One issue these days has been setting most Harvard employees decidely on edge.

The issue is "contracting out."

For top Harvard administrators, contracting out is an increasingly attractive alternative to in-house labor which may increase efficiency and lower costs.

For local union leaders, contracting out is Harvard's weapon for squeezing workers and threatening their livelihoods.

Contracting out is the process by which Harvard replaces its employees in a graduate school dining hall with a private catering service; or exchanges its guards for members of a for-profit security service; or displaces maintenance workers with competitive non-University firms--and often pays lower wages to the outside help.

The most recent, and successful example of this practice occurred five months ago when Harvard terminated many painters, carpenters, plumbers and other workers under an agreement with their unions and with ISS Energy Services Co., which hired many of the former Harvard employees.

As a result of the process, the University can now accept competitive bids from many outside firms for maintenance work.

Edward W. Powers, associate general counsel and Harvard's chief labor negotiator, said that working with outside firms makes it easier to get jobs done.

"We've had great difficulty getting our trades people to cross [job classification] lines--if we send a carpenter to do a job, he won't pick up a paintbrush." Powers said, explaining that since most outside contracting companies are not unionized, no rules prevent them from working at several jobs.

But for the workers, the more relaxed regulations governing non-union labor can mean harder work and lower wages. Also, not all employees dismissed by the University find work in the "real world."

Some of the ex-Harvard workers initially accepted by ISS were later fired from the new positions because they did not meet company standards, ISS officials said.

Powers said that some of the workers ISS fired might have been allowed to continue at Harvard, but added this was just an example of the increased efficiency available under private contracting. He added that no personal contracts were violated.

Still, negotiations for and the execution of Harvard's contracting out to ISS did not prove as warlike as many had expected. Both sides cited similar reasons for the cooperation; much of the work involved was already contracted for by outside firms and ISS is a self-unionized company, so the move could not be interpreted as an outright attempt to circumvent local labor power.

"Historically, outside subcontractors had done work at Harvard in addition to in-house maintenance," explained John Simmons, business agent for the local painters' union, adding that this holds true especially for the painters, almost all of whom Harvard needs only during the summers.

"Harvard manned for the valleys in structural trades [during the academic year], not for the peaks during the summer," Powers said.