One of the project leaders under the $4.5 million Tandem Motion contract is a “former head of operations and HR for an international corporation (who also happens to enjoy staying connected with her hometown community by serving as a barista when she visits home,)” Alaska Administration Commissioner Kelly Tshibaka said in a state press release.

Most of Alaska’s major newspapers have now printed the press release in full, without doing any reporting on Tshibaka’s assertions or the unfair labor practice allegation regarding the contract.

There has been no reporting on the unusual steps Tshibaka took to help steer the contract to Tandem Motion, such as writing a letter of recommendation. Other state employees who work under Tshibaka, including Deputy Commissioner Amanda Holland, also wrote letters of recommendation for the Seattle company.

The commissioner said “for this particular contract, the department does not anticipate spending more than $4 million total.”

If so, Tshibaka’s department should never have signed the $4.5 million, six-month deal on Aug. 14, with two possible $6.1 million renewals, with a total potential value of $16.8 million.

Tshibaka referred to me as a “fake news blogger,” which is not nearly as imaginative as the inflated description she provided in her press release about the resume of the former barista.

I have nothing but respect for young people who work hard and strive to improve themselves and their place in the world. I do not demean this person’s experience as a barista or her education. She is clearly a hard worker.

But in trying to defend the Tandem Motion contract, Tshibaska exaggerated the amount of experience that this person has and misled Alaskans.

Meg Sayre, the former barista, was head of operations and human resources at a small company called Elavo Supply from April to August this year. According to its LinkedIn page, Elavo Supply is a privately held company with from 11-50 employees, founded in 2019.

I don’t see how Tshibaka can describe it in good conscience as an “international corporation” or why she neglected to mention that Sayre only had the job for five months this year.

Sayre’s resume says “as head of operations, Meg oversaw the daily business activities of the company, managed projects across five divisions, and coordinated with an international partner and 15 international resellers.”

After I wrote about Tandem Motion, many of the workers made their LinkedIn pages private. Much of what follows is from screenshots I made when their pages were accessible.

Sayre was a freelance United Way consultant from January to May this year, a program evaluation consultant in February and March, and an organizational assessment consultant in January and February.

She was a fulltime barista from July 2018 to July 2019, working six days a week at a restaurant on Vashon Island.

She graduated from high school in 2014 and earned a bachelor’s degree from Middlebury College in 2018. She earned a master’s degree this year.

She is listed at an hourly rate of $350 an hour, for a total of $358,400 for six months. That is an exceptionally high amount for someone with limited experience.

Under the Tandem Motion contract, she is a “human capital manager” leading the “workstream”of the project management office and “organizational change management.”

“Ms. Sayre will be accountable for producing weekly status reports, the establishment of KPIs (key performance indicators) and reporting and maintenance, the objectives and performance management timetable, and the project plan. Ms. Sayre will be accountable for the work produced by a team of Human Capital Consultants, the Media Production Specialist, and the Visual Communications Designer,” Tandem Motion said in its submission.

Sayre is not the only person with limited professional experience earning a high hourly wage under this contract.

One of the subcontractors on the project is the Center for Organizational Research in Akron, Ohio at the University of Akron.

The center’s website identifies Alexandra Petruzzelli, as the graduate student coordinator. She earned a master’s degree from the University of Akron in 2018. She earned a bachelor’s degree in Florida in 2015.

Working on the Tandem Motion contract, Petruzzelli is to cost $350 an hour as a “human capital manager” for 1,024 hours, a total of $358,400 in six months.

Human capital consultant Emily Raulston is to cost $250 an hour, working 1,024 hours for a total of $256,000 in six months. She earned a bachelor’s degree in 2016 from Seattle University and a master’s in 2020 from Minnesota State University in Mankato.

She was a graduate assistant from August 2018 to May 2019 at the university and part-time assistant director of the Organizational Effectiveness Research Group at MSU from August 2019 to May 2020. The research group is another subcontractor.

Trevor Frey, a graduate teaching assistant at Mankato from August 2019 to May 2020, earned a master’s degree this year from MSU, with a thesis on “The Effects of Positive and Negative Humor at Work.”

Frey’s cost is listed at $250 an hour for 1,024 hours, a total of $256,000 over six months as a “human capital consultant.” He worked as a “boat mate” in Florida for the first seven months of 2018.

Cara Griffith, the managing director of the project, is listed at an hourly rate of $500, a total of $532,000 for six months, while her husband, Kurt Griffith, who works in IT, is pegged at $250 an hour, a total of $266,000 for work as a “human capital consultant.”

Cara Griffith earned a master’s degree from Seattle Pacific in 2014 and worked at Accenture from 2014-2018 as a “strategy talent and organizational consultant.”

This document submitted by Tandem Motion calls for 54 workers at costs that range from $27 an hour to $500 an hour. The number of hours worked over the next six months by each person will range from 10 hours on the low end to 1,064 on the high end.

Tshibaka’s press release leaves key questions unanswered. It should be the impetus for more reporting on the origins of this contract and its implementation.

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