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e e e this change through service teams, which work directly with the public, and management teams, which coordinate the work of various divisions in their departments. In conclusion, he said he believed the City has done a good job in reducing overhead and that, instead of further reducing the number of managers in the organization, the most likely way to achieve further efficiencies and reduce costs would be through adopting total quality management (TQM) methods. He felt that if there was a major dysfunction in the City's current management, it was around systems, many of which are superimposed by State law or past practice. He said he believed that the Eugene Decisions process was leading the City in the direction of reexamining these systems to achieve further savings. He said that given the high reliance on self-directed work activi- ties throughout the organization, more training is needed organization-wide. Responding to a question from Mr. MacDonald, Mr. Gleason said he expects assessment of customer satisfaction to become systematic as part of the or- ganization's work teams' efforts in the future. He said he believed that there are dysfunctions that need to be addressed, but felt it is not attrib- utable to incompetent staff members. He reiterated that the Eugene Decisions process was leading the City in a direction towards continually improving services by assessing what the customer is buying. Responding to questions from Mr. Boles, Mr. Gleason explained that a task team comprises staff members from different divisions and works on cross- divisional issues. For example, there is currently a task team charged with exploring cost reductions of the City's fringe benefits program. On a dif- ferent note, he said that due to job demands, most of the supervision at the work team level occurs over and above the regular work hours, for which most first-line supervisors are not compensated. Mr. Boles suggested developing a matrix that can be used to determine the cost of management in proportion to the City's total personnel budget. Mr. Robinette suggested including uncompensated time in the matrix. Mr. Gleason pointed out that managers spend a significant amount of time managing money in addition to employees. Mr. MacDonald suggested continuing discussion on the TQM concept at a future meeting and asked that the discussion include the idea of creating an inde- pendent loop in which customers can provide feedback. Mr. Robinette noted that he has completed a draft outline regarding the book, Reinventing Government, copies of which should have been provided to all councilors as requested by the Council Committee on Eugene Decisions. He said he hoped that councilors read the book before the council begins delib- erating on the strategies. Responding to a question from Mr. Green, Mr. Gleason said employee perfor- mance problems are dealt with by supervisors. MINUTES--Eugene City Council 7:30 p.m. June 8, 1992 Page 5