 Let's get started. My name is Dan Mogulov. I'm from the Office of Public Affairs and I'm delighted to be here today at the third in the series of campus conversations with Vice Chancellor Administration Mark Fisher. This has become very well attended and I think interesting and really valuable forum for campus leaders to meet with and talk to and listen to the campus community. I'm just going to do a brief introduction of Mark's background and then he'll have a few words to sort of set the table and then we'll be doing question and answers. So Mark is a graduate of West Virginia University, landscape architecture, was also also a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania's architecture program. He began working, his time at UC starts all the way back in 1987 when he began working at UCLA as a consultant and served as director of design and he was campus architect there from 1995 to 2002, leading the design direction for a $2 billion capital program that included projects such as the California Nano Systems Institute, the Broad Arts Center and Kauffman Hall. Then Mark moved over to UC Santa Barbara in 2002 where he spent 15 years. There also Vice Chancellor for Administrative Services and in that capacity he reorganized the administrative services division, introduced and rolled out a host of new technology services for the campus, led the creation of Santa Barbara's long range development plan and established its first sustainability plan and more. So if you're starting to get the idea that guy is incredibly qualified for his current job, that'd be right. Mark has served on numerous University of California system-wide committees with the office of the president. He came to Berkeley in September of 2015 and if you'll remember that was an interesting time to arrive on campus, 2017 sorry, last September in other words. And in his capacity as Vice Chancellor of Administration here on the Berkeley campus, he oversees just about everything. But it includes campus-shared services, human resources, procurement, business contracts and brand protection, IT, UCPD, facility services, parking and transportation, property management, and last but not least of course the campus sustainability office. So Mark just want to thank for joining us today. Thank you. I'm not sure this OAM turned on. Okay great, thanks everybody. Thanks for coming out on what was a rainy day but it's turning into kind of a beautiful day it looks like out there. This is my third UC campus. Each of the campuses is different, tied together by kind of similar genetics. And one of the things I like to point out is that while there are similarities, there are a lot of differences. And part of I think what makes someone successful or unsuccessful in a role such as this is the awareness that each of these campuses is really different. And yet we have a lot of similarities that we should always remember. It's great to be here. It's only been six months. I'm starting to recognize people in the room. I might not remember all of your names but I will try to get to the point where I get them right. It's great to see those familiar faces here today and hope to meet more of you over the coming months and years in my role here at Berkeley. An amazing place. So let's talk about that a little bit. So one of the things that Dan said, you know, what's different between Santa Barbara and Berkeley? You know, Santa Barbara is a relatively small campus. It is run on a very lean budget. It has a lot to do with the way the University of California funded different campuses. It had the lowest funding for student of any UC campus for the last 20 years. And with re-benching, there's some changes that are happening there finally that are very positive. Berkeley, I would say, is very different. It's been on the higher end of the funding stream. So it has built into that way of doing business that's different than I'm used to. A lot of that's very good. You can be much more strategic here, I think, than we could there. It's not a criticism of Santa Barbara in any way, shape, or form. It's just reality. So things like business process improvement we're talking about this morning. We really couldn't get to those sorts of things because we were so busy just trying to keep everything moving. All the bits and pieces aligned and operations moving forward. So there's a lovely opportunity here for me in particular to really be involved in something that is new for me. And that sort of process improvement and really thinking about how can we do things well in the future is great. It helps, I think, also to come from a place that's so lean. Because one of the things you see is, you know, I know we can do this differently because we did. And I know the resources are challenging. But I think the resources we have here are adequate to do a really great job. And I think it's just a matter of us coming to a point where we've aligned the resources and the work that we're trying to do in the smartest fashion possible. So it's, I think, one of our big efforts, especially over the coming year, will be in those areas. Let's talk about how smart it is. So this is my third campus. And I hope none of my friends in UCLA or Santa Barbara hear this. Because I think you have some of the most brilliant people on this campus of any UC campus. Okay? So it's not just the faculty or the students, but the staff. I found with the staff on this campus, I get engaging questions. They're challenging, thoughtful to the staff in the room. It's really remarkable. I love my colleagues in Santa Barbara. No question. But I really am thrilled to get to work with all of you because I see a level of thought in this that is nice, refreshing, interesting for me. So I'm really heartened by that. And as I meet you, again, I tend to be really amazed at just how bright this group of people is and how lucky we are to have all of you here. You'll find as you work with me that staff in particular are very important to me. I look at you, of your staff on the campus, as your, I feel a huge responsibility for you having a good experience here. So what does that mean? Things like staff engagement. Are we doing a good job? Is it inclusive enough? Are we being thoughtful about how we work with you? Are we making it fun in some way? It should be fun. You should enjoy coming to work. I like coming to work. What are the opportunities for you here? And if not here, what are the opportunities in the system? Because I always say to folks, before you leave the UC, before you leave the campus, let's look for opportunities on campus, obviously. But if you decide the campus isn't right for you, what are opportunities within the system, including the Office of the President? It's a big, rich organization full of all kinds of opportunities for everybody in this room to do things. I'm a perfect example of this. I started out as a part-time employee in 1995 and never thought I would stay more than two years. So 22 years later, almost 23 years, I had this remarkable career with all kinds of possibilities and things that happened. And part of it was taking those opportunities and really running with them. So there's something in this for everyone. And if you ever want to talk about that on a personal level, I'm more than happy to talk about why this is such a great place to be and can be a great place for everyone here. Maybe we should get to some questions. All right. I'm going to exercise my prerogative as moderator and toss you a few, and then we'll pick up cards. And again, as we go along, if people of the questions arise that you want to pose, just spell out the white cards and pass them down. So, Mark, I remember you got here in September, right when we were beginning to deal with all the, we're not beginning, in the midst of dealing with the free speech week. And I couldn't help noticing some of those initial meetings that looked like you were saying to yourself, I'm not insane on Barbara anymore. No, you're not. And obviously, a lot of what we did, the money we spent was about safety and security. And there were controversies and disagreements about the level of policing. Even recently, there have been other incidents involving UCPD and it's a hot and important area in your portfolio. And I thought maybe you could just share a little bit about how you think about campus policing, what its unique attributes are, and what you hope to do with the department and concert with the chief in terms of its relationship to the community and its ongoing efforts and abilities to provide safety and security for the community. First of all, we're lucky to have a great chief of police, Margo Bennett's great. She has a great national reputation. We're very fortunate. I think on campus is the most important thing is community policing, that the police department is really engaged with the campus, both, you know, all faculty, staff and students. In particular, I think students, student engagement is really critical. You know, every police force in the UC is going to have the moments when the police are loved and hated. I saw this in Santa Barbara and remember there we had riots, fires, mass killing, all within six months. So we had, you know, a huge arson case. We had six students killed. It was really a difficult period. And during the Deltopia riots, right afterwards, the students despised our police force. They thought it was too heavy handed. Then we had mass killings and they loved our police force. It's a very complicated job. There's no question. So for all the police officers, you know, we all should be really appreciative of what they do in terms of keeping us safe. Okay, having said that, we have to make sure that that same police force is so critical for our safety is also mindful of the fact that it's working in a very different environment. We're not a big city, we're a community. And in that community, how can we make sure that our policing effort is appropriate and is, you know, is tailored well to the community. So, Margot and I've had a lot of discussion since I've been here with everything from, we're putting together a police advisory board that will be composed of faculty, staff and students. The students brought this to us. We think it's a great idea. We're growing that idea to include all three groups on the campus. It's not the police review board that has a very different legal role. This is really about how do we make sure that our policing does fit the community. Student policing, CSOs. I'm a huge proponent of the CSO program on the campus. When I got here, we had 19 CSOs. We had 135 in Santa Barbara. So, we've grown that to about 50 or 60 I think now. And I am committed to that being a really great way to police the campus. More eyes and ears than anything else. They don't carry weapons. They're students just like the rest of our students. They tend to be well received by the student population. They can do a lot of good. They're just having more people out there looking and seeing what's going on. It's helpful we had a case last week involving a CSO. There would have been much worse without the CSO. And I won't go into details, but having a CSO on the ground, out in our buildings, resolved the case much more quickly than it would have otherwise. And, you know, it saves a lot of issues for the campus having that group. And on top of that, looking at things like our security force on the campus, what's the image of that? You know, is this the right image? We should think about that. How are they perceived on the campus? Policing in general, when you have a big event, and I wasn't here a year ago, it's hard to argue that what we did this fall was right or wrong. It's hard to argue it was wrong because I didn't have that context. And I believe the response was probably correct to give them what Berkeley had been through. So you always, and I know it was challenging and they're triggering issues with this, but we came out of something very bad and we didn't want that to happen again. So this balancing of safety and the sense of safety for the entire community is really critical for us and it's something we're just going to have to keep working on. And I keep saying to Margo, a big part is the image of policing and how do we temper the image of policing so that we feel safe but we don't feel threatened. And that's a lot of work for us coming forward. Thanks. Another hot button issue is campus-shared services. Chancellor has been very forthright when she talks about the extent to which it didn't meet initial hopes and expectations. In fact, one of the questions we got from the audience goes right to that. So talk to us a little bit about where we are in the whole process. We've heard about the regional model, what exactly that means, how it's going to differ, what your level of confidence is that we can learn from the past and really have sort of a setup that serves the needs and interests of the campus and all the folks who work here. So there's been a lot of good work done on this in the past and I think the most important thing for everybody is the regional model balances governance, if you will, of service provision. So when CSS was set up, it has a tendency to be more isolated, I think, from the campus than is really healthy. So the new model, the regional model, there will be six regions, five academic regions and one for the rest of us, will really be governed by both the academic endeavor and administration. So it's shared governance, truly shared governance of how this works. So we should have a better understanding of the needs of the academic community and make sure that we're making the right provisions and staffing and services available for that endeavor. The most important part of what we do here is the academic endeavor. So having a service provision or provider that is not as tied to that as it can be is a challenge and that's what we're really working toward. So the regional associate deans are a critical piece of this. ESO has been up and running for years. It's a good model for that. The second region is the Chem MPS region, which is up and running. And that's also, I think, working very well. We have a good regional associate dean, that's Ron Cohen. We hired with him the executive director for that region, Samantha Yee, also a good hire. And I think that what's happening with that, they're working very well together. The region's coming together as you'd like it to. They're very thoughtful about what pieces are in the region or not in the region, how they're going to serve their client base, if you will, and how it's shaped. There are issues that I think folks are worried about in terms of where do we sit? Are we at Fourth Street or on campus? And one of the things we are thinking about trying to work toward is having more people in close proximity to the folks that they're working with. So if you're in that Chem MPS region, hopefully you're in a building nearby. So if a faculty member needs you, they can walk over to the regional office and talk to you directly. We're also talking about merging pieces of the team, HR and RA's together, so that there's a closer working relationship. So in many ways, taking something that could be looked at as being a little bit balkanized and debalkanizing it and really making it a much more integrated, both academically and administratively, but also across the team a much more integrated model than we perhaps have in the past. What's the timeline look like for the transition? Okay, sorry. That's not such an easy question. There was an aspiration that this would happen fairly quickly. It will take longer than I think some would like. However, the critical piece here is to make sure we get it right. We don't want to make a misstep with this. So the second region I think is coming together nicely. I think the Bio College of Natural Resources region is beginning to take shape as well. And I think we'll start to see some progress there in the next few weeks. And then the professional schools are moving along as well. And theirs is probably the most challenging because they have nine deans. So they have to figure out how nine deans will pick an associate dean first of all, what their governance structure will look like, how they're going to work together collectively in the future. So that's a pretty big challenge. But I will say they are fully engaged. The one group that we haven't gotten as far along with I'd like is arts and humanities and social sciences. And we have meetings coming up with that particular part of the campus to start to really see if we can move that along as well. So there's no short answer. It will take longer than this June I think. But I think you'll start to see real progress by June. Then the sixth region just if I could is just as critical as the other five in many ways. Actually, I think it's $800 million worth of business will flow through that region. We need to make sure it's set up properly as well. And I know there's been some concern about which piece has ended up there. And we'll continue to work with the campus to make sure we have that the right shape. And also a similar kind of governance structure. So whether it's vice chancellors, whomever, we'll have a seat at the table and we'll be able to work together to make sure that we're providing the right services for the region. So I think that that whole subject offers a nice segue to another question that came from the audience given that we're talking about our future and evolution of systems and how we do business here. And this question is how are staff being considered in the strategic planning efforts in terms of staffing levels, skills needed, etc. And for those who may not be aware, the campus is now embarked on a broad strategic planning process involving the vision for who we want to be going down the road. So talk a little bit about how staff needs and interests are being accounted for and addressed and considered in that whole venture. Well it goes back I think of it to CSS and just thinking about what is the right staffing structure to support the endeavor. And part of this is redefining the endeavor, the strategic plan, is really thinking about what is Berkeley for the next 10 or 50 years, where are we headed. And I think there's a layer then that comes along with that where we really start to think about how do you get there. I don't know that we're far enough along in the process to really answer have we addressed the staffing model. But I like the question. It's a good reminder to me that we really need to think about that and move as soon as we have a sense of where the strategic plan is heading to layer on that very question to make sure that we have properly considered staff. So we're pretty early in the process. When did we start January? Yeah, January. So it's a really quick process and I believe it goes to the Chancellor in April or May. So it's very fast. So I like the question and we'll make sure that we keep that in our consideration. So the next question really here is about the workplace itself. And this is apparently there was some article recently on the internet that had to do with, I'm sorry, whoever wrote the question, I can't quite read the name of the website. But it was regarding workplace discrimination claims and questions that it raised about the campus investigative process and whether this person states whether we truly value an inclusive and equitable workplace. And so the question they pose is what plans do we have to address this in a way that people will believe and trust in and will believe that those who are in leadership positions on campus really espouse and live and practice the values that we give a lot of lip service to. So Chancellor Chris, we all know is very committed to this. Her entire organization is committed to this and we're going to, you know, make sure that we are mindful of this that we really understand where the issues are and what we can do to resolve those issues and make it a healthy, equitable, fair place for everyone to work. If we haven't done that, we will have missed a huge opportunity one and also do a disservice to the campus and its reputation. I mean, Berkeley's reputation is that of being an inclusive, forward-thinking place. We need to make sure and protect that. I have a message in the chairs. And, you know, I think it behooves all of us to work to that end. I know that there's been concern recently about specific areas on the campus where this might be an issue and I can tell you that my administration is really aware of that and we are looking for ways to make improvement whether that's where people sit, how they're organized, the structure of the organization, looking at all those pieces to make sure at the end of the day we really have considered the staff experience and make sure that it is fair and equitable for everybody on this campus that everyone's treated in a way that they feel good about. We have a lot of work to do here. You've seen the results of the engagement survey for this campus. They're not as good as I would like. You know, there are green boxes and red boxes. The campus has a lot of red boxes and very few green boxes. I came from a campus with a lot of green boxes and very few red boxes. Green is good, red is bad. So one of the challenges for me is to say what did we do differently there? What can we do here to improve the situation? How can we make this a really good place for everybody to work? And so we're aware of that and we're working on it and we know that we have not a lot of time because, you know, basically that survey tells us an awful lot about the current work experience, especially if you drill down and think about all the different groups on campus, all the demographic groups on campus. The level of satisfaction is pretty low in a lot of areas and we have some good challenges. In that regard, based on your past experience on other campuses, do you think it's primarily a matter of perception or substance or what have you noticed here? When you say we have a lot of work to do, what are the areas that you think demand that kind of work most immediately? I think communication is key. Really having the campus involved in what's happening on the campus, part of it I think is a sense of isolation on the campus is not getting enough information. We had our first town hall, I think it was last week, it seems longer, and I encourage all of you to participate in those processes. We'll have another one in the fall. It's a good source of information. What I'll be looking for in those going forward is really engaging you in the process. So if there are things you want to talk about in the town hall process, whether it's staff groups that want to participate, absolutely. That's the way I think we can open up lines of communication and make this a better place to work. If there are other things we need to do, engaging staff directly in the workplace, happy to do that. This is a chancellor, we're really lucky, who's already done a lot of that. We sold over the holidays in facilities. The chancellor came to their holiday event and they said that it never happened before. The tone, the mood, leaving the room was so much better. I think we take advantage of what I look at as really strong leadership at the top that wants to be engaged, wants to know what you are thinking and is really there to make sure that we make the best work environment possible. Chancellor Christ is really doing that already and I think all of us will be working hard with her to make sure that we are out with you as much as possible. Feel free to tell us what's going on or what bothers you. I always say in these meetings, my email address is really easy. My name is spelled M-A-R-C-F-I-S-H-E-R at Berkeley.edu. It's very simple to get a home of me. I read emails. I try to respond to them as quickly as possible and I might not always have an answer, probably don't always have an answer, but if there's something I can help you with, do contact me and don't be afraid to do that. Speaking of Chancellor Christ, the next person who posed a question referenced something that she's talked about which is our low tolerance for risk and how that influences our ability to think outside the box and the extent to which we actually can lean in and to address some of our problems with processes that were sort of a conservative institution. I think this person is really asking for your own assessment and how staff might be involved in that and in the context of sort of mandatory changes they seem really concerned about the ability to facilitate and implement change in the context of what is an environment that has this aversion or risk. How do you see that and what's your answer? Well, it's pretty process heavy here. I will say that. So there's definitely a level of risk aversion that is more so than what I've seen in the past. Having said that, I think you see why there's a pretty high level of risk aversion so it's not completely unusual. I do think though looking at things like we're looking at processes right now especially going into this next fiscal year, travel and entertainment. So there's an online travel form that seems to be working. It may need more work. We need to be thoughtful about how it's rolled out but I think it's a sort of tool that we really want to look at and say how can this serve the campus well, move resources quickly so that if you have been on travel and you come back, how are you compensated for the money you might have spent on that trip and I think there's some very strong potential here to really use certain tools that take away a level of bureaucracy and there's quite a bit of bureaucracy built into the current way of doing business here that I think we will need to simplify just to be able to meet the needs of the campus and provide a level of service that's commensurate with the quality of the place. Yeah, thanks. Let me just finish this off. Yeah, please. Your input's critical so the piece I didn't touch in there was if you have ideas or you think that's the stupidest idea ever, travel and entertainment, don't do that, let us know because or and or how we can improve it because in some comments there was a faculty member last week I think sent some really great notes through about how the travel form could be made better. That's good. That's great stuff because if you can take that current tool, tweak it and make it an even better tool, it will better serve the campus and that feedback is crucial. Rather than saying I hate it, I don't want to use it, why isn't it working and what can we do to make that a really solid tool going forward? So we're talking about process you've said a few times, let us know. What's the best way for people to do that? That's a great question too. You can always start by emailing me and I usually know who I'd send it to in our organization. That's not always the fastest way but let's start there. I like to know what's going on. Careful what you wish for. Exactly. I do have two email addresses. The other one is one called VCAT. I do not like that one because it doesn't get to me as fast. I really like the Mark Fisher one. Anyway. All right, here it comes. Blood in. So speaking about systems, this question is interesting and I think it probably resonates with a lot of people. Any chance we can stop charging each other just to use another room on campus? It's a little stuff, right? It's just too much work to get approvals and it doesn't really save or make money on balance anyway. So what the heck? What the heck is mine? Not there. So don't get me started on recharge. I think it's one of the weirdest things that was ever started in higher education. It just moves money in little circles. If it's truly new money, I'm all for it. Most of this is not new money. It's just circular money and it wastes a lot of time and energy and I think it's one of the great challenges here for us to really see how can we eliminate as much of this as possible. This gets back to how we core fund things like T efforts. I think that looking at that very carefully is really important. What are the common goods that we should have on the campus? How do you fund them? How do you make that move forward? Then you can start to get away from these little circles of money and all the complication associated with it. I'm fully supportive of trying to reduce that. Room rentals, it was one last week I think that we heard running academic space. It's not currently being utilized by the departments or their academic departments. What a bad idea. It just sets up one more piece where is that really an appropriate way to raise funds? Probably not. It just penalizes our academic endeavor. Especially as we've grown as much as we've grown without growing buildings or other resources using our space wisely is just critical. Talking about space, share your sort of assessment about the physical condition of the campus. Inside, outside, what you've been doing, what are the areas you're looking at going down the road? It certainly doesn't meet my standards which the folks around me know. When you say it, what do you mean? The condition of the campus. Whether that be grounds, interiors. But I think we're making huge progress. Having said that, there have been some really good things happening over the past six months that I'm very proud of. Let me back up and say it didn't meet my expectations when I got here but it's beginning to get closer to my expectations which is good. Again, the folks who are near me in our division will know that I pay attention to a lot of things that I'm really interested in. I try not to micromanage but I'm interested, trash cans are overflowing or the grounds aren't in good shape or I walk in an academic building with a dean and it's in bad shape. We'll work on that and we work on it very quickly. The condition of the parking structures is something that's come up recently and we're making a very concerted effort to try to clean up the garages. As I say, it's our first impression. Someone comes to campus if the garage isn't well painted, it's not well lit, there's trash on the floor. What message does that send? It sends a message that Berkeley is not a very high quality place. That's your first and probably your lasting memory of the place. I'll tell you something. My mother always said, the front door is the most important thing. If your front door isn't well painted and the glass by the door isn't clean, that's the impression you have of someone's home. This is a chance for us to change that first impression there as you walk the campus. The campus should look great. Then getting into the buildings and in order to support what you all do out there, we need to make sure that they're well managed as well. We have a lot of deferred maintenance. We're in the middle of a process right now, something called ICAMP. It's a system-wide process where we look in detail how much deferred maintenance do we really have. We say $700 million, I think of Rajiv, I don't think he's in the room, but he would tell you it's probably with Seismic closer to $2 billion of deferred. Two billion with a B? B, with a B. That's both for Seismic upgrade and for deferred maintenance. I think our deferred maintenance number will probably approach a billion dollars. That's big. However, we have found some resources. We're beginning to make some progress out there. Progress against a billion dollars worth of deferred maintenance is going to take a while for us to start to chip away at that. You can do a lot of little things along the way that will make it much more bearable to be in older buildings that really need probably total refresh. Again, making the work experience better for everyone, faculty, staff, and students. It's a big problem, but I think we're beginning to chip away at it. There have been some structural changes in facilities that are very good. There's some new staff there that are incredibly good, actually. I think as you walk the campus, you'll probably, I hope, you're seeing there's less trash. The grounds are more well-tended to, and you'll see more and more of that going forward. Speaking of trash, which brings up the idea of recycling and sustainability is also in your bailiwick. What are some new initiatives going on there, and what are your designs and intentions for that part of your operation? Kira Stolls is in the back of the room. She's the person in charge of sustainability for the campus. That role was elevated just after I got here. Kira now reports directly to me. Sustainability is now front and center in terms of an important issue on the campus. I don't think that it was unimportant, but it now has a re-heightened focus. We have some very big challenges ahead of us. One is carbon neutrality by 2025. Carbon neutrality means that you no longer really burn natural gas if you're really going to meet carbon neutrality. Everything on the campus would be electrified. It's impossible. All the campuses are challenged by this. Stanford spent $480 million to electrify their campus and got to 80% carbon reduction. We won't get there without doing some things that are similar over time, and in the short term we'll do things that the students don't like, like buying carbon offsets. It's not a permanent solution, but it's a way to get to that goal of 2025. That's, by the way, a president's initiative. It's something President Apolitano is very convinced that we should do. She's committed to it, and I think we have a lot of work to do in that particular area for our campus, because we do burn a lot of natural gas for our cogem plant. And now that we own and operate the cogem plant, it is our carbon. Before that it was someone else's carbon. We now have a big carbon problem here to work on. So we're certainly thinking about that. By 2020 we're supposed to reduce our waste stream to only 10% that goes to the landfill. Right now 50% of our waste goes to the landfill. We are actually, I think, at the lowest level in the UC in terms of trash diversion. That sounds like a bad story. It's tempered by the fact that we've reduced our overall waste stream, and it's one of the factors that really needs to be more carefully reviewed at the system-wide level. Having said that, we still have a big challenge. By 2020, to get to 90% diversion is going to take everybody in this room working really hard to make that happen. So what does that mean? You're going to start to see more recycling containers. I see some of the back of the room in all your offices throughout the academic buildings. You'll start to see more of those big trash collection devices out on campus. They're called, what are they called? Big Belly, thank you. They're called Big Birth and Santa Barbara. So they're Big Belly. They do a couple things. One, they sort the trash stream into multiple streams, which is great. They also compact the trash so that it takes less staff to keep them emptied. They're generally cleaner than a normal trash can. They don't have the positive benefit for the aesthetic of the campus. In fact, the newest ones have a foot pedal, which I encourage you to try because it means you don't have to touch anything with your hands, which is also nice for some of us who don't like to do that, necessarily. So those sorts of moves are all going to help with this. Again, though, it is a big challenge. The students are very engaged. They're going to want you to be very engaged and faculty as well. So one of the, I think, big challenges is getting together to get there. An extra complication of Berkeley is we're so porous. So if someone picks up something for lunch at, say, Subway across the street on Bancroft, and they carry the trash back to campus, and I have some pet peeves with the way Subway packages things. They use a lot of material, I think. When they carry that back to campus, that goes into our waste stream. Very hard then to separate that out and say it's really not ours. We need to think carefully about what our zero-waste effort looks like and how we define the edges until the city of Berkeley is at the same place we are. And I know that they're trying to achieve the same goal, but we're not quite in step. And one of the things going forward, working hard with the city to make sure that our efforts are well-aligned. Thanks. Circle back now to sort of staff issues. Interesting question here. Could the administration start a program that honors and acknowledges staff volunteer contributions on and off campus? Maybe even badges or community bonus points. And I think this also reflects on a broader issue about workplace development and just how we engage people who work here, not just in terms of what they do between nine to five or eight to six or in some cases seven to seven. But sort of all the things that they do is part of their public service commitments and as members of the community here. Short answer, yes, I think it's a great idea. I think this is one of the big questions for how we recognize how long staff have been on the campuses. I think in the old model, you don't get that first pin until 10 years, is that right? There's really no recognition of how long you've been in the UC. And we know there's some generational changes for folks who may not want a career that goes for 30 or 40 years. And so I think recognizing staff earlier, more regularly, outside of that formal pin process, it makes a lot of sense. And I think particularly for the millennial generation being very thoughtful about how do we make sure this is a really great place to be and that they feel like we're recognizing and honoring their efforts. So sure, I don't think Joe's in the room today, but that's something I can take back to Joe Magnus and talk about. In that same vein, I mean, given the length of time that you've been at the UC and three different campuses, you don't like the length of time thing, do you? No. How do you characterize? What are the commonalities staff have at the various campuses? I worked in the private sector and it seems it's very different in amazing ways, but I'm wondering what your own perception is having set at the apex of the HR system and administrative systems on these campuses? One, a level of dedication. I think staff, many most staff, most all staff, really believe in the place, believe in the endeavor, which is great, are committed to it and really, and you know, I think it's fun to be in higher education, frankly. You feel like you've done something good, I think, at the end of the day, you know? I wasn't in the private sector long enough to know there are certain rewards there that we don't have here. On the other hand, I just can't imagine a 23-year career someplace else, frankly. You know, this is just a great place to spend a big chunk of your life and staff are really important in that. Across the UC, they really I haven't seen a place yet in the UC where the staff haven't been really dedicated to the place. Interesting. This plays into another question that just came up from the audience here, and it is that as more reductions in staff are requested or contemplated, how do you ensure the time-sensitive issues, especially in HR, that might not be addressed as quickly as mandated by law won't cause an increased legal cost as staff doesn't have the bandwidth to sort of work on those issues. And I think I would actually ask that you expand that into other departments, too, that as we become leaner, that doesn't change the things we need to do that are mandated by regulation law and UC policies. How do you address that? How do you think about that? You definitely want to protect the core mission, making sure we have the right resources in place to help serve the academic and research endeavor. The teaching experience is critical. Having said that, we're going through a tough year, I think Paul said this in his comments, that this is a particularly tough year in the restructuring the finances for this campus. We're trying right now to make sure that as we go into the tail end of this year, that we're really structured in a way that we're ready to handle some changing, frankly, on the campus. And the cabinet is keenly aware of what we need to do process-wise and trying to make sure that we don't overburden areas of staff and that the process can be handled in a smart civil way. And so we're very, very conscious of what the demands are on staff. Taking that to a different position making sure that staff if it is a leader environment that the staff are not being asked to do things the old bureaucratic way that we're really trying to reduce the effort so that the staff can manage what they've been tasked to do in a way that is not producing unnecessary stress. So it really is combining both things and making sure that processes are properly structured and that we have the right staff and the right numbers and the right places. So I want to push back a little or just sort of focus in a little more on the bureaucracy issue. It's come up in a number of areas. I've been here for 14 years and it's like the weather. Everybody talks about it. There doesn't seem to be much that we can do about it. What do you think the keys are to actually making progress on deburocratizing if there is such a word in an institution that's as far-flung, decentralized and complex as this one? Well, I think it takes broad buy-in. So I think for example, in the shared service model as we look at the regions having the deans and the associate deans co-own this with us will help us streamline processes. When it's somebody else's effort, you can say, oh, just let them do it. Oh, they're not doing a very good job and I don't understand why. Well, you don't understand that they're maybe really understand. And I think that this regionalization will allow us to be better integrated into the academic departments and then really seeing where the resources in the departments and in CSS, for example, that might be complementary and how those resources can be best utilized to get everything done that needs to be done but also doesn't stress any one part of it. It's no longer them and us, it's us. And I think that's really critical. I think the only way to really take away a level of bureaucracy is changing the mindset to we're all together in this. But I think we're headed there, frankly, which is great. A lot of good effort. Something else that I've heard, I think we've all heard the chancellor talk a lot about rightly so is one of the key values for the university and that's diversity. How do you think about diversity? When you hear that word, I mean, that some people just think of it in terms of racial or ethnic or gender or how do you think about diversity? Is that something that's important for this campus, for the UC as a whole? And what's happening in your realm in that regard? We're much richer when we're in a richer environment. When there's more diversity, we'll lead to a much more sophisticated richer place to be. And that is in all sorts of ways, whether it be gender or race or ability, physical abilities. All those factors need to be understood and we need to make sure that the entire community is really included in making this a great place to be. Diversity is a very important piece for us right now, I think. And I think Berkeley has a lot of diversity. It's a question of is it diverse enough in all ways, in all layers? And I think that's where I think we have some work to do to make sure that we really do have a diverse population that has all the right tools to do what I did, for example. How do you move up in the system if there are impediments what can we do to change that? I'll give you an example from the Santa Barbara campus. We had a lot of Spanish-speaking employees, especially in the services. And it came to my attention through the union reps that this was kind of a glass ceiling. And so we brought in the city college group to produce language skills, to teach classes in English, English in the second language. It was hugely beneficial. So you start to see the glass ceiling begins to erode because the language barrier is eroding. And it made a lot of difference for the employees and the engagement, staff level, engagement there was I think a lot better because of this. And I'm not saying that's something we need to do here, although I have heard some suggestion that we might think about that as well. We did that on our time. The employees were paid to take the classes essentially. They got college credit for it, which worked really well. For a lot of them, they hadn't gone to college. College credits and a little graduation ceremony meant a lot to them personally. So it was one of those things that we did that I think helped erase some of the barriers to upward mobility. And I always say if you're happy in your job, fine. That's great. I think there are a lot of very noble things that you can do. If you're good there, that's great. It's if you want to move up and can't, that's a problem. And so to the extent that we can foster upward mobility for those who want it, then we need to work on that. And I think that's probably true across the whole UC system, frankly. I want to circle back to something you said earlier, that this is going to be a difficult, challenging year. In your experience, how do you think about adversity? What are the keys to institutional resilience? And how do we make sure that we're both addressing and understanding concerns and anxieties that staff can hold during a period like this? It's a great question and something I would like to touch on. So if you look at the administrative endeavor on the campus sort of the non-academic side, our cut this year is about $20 million, but that's not really the full number. It's really $36 million when you add into that merit and benefits increases. I'm going to be honest with you, that's going to have an impact. However, as we look at the numbers, it's not quite the impact that I thought it could be. It's not as bad a story. It's not a perfect story by any means. I'm not going to lie to you. However, there's some clever things that have been done that I think are really, should be recognized. And one of them, and Dan and I were talking earlier about bringing back the cogeneration plan. Why was that a good idea for the campus? And why was that a good idea in the context of all the other things we were doing? Why would you do that? And I think the question I've imposed was we buy energy fairly inexpensively from PG&E. We actually don't. We pay a premium for energy from PG&E. I think it's about 20 cents a kilowatt hour. We produce energy at around 8 cents a kilowatt hour. By taking the plant back, we're actually saving energy cost. So saving energy cost means that we now have a place to offset what might have been a staff reduction. That's a very positive thing. So I think it's really critical that we all think together about how we can do things like save energy on the campus because saving energy, I'll be really blunt, can save jobs. And that's just a smart way to do business. I'll personalize that. When you leave your office, turn off the lights. When you think of any place you can help reduce energy, think about this in terms of, hmm, my colleagues, you know, if I want to keep my colleagues here, I'm going to reduce my energy use somehow. And that energy footprint is really critical. So I think there have been some very smart things done. I think in some of our areas in particular, there were positions that just weren't filled. So let's free the resource back up. And or there are things we were doing that we don't need to do going forward, which frees up resources. So I think it's a combination of every clever thing we can possibly do to, you know, maintain the staff that we can going forward. But with the recognition that $36 million is a big number still. So it's important. Yeah. So we've come to the end of the questions in the session, which, and I really want to thank you for what we're forthcoming and candid and comprehensive remarks. And just thanks for coming today. Thank you. Thank all of you. And just to remind everybody that I think the final one for this academic year, the final campus conversation is on April 24 at noon in the same place with none other than Chancellor Carol Christ and look forward to seeing you all then. Thank you. Thank you.