Harris is one of the few UO VP’s to have ever undergone a performance review, I believe in 2010. It did not go well. Jim Bean kept him on anyway. Then in January, while Bean was on sabbatical, Lorraine Davis took the opportunity to fire Harris and run an open national search for a replacement. She did this successfully, hiring Melissa Woo from UW-Milwaukee, who starts in September. Meanwhile Harris has been given the usual JH sinecure, $206,484 plus benefits and no job responsibilities until his contract runs out Jan 31, 2013. Expensive, but my take is that if it hadn’t been for Davis taking over during Bean’s sabbatical we’d have been paying his salary forever. Letter and contract here. 8/15/2012.
And so … ?
Bean’s a distraction, and perfect for a one note samba. Davis, on the other hand, might be too hot for a muckraker like you?
Lets face it, Lorraine Davis has been one of few standing between UO and the abysses of Moseley, Brady, and Bean. That said I don’t think I’ve been shy about pointing out her various athletic scams.
Point taken…but suggesting that LD has been a better administrator than Moseley, Brady, or Bean is setting an awfully low bar for UO administration. Wish we could do better…
Davis was by all accounts a very decisive and crisply efficient manager (though I don’t know her, or Bean for that matter). But it has never been clear to me whether she brought any academic values or credentials to bear on her decision-making. She certainly had little experience of the academic world beyond UO.
I have long thought that (a) UOMatters gives Davis a pass just so he can try to make Bean look bad in comparison and/or (b) UOMatters doesn’t care whether the provost is academically-minded or not as long as s/he is a competent manager.
UOMatters is too kind to LGD. She has been a ‘willing helper’ in all the actions that this blog has condemned. And done very well for herself in the process. Capt. Nemo
Dog says
what does the above post even mean?
well at least I found a rendition of “one note samba” by Ella Fitzgerald on You Tube so that was worth it.
yes, amazing scat singing.
I am not clear on why Harris was disliked and removed. I have worked with him a bit and I thought he seemed very competent, but my work with him was not relevant to his job. I asked this question when the news first broke, and I got some rather technical gobbledygook (to my eyes) about networking compatibility problems from a commenter who I think was an IT person. Anybody want to offer their take?
Dog says
There are a lot of reasons but the top generic 3 would be
1) Failure to move IS/IT to the modern world of open source – too much reliance on legacy and proprietary systems – UOdocs – are you kidding me?
2) Failure to produce a research computing environment (like we don’t have one at all)
3) Created huge friction between groups inside the locked down building. Terrible morale, large turnover, complete disrespect
to Network Services.
We lost considerable ground because of this and are now very much in the IT/IS backwaters compared to where we should be.