TVA’s problem with “cause and effect”
December 19, 2009
Once when I was a young boy with a BB gun, I accidently discharged it in a stairwell in the apartment we lived in. Here are the facts: I did fire the BB gun in the stairwell but I believed it caused no harm. The landlord, pointing to a large window with an obvious small mark of something that had caused the outside of the hole to break off thought otherwise. My parents paid for the window replacement.
My defense: I admitted that the BB gun discharged accidentally in the stairwell, however, the small hole in the glass was shattered from the outside so therefore it could not have come from my gun. I held firm in my belief until later in life I discovered that a BB shot from inside a window actually causes the outside to shatter.
Here’s the problem with TVA and its “root cause” analysis so far. It’s a matter of cause and effect. The cause of the ash dam collapse simply could not have stemmed from anything the TVA had done. Holding on to that childish belief, the TVA already has spent millions trying to disprove what already is fact.
The cold, stark realization may not come to TVA until a court proves they were negligent.
I believe the “root cause” of TVA’s multiplicity of problems actually stems from the TVA culture. It has been recognized for decades and was mentioned by OIG Richard Moore in a House hearing when he cited a 1987 report which recognized the root cultural problem. He says it is the same today and he can do nothing about it.
If management obviously will only give lip service to the problem and the OIG who is supposed to make recommendations to solve this core issue, if they will not solve it, there is only one reasonable solution – dissolution of the TVA.
Here’s what one TVA employee told me: (It sounds 1984ish to me)
“We can't seem to escape our daily dose of social engineering...this is one way TVA has tried for years to "change the culture". To some extent, they have told the same lie in different shades of grey for so long, they have succeeded in convincing themselves that this is the "right way to do business". Fortunately, many of us retain the ability to see through the lies, and hopefully as many will not be corrupted by them.”
Ernest Norsworthy
emnorsworthy@earthlink.net
http://norsworthyopinion.com