The real problem of facelessness

by Nick Charney

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I wrote a few weeks ago about the facelessness of bureaucrats (See: How Can Bureaucrats Be Interesting When the World Demands that they be Boring), the ensuing conversation focused a lot on the question of whether or not bureaucrats can remain faceless given the pressures of the new media environment. What I've come to realize since then is that its the wrong question to be asking.

Bureaucratic cultures are indeed defined by facelessness

But not the facelessness between individual public servants and the public they serve but rather among and between individual public servants themselves. By this I mean that facelessness isn't some abstract problem out there where we interface with the public, but rather a very real problem in here where we interact with one another.

I may be wrong, but I can't help but wonder if we are slowly coming to the conclusion that our self-isolating, postmodern and deconstructivist organizational cultures are no longer tenable. That it is no longer sufficient to accept as given the close reading and even closer enforcement of rules without reference to the cultural, ideological, and moral opinions of those who first brought those rules to bear. In the words of Derrida, "Il n'y a pas de hors-texte" (there is no such thing as outside-of-the-text) is no longer a cultural pillar we can build around.

In other words, are we realizing that we need to move away from facelessness and rehumanize the civil service? Is this the mountain that may or may not be ready to move? (See: Moving Public Service Mountains, Part 1)

I can't say for sure, but I get the sense that it may be time to shift rewards away from the cold comforts of facelessness and the predictability that rules, frameworks and protocols afford. Make no mistake, these things are still needed, but they ought to be used to build platforms for civil servants and public services to stand on proudly, not cast shadows for them to hide in.

The most obvious and important realities are often are the ones that are hardest to see and talk about. 

Above is an excerpt from a new take on a commencement speech given by David Foster Wallace that went viral last week.

Watch it (embedded below)

Its simple, effective and drives home the discussion I think we ought to be having about problem of facelessness and the deference to "the default setting" of our shared office cultures. It also does it in a far more convincing manner than I ever could.

Rearranging the Briefing Room Chairs on the Bonaventure

by Kent Aitken

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Yesterday, my colleague joked on Twitter that his son had agreed to make the family lunches as part of his allowance, but the bread, mustard, and cheese sandwich from day one wasn't exactly up to snuff. I joked back that he should institute a sandwich accountability framework and make a portion of his son's allowance at-risk, contingent upon results.

Er, it's just something bureaucrats do.

Sorry.

And Speaking of Segues

My colleague responded – as any normal person should – that in fact, he was just going to teach his son how to be a better sandwich maker. And then simply let said sandwich maker, well, make sandwiches.

My colleague is accidentally following the advice from the 1962/1963 Glassco Report. This report, formally the Royal Commission on Government Organization, published recommendations for the management of the public service of Canada. The most memorable of which was this lasting soundbite: “Let the manager manage.”

How'd that work out?

Shortly thereafter, the Canadian House of Commons spent a considerable amount of time debating the minutia of contracts for the retrofitting of the aircraft carrier Bonaventure. As Donald Savoie explains in Whatever Happened to the Music Teacher:

“During the debate, opposition members from all parties hurled accusations at the government and concluded with pleas to introduce 'administrative integrity.' Specific details were brought up, including the awarding of two separate contracts – for different amounts – to remove fifty-two chairs from the Bonaventure's briefing room.”

That was 1970. Despite it being less than a decade after the Glassco Report, the resounding call was for increased oversight, rather then letting managers figure out the underlying issues and manage on. Increased oversight may protect the public purse in the short term, but it may also lead to important questions going unanswered, or worse, unasked.

Did decision-makers have the information they needed to make solid decisions?

Were theygenerally well-equipped to do their jobs?

Asking Tough Questions

I suspect Glassco would prefer the story of Tom Watson Jr., former CEO of IBM. As legend would have it, a young executive once walked into Watson's office after making a decision that cost the company millions, expecting to be fired. Watson's response was that firing was out of the question because, as he put it, he had “just spent a couple of million dollars educating” the executive.

No kneejerk reaction, no changes to accountability regimes. Watson recognized the difference between structural deficiencies and management issues. In that case, the issue was an ill-prepared executive. In my colleague's, it was an inexperienced sandwich maker.

Asking tough questions about the whybehind events is the sustainable approach. And it leads to good results. For sandwiches and management.

Learning plans are a crutch and I'd rather learn without one

First let me start by saying that the line of reasoning I am about to present to you may go somewhat against the grain; feel free to take issue or prove me wrong, as you will see below, its been done before.


I am not a fan of learning plans

My main contention is that organizations that are serious about learning don't have learning plans they have learning cultures. They don't have forms that need to be filled out, justifications that need writing, and approvals that need approving. Rather they position learning a cultural cornerstone of everyday activity, encourage inquisitive minds and guard against permission based barriers.

my crutches by dimtri_66

Learning plans are inherently antagonistic

I also think that learning plans reinforce organizational power differentials by reducing employees to applicants and managers to approvers.  This leads to skirmishes over justifications and shrinking resource pools.



Learning plans are biased towards a particular model of learning

In general, organizational training authorizations forms (the one's I have seen) are biased towards classroom or conference (learning event) based training. Where, for example, is the box on the form that allows me to express my desire for a more nuanced approach to learning?

They are also biased towards the here and now, I was recently asked to complete a 3-year training plan. How can I honestly complete it when the things I want to learn - the prescient things in my field - haven't even been invented yet?


Let me tell you a little story about learning plans

A few years ago, my boss at the time informed me that I needed to fill out a learning plan. We had an excellent relationship and while we agreed that we didn't really need a learning plan that is was mandatory.

So, I decided to have a bit of fun.

I took out a stamp my wife got me when I was a teacher's assistant and stamped the learning plan with it; the stamp read "Complete and Utter Bullshit". Signed it, turned it in, cajoled the admin into giving it to my Director General (DG), knowing full well it would get a good laugh but wind up back on my desk.

We were a small team (about 7 in total) so it didn't take long (I literally split a single office with the admin and our DG sat in the office next to ours).  A few hours later the learning plan was on my desk with a little note asking me to redo it. This time I decided to write a single line on the training form:

"All I want is the flexibility to discuss reasonable learning opportunities as they arise."

Again, I signed it and sent it up the pipe. Again it came down with a redo post it affixed to it. Finally I acquiesced. I wrote down a conference that was a few weeks away knowing full well that it would be near impossible to get it through the approval chain given that it was in DC (technically an international conference and thus subject to greater approvals).

Long story short, I submitted the form trying to prove that learning plans don't actually work and my DG proved me wrong.

She approved my training plan, and personally shepherded the request through the system and wound up in DC attending an O'Reilly Media Government 2.0 conference.  That woman went to the wall to get me to that conference. But I doubt proving me wrong was her motivation, she just wanted to honour her commitment because that's the type of person she was (and probably still is - we no longer work together).

I suppose in retrospect that learning plan did teach me something: that a learning plan is less important than the relationship between the people negotiating it.

That the former is only as strong as the latter.

That I ought invest more time in building relationships than filling out forms.

That a learning plan is a kind of crutch, and I'd rather learn without one.





Originally published by Nick Charney at cpsrenewal.casubscribe/connect