. It had just become a CLIV org in 1968. There were a number of pretty groovy old-timers from ARCBA which had formed in Oakland when Ron had lectured there in 1950. Then I was on staff at FCDC from 1972-74 which was groovy as the office of LRH was the actual office where he had worked in the fifties with the original Sequoia University PhD on the wall. I used to audit in his bedroom sometimes. The worst I'd say of day to day was children were treated well enough, but just barely...
Thanks. I heard that SF and FCDC were pretty wild in the 60s and 70s, but then, I am also aware of much worse things with the children than "treated well enough." It sounds like you didn't have children when you were a staff member so didn't have the inside information. Staff were obligated to present a nice picture to new recruits and public.

From what I heard, pay was very poor there in the 60s and 70s unless you were getting book or reg commissions. Most staff moonlighted. Did you have money saved that you lived on so you didn't have to do that?

One couple who were staff at FCDC in the early 70s that I knew later (in the Sea Org) had lots of troubles with eating properly while the woman was pregnant. Did you know Nancy? (I won't write her last name here and you shouldn't, either) She was malnourished while pregnant and her firstborn had a lot of problems later. There were also stories of miscarriages and other staff eating poorly. That staff were there so many hours, the children were also badly neglected and they lived in rundown apartments. Many of those children, maybe all, had problems later in life because of negligent parents who were so intent on studying LRH that they didn't look after their best interests. They also believed what L Ron Hubbard wrote about children and left them on their own because they thought they were "big thetans in little bodies." They were NOT, they were children, and they needed their parents to act like responsible adults.

I heard it was fun, though. For the parents. Until they realized they'd wasted years of their lives working like mad to line someone else's pocket and understood the terrible effect it had on the kids to be neglected like that.



It's easy to gloss over the terrible things of the past and only remember the pleasant moments, but it's important to remember the innocent people who were hurt by Scientology.
 
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Wilbur

Patron Meritorious
In the early 70s, when ASHO and AOLA weren't at the complex yet Sea Org members left their children at the Melrose Org slum building all night long. That went on for years and years. Parents weren't ever allowed to bring their children home. They saw them for hygiene time or liberty (every other week if stats were up) and :45 family time daily.
45 minutes family time daily? What a waste of production time. Did they subsequently find the SP and put his/her head on a pike?
 

Wilbur

Patron Meritorious
I used to audit in his bedroom sometimes.
That's a quaint euphemism. Did you wear a condom? Or did they have plenty of loo roll at that org at the time?

I always wanted to 'audit' in the LRH Office, but our org didn't have toilet paper at the time, and I was sleeping in the org overnight, so didn't want to soil the underwear I'd been wearing for 3 days already.
 

phenomanon

Canyon
I supposed that's possible, but what org are you thinking of that was more kosher in its conduct? Was there one in particular that you know about?

Not the Sea Org in LA.

In the early 70s, when ASHO and AOLA weren't at the complex yet Sea Org members left their children at the Melrose Org slum building all night long. That went on for years and years. Parents weren't ever allowed to bring their children home. They saw them for hygiene time or liberty (every other week if stats were up) and :45 family time daily. The children weren't even allowed to eat with the parents because they were only paid to eat at the Melrose. That practice didn't end until 1977 or 1978 when they were moved to the Fountain Avenue building.

L Ron Hubbard customarily sent married couples to work in different orgs for months or even years at a time, too. Sea Org members sent on Mission often didn't see their children at all during the mission, which could last a year or more.

The Melrose building was an overcrowded, rat and cockroach infested slum and the children rarely ever got out of their playpens. Some were 2 or 3 years old before they saw grass for the first time. I saw it.

ASHO and AOLA weren't better in the early 70s. Which orgs do you mean?
Millie and I would go to the Melrose bldg and pick up Justin, and Ali, and a couple other kids and take them to the park, ( at Melrose the kids had only concrete to play on), take them home and feed them, or maybe let them sleep over. The conditions there were deplorable.



That's awesome !!! Lol !

We had FEBC OEC folks around. Always an adventure waiting to see what they came up with. Like how to pay the rent.

What I've noticed is that people with little business experience get partially hatted on some admin tech datum, but not really understanding it, poorly apply it and there it all goes to hell. Then those same people go to some business and apply that same data and oops, another failure.

I always liked the FBO doing some analysis, and announcing the results to staff. We sat there and said to ourselves, what do we do with that? And then your pay for the next month totals $ 10.

Total disconnect from the world and how to run a business, but you've got LRH Admin Tech!! What could go wro
 
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