You Cant Polish a Turd The Civil Servants Manual by George Fripley

ISBN 1453705546 EAN 9781453705544 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

You Cant Polish A Turd was first published by Night Publishing, a

trading name of Valley Strategies Ltd., a UK-registered private limited-liability company, registration number 5796186. Night Publishing can be contacted at http://www.nightpublishing.com.

You Cant Polish A Turd is the copyright of the author, George

Fripley, 2010. All rights are reserved. The front cover image is the copyright of the designer, Bruce Essar, 2010. All rights are reserved. All characters are fictional, and any resemblance to anyone living or dead is accidental.

Section 1 Introduction

You Cant Polish a Turd You cant polish a turd. This is an old saying with which prospective government employees should become familiar. Do not misunderstand me; the civil service is a fine occupation for the young person wondering what to do with their lives, or how best they may be able to serve their fellow human beings. However, some things, like turds, are simply not capable of being made to look or smell any better than they already do, however bad that may be. This is a fine metaphor to use when talking about government. There are systems in place that have been there for years that really stink. Even a cursory glance will reveal that they work about as well as a rusted old museum exhibit. However, and this is the crucial point for any person wishing to work in government, it is futile to try to clean them up and make them run more smoothly. Many a delusional individual has brought out the oil and the rust remover, confident that they can fix the problem and transform an ancient and clunky process into a gleaming, well-oiled example of a modern cutting-edge procedure. They usually end up wandering the corridors muttering to themselves in corners, occasionally bursting into tears, and looking like the weight of the world has been dropped upon their shoulders. A look back at the government machine shows that it is still there clanking along, still covered in rust, still looking like the two-thousand year old dinosaur that it is. The system is also hazardous to the employee in another way; it sucks out part of the personality of anyone who tries to tamper with it, leaving them unable to escape from its dark clutches. This is the

fate of those who do not heed the information in this book. They will end up with their soul trapped within the machinery of government with the life being squeezed out of them, unable to improve matters, and unable to escape to another job. Trust me when I say that you do not want to end up like this. Changing how government works is like trying to stop the tide coming in. The machine will suck you in, chew you up and imprison you for life. As long as you understand this, you are well on your way to a successful and rewarding career. This book will provide you with the necessary arsenal of weapons that will enable you to establish a position, defend it, and gradually increase your area of influence within the system. What you will learn will include:

how to get a job within government; the five paradigms of government; the people you will need to deal with on a daily basis and the mysteries of dealing with boards and senior bureaucrats; tips on how to enjoy your day within a government environment; valuable information on the effective use of jargon; and useful snippets from current and past experts. So, if you are considering a career in the civil service, or have recently embarked on such a career, this is the book for you; its

principles apply to all levels of government. If you think that you may soon need to apply to the government for an approval of some description, then this is also the book for you. If you are merely an interested spectator and wish to know how your taxes are spent, then this is most definitely the book for you. So read on and learn the secrets.

Section 2: BASIC SKILLS

Government Philosophy for Beginners Before embarking on a journey through the convoluted corridors of government process, it is, perhaps, useful to gain some understanding of the philosophy that provides the foundations for current government procedures. To do this we need to look back at early civilizations. It is there that we will find our answers. For many thousands of years people have lived with forms of government that included feudal systems, totalitarian monarchs and dictators, forms of democracy, or in some cases, total anarchy. During the formative years of democracy, some two thousand years ago, there were some significant thinkers who studied the way the systems worked and developed advice for those involved. Prior to working in government, it is wise for potential bureaucrats to take time to research these philosophers. This will assist in understanding the environment into which they are going. While numerous individuals have studied the area, four major philosophers carved out reputations as being at the forefront of this field. These are Obstrucius, Burocrates, Futilius, and Dillayus.

Obstrucius The first and greatest Not many people have heard of the great government philosopher Obstrucius. He lived from 550 BC to 470BC in a time when China was still fragmented. He is an often forgotten philosopher who devised many pearls of wisdom about how governments should be run. The list is extremely lengthy, however I have included a selection of some of the more pertinent quotes with which the new government employee should become familiar. Successful public servants may want to have some of these motivational sayings pinned somewhere around their workstations.

By three methods may we run government: First, by obstruction, which is noblest; second, by procrastination, which is easiest; and third by out-sourcing, which is dearest. To be able to practice the five paradigms everywhere in government constitutes perfect virtue: delay decisions, cover ones arse, show no initiative, do not communicate and remain anonymous. A public servant who commits a mistake and does not correct it should follow government paradigm number two. The will to confuse, the desire to delay, the urge to reach complete anonymitythese are the keys that will unlock the door to public service excellence. He who speaks without jargon will find it difficult to

achieve promotion in government. Burocrates The Greek perspective The pre-eminent Greek philosopher was Burocrates. Born in 450 BC, Burocrates studied early democracy and looked at government in a holistic manner. He regarded it as a form of art. He viewed public servants as artists whose job was to provide aesthetically pleasing processes and outcomes in a manner that was not rushed by the mere inconvenience of time. He was a contemporary of Socrates, and it is rumoured that these two philosophers spent many hours discussing the relative merits of democracy and royal rule, over large amounts of wine. He met his death in 385 BC when he found himself in an argument with another contemporary, Aristophanes, who accused him of having all the characteristics of the popular politicians he studied: a horrible voice, bad breeding, and a vulgar manner. They both died when their brains dribbled out of their ears due to the banality of their arguments. Unfortunately, Burocrates is not widely known and few, if any, academics have seriously studied his work. However, he leaves us with some notable quotes including:

The pure art of government should be unsullied by the ticking of the clock. Where the path appears straight and without danger, extra

care should be taken and your pace slowed. A quick decision is like a premature ejaculation. It deprives the bureaucrat of respect and leaves him feeling unsatisfied. The vote is a precious thing, its value priceless; never have so many people been kept happy by such a futile act. Let a politician announce decisions and keep him happy for a day. Let a politician think he made the decisions, and keep him happy for a whole term of government. Futilius - The study of committees Ancient Rome had a philosopher who made a career out of investigating the bureaucratic process of committees Futilius. Futilius carried out his work in the time of Lucius Cornelius Sulla, Gaius Julius Caesar and Augustus. He was born in Rome in 99BC and died shortly after Julius Caesar in 40 BC. He studied the public service of the day. Only three weeks before his death he had been asked to chair a committee, at which time he decided to put his theories to the test to get practical feedback on his research. After two weeks in charge, he was brutally stabbed to death by the committees executive officer. As with Burocrates, he developed much useful advice that has stood the test of time, but received little recognition for his work. He specialized in the study of how the most successful of committees operated. Five of his pearls of wisdom are included below.

Chairs should every night call themselves to an account; what decision have they delayed today? What proposals opposed? What innovation resisted? What public servant frustrated? Other peoples projects will abort of themselves if they be brought every day to this account. Be extremely vague, even to the point of deferral. Be extremely mysterious, even to the point of confusion. Thereby you can be the director of the public servants demise into insanity. All public servants servicing the Board pass through three stages. First, they are ridiculed. Second, they are violently opposed. Third, it is accepted that they are too difficult to change and they are ignored. All Board meetings are based on procrastination. There is no place where the brakes are not applied. Offer the public servants hope to lure them in, and then trap them in a cage of frustration. Where no policy exists, ask for a new one; where a policy exists, ask for a new one; where there is no need for a policy, insist on a new one. Dillayus Out of the shadow of Futilius At the same time that Nero was striding through the corridors of Rome, Dillayus was contemplating the complex area of government decision-making. He was born in Rome in 5 AD and grew up reading

much of the work of Futilius. He identified areas that Futilius had not spent much time researching, specialising in the study of emergency situations where decisions appeared imminent. He is perhaps not as well known as Futilius, and might not have had the same standing. He did, however, produce a large body of work that remains relevant. He died in 64 AD after being trapped in the great fire that swept Rome, finding himself unable to decide on the best course of action until it was too late to make a difference. His desperate calls for a consultant to advise him about the proper course of action remained unanswered, as all the consultants had left for greener, and less hazardous, pastures. His gems of wisdom include:

When in doubt, employ an outside expert to review all information. The pure joy of procrastination is unrivalled by other experience in government. When all other means of obstruction have been exhausted, all that is left is public consultation, the mother of all delaying tactics. There is never enough information to make a decision. Those who disagree are not in possession of all the facts. When all is lost and a decision is inevitable, take solace in the fact that you did everything possible to prevent it.

The 5 Paradigms of Government Now that we have an understanding of the underlying philosophy of government, we can delve deeper into the mysteries of the civil service and other bureaucracies. The first thing an aspiring bureaucrat needs to do is to familiarise themselves with the five paradigms of government. The five paradigms, developed by Obstrucius, provide a path which, if followed, leads to a comfortable and relatively hazard-free existence in a bureaucracy. Once you have mastered them there is very little that will prevent you from having a long and rewarding career. You may come across times where you can ignore a paradigm. However, you should only do this where it allows you to implement one of the other paradigms. Civil servants who have mastered and memorised these paradigms can be assured of a steady, if unspectacular, rise through the ranks of government. Dont Make a Decision The first thing to realise in government, or any bureaucracy for that matter, is that making decisions is inherently dangerous. This sort of activity should be left to those who have enough experience to make them safely, if indeed they need to be made at all. This is, perhaps, the most important of the paradigms of government and should be memorised by all. Not making a decision is not a deliberate way to make outside

institutions, companies, or individuals unhappy (although this may be a resulting bonus), it is a tried and tested method of ensuring that you do not inhibit your career path within government. Making a decision could be a seriously career-limiting move, particularly if you get it wrong. Nobody remembers correct decisions. Everybody remembers who made a bad decision. If you do make a decision, the status quo may change and this could potentially lead to the need for actions to be taken. You may therefore increase someones workload, most worrying of all, your own. Cover Your Arse If you are forced into a corner and find yourself required to make a decision, you need to make sure that the decision, and its potential ramifications, cannot be traced back to you. This applies no matter how small the decision is or how insignificant the consequences may appear to be. You never know when a seemingly small issue will blow up into a huge palaver that sucks in your manager, the Director, the Chief Executive Officer, or even the Minister. The less attention that comes your way, the less chance there is that you will be the subject of criticism. So, how do you work to ensure that little attention comes your way? One of the tried and tested ways is to implement the third paradigm. Show No Initiative

Initiative is a dangerous thing. Showing it is very close to decision-making in its potential to inhibit your career; therefore always follow the established processes and procedures. Things are done the way they are for a particular reason. This reason may simply be because theyve always been done that way, but to try and change, or even improve, procedures is likely to cause confusion and additional work for other people. It will therefore win you no friends and bring you unwanted attention and notoriety. Your supervisor will certainly not look kindly on you for the trouble you cause them, and this can seriously affect your career prospects. If word gets out that you have tried to change things you may also find that other areas within government avoid you or appear reluctant to employ you. It is far better to follow the standard procedures, no matter how arcane or impractical, and ensure that you fit in with your work colleagues.

Use As Much Jargon As Possible in Your Communications Jargon is an essential tool in the arsenal of weapons carried by the civil servant. When properly used it can cause total confusion, will sound as though it is plausible, and is likely to send people off with a feeling that you know far more about a subject that they do. The more contact you have with people outside of government, or

even within government (as there are those within government who will do their utmost to have you break the paradigms in their own push to avoid career-limiting moves), the more likely it is that you will be forced into a position of decision-making. Unavoidable contact, whether it is in-person, on the phone, or through written communication, should contain as much jargon as you can manage. This has two effects. The first is that external stakeholders get a feeling that you really do know what you are talking about, and are working on the situation. Secondly, other civil servants will avoid you when they realise that they cannot compete with your skills in avoidance and procrastination. Good jargon is an art form, and expert practitioners will rise rapidly in government. See the chapter on jargon for some examples of its use.

Make Sure Nobody Really Knows What You Do If you can keep your job as vague as possible you will avoid the need to justify your position. You will then be able to pass on almost all the work requests that you receive to other people with more defined roles. This reduces the need for decision-making, makes covering your arse easier, removes the need to deal with issues and potentially show initiative, and reduces the number of people with whom you will have to communicate. Where you do have to carry out tasks, the use of jargon, either written or verbal, will add a delightful vagueness to whatever you write or say. It will also keep everyone guessing about what it is that you actually do, and this is the surest way to avoid difficult decisions.

The Civil Servants Haiku and the Politicians Prayer The first record of the Civil Servants haiku was found in Australia. It is a three-line poem based on the traditional Japanese Haiku poetry rhythm. It is blindingly clear in its simplicity and perfectly explains the choice that the electorate face when they go to the polls and the likely outcome that will result. Civil servants take great comfort from this as it outlines the level of service expected, no matter which political party gets elected to govern the nation. The Civil Servants Haiku The people have to choose Between a rock and hard place Suffer in your jocks! To add some further context to the life of the civil servant, all new employees should read the Official Politicians Prayer. This is allegedly read by the Prime Minister at the beginning of every Cabinet meeting, and apparently is often repeated by politicians every night before they go to bed. It was written by Cardinal Slumberus Drone in 1909 and has so far passed the test of time as still being relevant to this day. It turned out that the good Cardinal spent most his time soundly asleep in the House of Lords. He was usually unaware what was going on around

him, but felt that he could at least sleep safe in the knowledge that nothing of any significance was happening. Hansard records that he did wake up at least once, and had an expression of mild puzzlement on his face as he tried to take in what was happening around him. His diaries confirm that this was when the Politicians Prayer was born.. However, if you were to go and ask a politician about its existence I am sure that they would deny all knowledge of it, but trust me it does exist. This prayer gives the civil servant a clue as to the sort of requests and workload that will filter down to them as their political masters go about their daily business, as well as some inside knowledge about the mindset of the majority of politicians.

The Politicians Prayer Our government, somehow elected, Delusion be our game. My god we're dumb But there's work to be done And blame to be deflected. Delay us today our daily decisions. And forgive us our empty promises, As we forgive those who make empty promises in response. And lead us not into innovation, But deliver us from progress. For we have the bureaucrats, With the power and the will To bullshit For ever and ever. Amen.

Getting a Job Within Government Now that you have a good grounding in the underlying philosophy of government, you can think about applying for a government job. To get a job within government you need to do two things as a matter of urgency. Firstly, you need to do some comprehensive revision on the five paradigms of Obstrucius; revise until you are dreaming of them. Secondly, you need to find out the specific jobrelated jargon that applies to the position. The selection criteria are often the main part of any application for government, and should therefore take up most of your time. This will not be a problem, as there will often be numerous criteria. Sure, your resum and referees are important, but it is the selection criteria that will be foremost in the selection panels mind. These criteria have been developed with the aim of weeding out all those practical and can-do types that would not be suited to the government machine. The person who can effortlessly peel off confusing jargon, or can spend 10 minutes talking about what should only take two minutes, will be well suited to this process. You certainly do not want to be seen as one of those people who are intent on making decisions and consequently stirring up trouble. When it comes time to address the numerous criteria, it is important that you know what the key phrases and words in each criterion actually mean and what type of response is necessary. This may sound like a fairly basic thing, but the unwary are caught out

when they show their ignorance of the government system. I have therefore included some examples of criteria that you may have to address below, along with some suggested ways to respond.

Demonstrated leadership skills including the ability to provide direction and influence outcomes To successfully address this criterion you will need to show that you have not only the required skills, but also the demonstrated experience. To do this you need to show rather than tell. Therefore, you need to provide a complex explanation about how you managed to delay a project for months (purely on the basis that you felt that there was information lacking and an unsafe decision might be about to be made) when it should have been completed within weeks. Your explanation should also provide a convincing argument about why the delays were necessary. This will show the selection panel in no uncertain terms that you are more than capable of showing the type of leadership required in government. Explain how you have called unnecessary meetings, requested ridiculously vague legal advice, sent a statutory authority off on a tangent, or even cast doubt on the integrity or need for the project in the first place. As you apply for more senior jobs, you should ensure that you use more complex examples of how you have hindered projects.

Synthesise complex and disparate information into clear, articulate advice. Confidently prepare and present advice focusing on key issues. This criterion will require you to demonstrate that you have the ability to gather irrelevant information from a number of sources and use it to provide advice on whatever matter is currently being considered. For clear articulate advice read the use of government jargon that sounds meaningful, but in reality says nothing much at all. The use of words like synthesise and disparate in the first part of the criterion is a clue that the job requires people who can write language not commonly used by the general public. It suggests the use of long words where short words would provide a clearer message to the majority of the population. They certainly do not want people who use clear and easily understood phrases. The second part of the criterion should be addressed with examples of how you have been able to take government jargon and present it confidently to numerous audiences without being discovered as the fraud that you are. Focusing on key issues requires you to demonstrate that you know the difference between key issues and important issues. Key issues are those that should be discussed publicly to provide an impression of calm and control, while important issues should never be discussed publicly as they might result in too many people knowing how bad the problems really are.

Knowledge of the development of management strategies for (insert as appropriate). Knowledge of things relates to a criterion that does not require you to have had actual experience in the relevant area. This gives the prospective government employee a chance to show how good they are at convincing others of their abilities in spin and bullshit. This particular criterion relates to management strategies, so a cursory glance at some previously developed management strategies should be sufficient to get you on the right track. If you are able to talk confidently about an area you have had absolutely no experience in without betraying yourself as completely green in that area, you are likely to be snapped up. You should also consider a career in politics. So as you can see, you cannot take selection criteria lightly or at face value. You need to do enough research to find out the key words that you need to address. You should also understand that the selection panel wants to do as little work as possible. Therefore answering the criteria using copious amounts of government jargon, mixed in with an emphasis on process rather than outcomes, will allow them a great degree of comfort in their decision-making process. Being seasoned public servants themselves, they may have the nagging feeling that you may not be quite suitable for the job, but your ability to spout jargon and talk process will convince them, and everyone else, that you are eminently capable of dealing out the necessary spin to implement the five paradigms of government. This being the case, they can have the confidence that you will fit smoothly into the system.

Understanding Your Work Colleagues When commencing your job within the government, you will, like in any other job, come across numerous types of people. Every new employee should make themselves familiar with their co-workers and try to understand their motivations. While there are numerous types of people, the following character types, although often found in other parts of the work force, thrive in government jobs. They all have their place and you will have to interact with them on a daily basis. Drama Queen This person, be they male or female, exists in surprising numbers within the civil service. They are attracted to some areas more than others, namely communications, publications and other such jobs. It is their main aim in life to make a large noise about the smallest and most insignificant issue that they can find. Deep down they want to be performers, but have never made it into a real spotlight. The enclosed space of the office provides them with a captive audience on which to practice their theatrical talents. This can be particularly difficult to avoid if the Drama Queen has managed to rise to a managerial level. Dont laugh. This can and will happen. These people live for drama, so you should avoid them as much as possible. Drama brings attention and can cause panicked civil servants to feel the need to make decisions that they will end up regretting. Little thought goes into these decisions and they can lead

to career-limiting moves. As soon as the Drama Queen gets into a position of power and is required to make a decision, they somehow manage to attract more Drama Queens. They are like moths drawn to a flame. This is guaranteed to lead to predictions of dark and dangerous scenarios, possibly even some kind of Armageddon. Before anyone knows it, the CEO will be taking notice and shaking his head in pity. He will mark the card of the Drama Queens and note that they have the potential to cause confusion and muddy the calmest and clearest of waters. He will then roll them out as required, transferring them to any branch or division that appears dangerously close to achieving clarity or making decisions. The Drama Queen has a great potential to turn into a very bitter employee. The Bitter Old Man There is one of these in every branch of government. They are usually in their middle years and are quiet until approached in an effort to break the ice and start a conversation. If this happens, they will start a long, blow-by-blow story about how they have worked in that branch for twenty years and have been passed over for promotion. They will tell how nobody is interested in their opinions and then go on to detail their long-past days of glory. You will very quickly find out that you are not interested their opinions any more than anyone else. They will also have a list of grudges as long as your arm; against the Manager, the Director, and numerous younger members of staff who they see as having done

them harm in some way, shape or form. Of course, the longer they are there, the more young people appear, and the worse they become. These people actively look for new employees to talk to, as experienced staff members have learned to keep their distance. Once cornered, such a new employee will get the full treatment and is likely to be baled up for hours. These employees are often seen walking around in a state of shock as they try to disentangle themselves from the bitter person hanging on to them, pleading for a longer audience. The whining monotone of bile can take years to remove from their memory, if it can be removed at all. The Bitter One must be avoided at all costs, as they do have the potential to lose total control and bore you to deathliterally! However, this type of person can be used to departmental advantage. You can set them loose on productive employees whose efforts appear to be getting near to making actions necessary; insisting that they work together on a project. A word of warning - this should only be engineered where there is no other way of stopping the rogue civil servant. A full medical team should also be put on standby in case the Bitter One is in danger of being beaten to death. The Bitter One takes a lot of sick leave. The Administrator The Administrator definitely rates a mention in these character types. This person thrives on the application of process rather than the achievement of outcomes. They will therefore find government a perfect place to work.

They will also be welcomed with open arms by the senior management. Their steadfast adherence to process and procedure will ensure that they provide serious obstacles in the path of those who wish to get things done. Many a frustrated staff member has wondered aloud whether the Administrator gets some sort of perverse pleasure out of causing such obstruction, and perhaps they do. They are a serious, and often necessary, blockage within the machinery of government. While they are obviously essential to the proper running of government, you should never try to engage in any meaningful conversation with an Administrator unless you want your brains to dribble out of your ears. No, dont laugh; Im serious about this. There are many documented cases of unwary staff being bored to death, particularly at lunchtime when the seemingly harmless Administrator is sitting having a quiet lunch (on those rare occasions when they have managed to drag themselves away from the joys of writing procedures and process manuals) and an attempt at polite conversation is made. This is the often the last act of the inexperienced civil servant prior to their being found, much later, unresponsive in the lunch room with drool hanging out of their mouth. The Sports Freak The Sports Freak will often limp into work on a Monday morning with stories about their exploits over the previous weekend. Sometimes they are genuinely talented sportspeople, but most are

just might-have-been junior sports stars that never made it to the top because of their lack of talent or poor commitment to training. Consequently, they feel the need to talk up their mediocre exploits due to the nagging feeling that they squandered their opportunity for international stardom. They carry their many injuries with considerable pride, and will ensure that whole branch, or even department, know exactly how they came to be so injured. It is not uncommon for them to arrive with an arm in a sling, a pronounced limp, or conspicuous bandaging and/or bruising. On that rare occasion that they really do perform well at the weekend and they achieve a mention in the paper, they will become insufferable for weeks as they dine out on their one success of the year. These people make great project officers as they rarely sit down long enough to achieve anything as they do the rounds of the office spreading their news. The Boffin There are numerous Boffins within the civil service. They usually get a job soon after leaving university and find a place in government where they can sit quietly carrying out their research. Most Boffins have very few social skills, and so find the idea of teaching at university and having to mix with all sorts of students to be repugnant and extremely daunting. It is far better for them to end up tucked away in a government department where they can avoid as

much human contact as possible. These are the perfect people to put in charge of writing government policy. They will fill it full of jargon, justification, and endless theory, so much so that nobody in their right minds, except other boffins (who many people believe are not in fact in their right minds most of the time) will be able to understand it. This keeps the mysteries of government policy well and truly safe. Boffins are technically very good and, as a result, often rise through the ranks of government. They get so good at what they do that they are promoted to management positions. This is essential, as it prevents them getting to the point where they start believing in their ability and making decisions. Once in the role of a manager they quickly find themselves out of their comfort zone, buried in reams and reams of paperwork, and not having the social skills to manage anybody. They also step onto an endless conveyor belt of meaningless administrative trivia, ending up incredibly unproductive and stressed, and taking lots of sick leave. The Entrepreneur All government departments have an Entrepreneur; they can also be found in universities. The Entrepreneur is a dreamer who has usually been dreaming for many, many years. There will be many quiet comments and nudges as confidential contacts are hinted at and out-of-hours meetings are described. These meetings usually end being visits to the dentist or doctor.

Their colleagues will often be seen rolling their eyes and shaking their heads as the next potential scheme is explained to them. They all know that, despite the numerous ideas, the Entrepreneur is unlikely to ever have the initiative to make anything actually happen, and this is why these people have found themselves a niche within the machinery of government. They say a lot and do very little; perfect attributes for a career civil servant. The Slacker Slackers are omnipresent in all types of public and private sector employment. They spend large amounts of time wandering around and talking to anyone who will listen. However, they also, somehow, have an ability to keep achieving enough to avoid getting themselves into serious trouble. They are extremely annoying to the hard workers, who feel that they are deliberately taking the piss out of them by coasting along without breaking into a sweat. They have been in their job long enough to know exactly how much energy to expend to meet their obligations, and have no desire to improve matters. They often rise through the ranks quite quickly as a result of their low care-factor approach to the job at hand. This makes it easy to defer making decisions, leading to a consequent lack of mud sticking to their reputations from making wrong decisions. As long as their pay goes into their bank accounts on a regular basis, they are happy. These people will steadfastly wait for other public servants to

weaken and start making decisions, and then pounce on opportunities created by poor decision-making. Before you know it, they will be a Manager or Director, leaving their staff and former colleagues fuming at the seeming unfairness of it all. Of course, to make their life easier they will give glowing references to staff that they see as having the potential to cause them decision-making stress, and will actively encourage them to leave for better-paid jobs. While clearly upsetting some people with their rapid rise and higher pay packet, the truth of the matter is that they have simply been the best at implementing the five paradigms of government first devised by Obstrucius.

The Communications Hierarchy Now that you have successfully gained employment, it is time to start learning the basic skills and attributes necessary to be successful within the government machine. As you will remember, one of the five paradigms of government relates to communication. It is generally unwise to communicate if you can avoid it. However, you will have to communicate at one time or another and there is a defined hierarchy to which you should adhere. The preferred hierarchy of communications is outlined below in reverse order. In-Person contact The worst thing you can do is meet a client of any sort in person; being in the same room as a client leaves you vulnerable to emotions. This can seriously impact on your efforts to ensure that the integrity of the bureaucratic system is maintained. Looking into someones earnest expression or pleading eyes before you reject their proposal will only result in stress for you; it may also lead to you weakening and ignoring the paradigms. This can lead to career-limiting actions and is a situation you should try to avoid at all costs. Also, meetings leave you open to having to respond to questions or demands without the appropriate level of research and consultation. This will increase your stress levels. So, face-to-face contact should only be undertaken by

experienced public servants who can be trusted not to wilt under this sort of intense pressure. Where such meetings are unavoidable, they do provide an opportunity to test out your abilities and skills as outlined in the chapter on techniques used for running meetings with external stakeholders. You should, however, always take along an experienced bureaucrat if you are new to the job. Phone Contact As with meetings in person, talking to people on the phone leaves you open to some emotional engagement and should therefore be avoided if possible. Talking on the phone can also leave you open to having to instantly respond to questions. If you find that you have no option but to communicate on the phone, it is easier if you have some ready-prepared responses written on the whiteboard by your desk. The following responses will give you breathing space and a way to avoid agreeing to face-to-face meetings:

I dont have my diary to hand at the moment. Could I get

back to you?

I cant access my calendar and the moment. Can I get back

to you?

The following responses will deflect the need to answer specific questions:

I dont have the paperwork to hand. Can I get back to

you?

Thats not my area. Ill need to find out who should speak
to about this. Can I get back you? One way of avoiding phone contact is to use an answering machine that you never turn off. Remember though, that the message you use should not give any clue about who you are or what you do. It should just ask that people should leave their details. Make no promises about returning the call. E-mail Contact The advent of e-mail has made the business of government far easier, although it is a double-edged sword and should be used with care. While it is thought to increase the speed of communication, email can still be effectively used by government in its decision-making process. E-mail is remote and takes the emotion out of contact with both external and internal clients (remember that people within your own organisation can be as dangerous as those external clients). It is far easier to delay and obstruct progress with this

communication medium than most others. It will help in your quest to avoid career-limiting actions such as decision-making. E-mail allows you to copy in other staff members and so draw them into the conversation. This broadens the potential for confusion about who should be dealing with the matter, thus diluting the need for you to take actions. E-mail also has the advantage of taking away the pressure for instant responses that phone or face-to-face contact can cause. However, a word of caution, e-mail responses are written documents so you must ensure that your government writing skills are up to par. You will need to be able to produce appropriate jargon-filled e-mails that will mean very little and not be able to be used as approvals for actions to be taken. In fact, they should not be of any practical use whatsoever. SMS Contact The most recent innovation is using mobile phones to send messages via SMS. This is guaranteed to annoy your stakeholders as the abbreviated language used will be unfamiliar to many. It is even more impersonal than e-mail and leaves plenty of room for misunderstanding and misinterpretation. The more plausible the possibility of misunderstanding, the easier it is to avoid work. This is an expanding area and has great potential to further muddy the already murky waters of government process.

Running a Successful Meeting (internal clients) Most civil servants have to attend numerous meetings that only involve members of their own division, branch or section. It is essential to have as many of these meetings as possible so that the business of government can run suitably slowly. There will usually be at least one of each of these meetings in every month; however experienced civil servants can usually schedule at least two section meetings in that time, if not weekly section meetings. The longer these meetings can go for the better, as this takes people away from communications with the outside world and gives them less time to work on their projects. Such meetings are apparently to make sure that people know what is going on within the division, section or branch. This is potentially dangerous if taken seriously, as you really dont want people to know what you are, or are not, working on. However, a good civil servant can use them to achieve exactly the opposite. When you do have to speak, make sure that you can talk for at least ten minutes without telling anyone anything they dont already know. If you are a beginner and not confident in your ability in this area, it is best just to say that everything is on track. Then you can sit back and watch the masters work their magic. If these meetings are run well, they can last for up to half a day and become an endurance test for all involved. Everyone present, especially those who do not see it as an

opportunity for procrastination and obstruction, should dread a good internal meeting. Those sincere and proactive government employees who feel an urge to make things happen need to be ground down and reduced to quivering messes as soon as possible. Below are some tips to help extend the life of these meetings as much as possible.

Let everybody have a say

There are many people in government who love the sound of their own voice and who will be happy to dribble on to anyone who will listen. It is important to let these people have an agenda item as this will fill everyone else with dread even before the meeting has begun. In addition to this, there are large numbers of extremely insecure people who feel that when they have the chance to speak about their project, they need to explain everything that has happened, will happen, and is ever likely to happen. And I mean everything. These people could test the patience of the Dalai Lama. When this happens every month, it turns a meeting into a sort of show and tell session, similar to what used to happen when you were at primary school.

Organise a presentation

Having an external person coming in to give a presentation at the

end of the meeting will add to the endurance required. Find an expert in a field (preferably a boffin) who wants to come and talk about their project. This can be promoted as an attempt to broaden the knowledge of those present; however, what it really does is raise levels of boredom to almost insufferable levels as your invited expert gets into the practical details of their project. They do their best to explain the mysteries of their research to people who have no interest, dont give a shit, and basically would rather subject themselves to physical torture rather than listen to this drivel.

Ask a question that you know will result in a long and confusing response Where, despite your efforts, it appears that a meeting is running too smoothly, you should have some back-up plans ready. One of the best plans is to have some questions prepared for those people you know like to hear the sound of their own voice, or are insecure enough not to be satisfied until they have told you everything they think you might possibly want to know. This takes the responsibility of extending the meeting away from you and on to the responder. If you do this before it is your turn to speak you can use up valuable time, increase peoples levels of boredom and frustration, and so further reduce the amount of attention they are likely to pay to your own long and rambling explanation of the status of your projects.

Spread confusion

This is something that you will be able to do with increasing effectiveness the higher up the ladder you reach within government. For instance, if you have become a Branch Manager, you will be able to use a branch meetings to hold the floor, using your time and influence to talk about business planning matters, accommodation issues, and to bore people with what you heard at the Divisional Managers meeting. This is where the Director tells you what happened at the Corporate Executive meeting earlier on that week, in turn boring you. Most of what you have to say will be of very little relevance to most of the staff and will be repetition for your Section Managers, with whom you have already met. Talking down to your subordinates about senior management's problems will do two things. Firstly, it will make the meeting more of a trial, and secondly it will allow you to pass on incomplete information that can then be taken out of context, providing fodder for all the Drama Queens who will go out and start their campaigns to spread tension and innuendo.

Chair the meeting

Where possible, see if you can have a go at chairing meetings. This puts you in control of the agenda and timelines and can let you practice your procrastination and obstruction methods on internal employees before you use them on external clients. A good Chair will be able to give the most boring and tedious people the longest opportunity to speak and, while this can be a trial for the Chair, it is essential practice for when you get to positions of seniority. It gives you the chance to see how long you can make the tortuous meeting last (keep a record and try to beat it the next time you take charge), and you can also ensure that those annoying and enthusiastic staff members that cause so much trouble for everyone else by ignoring the five paradigms and trying to achieve outcomes, all have an agenda item and therefore have to come along. You will be able to take great joy from the grimaces and tortured looks on their faces as they contemplate the next couple of hours of unmitigated boredom.

Running a Successful Meeting (external clients) If you are up to it, your supervisor may let you attend or even run meetings with external stakeholders. These may be other departments, members of the public, or private sector companies. As this involves dealing with stakeholders in person, you should ensure that you are ready for this sometimes stressful, but often enjoyable, task. If you have followed proper procedure, you will have done all in your power to avoid meeting the external client in person, let all of their phone calls go to a message bank, and so carefully prepared them for a meeting. Their need for a government approval or advice with regard to government policy will have made their desire for this meeting almost painful. Bearing this in mind, it is important that you follow the correct rules. They will ensure a good result and hopefully discourage people from ever wanting to meet with you again. Rule 1 Remain calm and polite at all times. A polite and calm manner will give the client nobody to immediately blame and no avenue to release their frustration, guaranteeing that their internal pressure will continue to build. There is nothing more infuriating than a government official showing complete disinterest in the act of refusing a request. If you are experienced, you can make it very unclear whether you

are refusing their application or not by modulating carefully the amount of government jargon used. This adds to the tension. Rule 2 Follow the appropriate government policy to the letter, even if makes no common sense to enforce this policy. In fact, especially if it makes no sense, as this will further increase frustration levels in the client. Rule 3 The third rule is to smile in a condescending way as you explain to them all the relevant red tape that they will need to overcome. At the same time you should infer that they really should have done their homework before they came into the meeting and that they are inconsiderately wasting your time. Clearly lay out the likely, and lengthy, delays that will occur before there is any prospect of a decision being made by government. They will leave unsatisfied, probably fuming at the arcane inefficiency of government. Advanced tactics These are the basic rules. However, advanced practitioners can apply some further techniques to magnify the frustration and desperation experienced by the client. A careful sequencing of the order in which you inform the client

of relevant policies can lead to initial hope of a relatively straightforward and productive meeting. You can then drop a bombshell that completely kills any hope of success in the near future, just as the client is basking in the warm glow of an easy process. Whoever heard of an easy and straightforward government process? There may also be times when you can send the client off on their way, leaving them feeling happy that everything is running smoothly, when in fact you know that another department involved has polices that directly contradict yours and has experienced procrastinators of its own that will stymie any progress and significantly delay any approvals or licenses required. Finally, there is the double-team approach. This is where the junior member of the team leads the client to believe that sensible compromises can be made and that a successful outcome can be achieved. However, the senior, more experienced, officer then comes in and completely refuses to allow any compromise at all, dooming the project to failure, or at least to lengthy delays and a protracted approvals process. Things to look out for as signs of the success of your approach include:

1. Veins on clients forehead begin to bulge. 2. Red tinges appear on clients neck and tie is loosened. 3. Clients eyes become a little wild and have a staring quality 4. Tension appears in the voice

5. Voice is raised 6. Voice becomes high-pitched and hysterical 7. Client is reduced to tears and pleading for help 8. Client threatens, or carries out, physical violence 9. Client reduced to sobbing mess, more pleading 10. Complete mental collapse, gibbering, head-butting wall
When you can reduce a member of the public or an industry representative to a 10th level response, you know that you have graduated to the very top tier of government, and will have very few clients requesting a meeting with you in the future as word spreads about your skills.

5 Ways to Brighten a Dull Day Life in the civil service, or any other bureaucracy for that matter, can have its boring moments when nothing appears to be happening. This may happen quite a lot if you are properly implementing the paradigms of government. In times like these you will need to have some ways to brighten up your day, or at least to try and to give your civil service life some meaning. Cultivate a Grudge All good bureaucrats need to have cultivated at least one grudge during their time in the civil service. A grudge will give you a hobby that you can enjoy whenever you like. It will usually make someones life difficult, though preferably without them being aware that it is you that is causing them problems. If you find yourself the subject of what seems to be a lot of bad luck, few opportunities, or even just more boring and soulless work than usual, you are probably the subject of a grudge. A good grudge can be cultivated where you feel someone of less merit was awarded a promotion, or perhaps where someone has made a decision that has given you more work to do, or even where someone just seems ripe to be the subject of a grudge. It really does not matter who you choose, so long as you work to make their life difficult and have fun in the process. The more senior you are in government, the more grudges you will be able to accumulate, and the more entertainment you can devise

to make your days go by more rapidly. In fact, by the time you are a Director, you should have at least five well-cultivated grudges that colour your every decision. Invent Some Jargon The nature of jargon means that at any one time, there is new jargon being invented by some boffin or career bureaucrat somewhere in the world. It would be shame if you missed out on this. So, a way to pass some time is to invent your own phrases. The minimum you should aim for is a three-phase high-impact neologism. Once you have become comfortable with this, you can progress on to four and fivephase jargon. Anything more than a five-phase fustian phraseology will lose its impact on the reader. The ultimate accolade for inventors of jargon is to see their own phrase included in a government document. This shows that your invention is gaining ground and that some poor soul has convinced themselves that they know what it means. This is extraordinary, as you know it was just meaningless crap. Some examples of meaningless drivel are included below.

Collaborative database nodes Enhanced empirical capability Interactive operational paradigm Relevant talent dimension Functional competency matrix

Replicable human capital synergies High-resolution talent protocols Emergent executive mission statement Corporate risk management feedback-loops Multi-phase expanded organisational continuum

Invent Jargon with Acronyms Of course, to take your jargon to the next level, you need to disguise it in an acronym. This adds an extra layer of confusion to the term and sends people scurrying for a dictionary or searching the Internet for an explanation of the term. The more amusing your acronym, the better. Five examples are included below. Joint Australian Regional Government Organisational Network (JARGON) Notional Organisational Benchmark (NOB) Transitory Work Allocation Timetable (TWAT) Comprehensive Risk Assessment Protocol (CRAP) Global Undirected Feedback Framework (GUFF) Write a letter to the Minister that you know will come to you to answer No matter what area you work in, there will be times when you

will have your own views on a particular matter that you are dealing with on behalf of the government. At these times, you can write a letter to the Minister (under a pseudonym of course) and wait for it to work its way through the system and onto your desk (members of the public are often unaware that letters to the Minister go to a civil servant to draft the response that the Minister then signs). You can then spend your time composing a well thought out institutional response to your question. If you write enough of these letters you will also be able to keep track of how well the bureaucracy is working, by comparing the time it takes to get a response back to you through the system. Start a Rumour Many an enjoyable day has been spent watching the result of a well-prepared rumour. The government rumour mill will spread the word as quick as greased lightning. For example, a well-placed whisper that a major restructure is in the wind after a visit by an unknown suit, will take off like wildfire. To start the rumour you should make the suggestion to a colleague that you have heard the man is a Human Resources consultant with a reputation for streamlining departments. Never directly suggest that you think a review is in the wind; just give enough information to set off the minds of the impressionable into a stream of consciousness that will head in the direction of a dark and scary tunnel. The impressionable person, probably a drama queen or a very bitter and cynical employee, will hit the ground running. Before you know it someone

will be saying to you Did you know that a departmental review is happening? and you can truthfully say Really? I hadnt heard that before. Who told you?

5 Signs that You Have Been Successfully Institutionalised You may find yourself asking yourself how you will know when you are fitting successfully into the government machine, or you may start questioning whether you are suitable for government service. This is only natural, as we all need encouragement from time to time. You should look out for the following signs that will show you to be successfully institutionalised. Once you see these, it will be time for you to move onto the intermediate level bureaucracy in the next section of the book.

You get nervous when your diary does not show at least three meetings organised for the coming day. You get uncomfortable at training courses where you are encouraged to write or speak without using jargon because your manager is always insisting you write gibberish. You find yourself gaining immense satisfaction when a member of the public yells at you down the phone. You immediately understand jargon, such as community capacity building, and even know how to fit it into a sentence. The idea of working more than 7.5 hours a day causes you to break out into a cold sweat.

Section 3: Intermediate Skills

Writing a Letter Most civil servants come across numerous instances where they have to respond to a letter from a member of the public. There just happens to be plenty of people who enjoy expressing concern on their particular issue of concern. Those new to bureaucratic systems often make the mistake of trying to provide a long and comprehensive answer to the question; however, a moments reflection will confirm that this is not consistent with the paradigms of government. The relevant paradigm relates to communication, and the fact that you should not communicate if at all possible. Simply not talking or corresponding with people can achieve this; however, this approach can only work for a limited time. Eventually you will have to learn how to write to people (or talk to them) without communicating anything of use. Learning to write such a letter is a significant step towards becoming a more senior bureaucrat. Now, to business. There is a tried and tested 7-step method of writing a standard response, and this method can be applied no matter what part of government you may work in. It can also be applied outside government where companies have become so large that bureaucracy has taken over as the main operating system. These steps were first devised by Spooner Read in the late 19th Century, and have so far stood the test of time, albeit with a few changes to reflect contemporary government systems. The 7 steps adapted to the modern age are:

1. Use the first paragraph to repeat the issue that was raised
in the writers correspondence. This promotes a misguided sense that the relevant issue has been understood and a helpful response is about to follow. 2. Begin the second paragraph with a gentle admonishment that suggests the writer should have known the various relevant regulations, new initiatives and policies, and has not done enough research themselves. Then go on to list the regulations that your department administers. 3. Be suitably vague about the role of your department in administering these regulations. Maintain the gentle sense of frustration that the writer has not done the right research and should have tried harder to solve the problem themselves. 4 . In addition to the regulations, inform the writer of numerous publications, including some out-of-date ones, which will provide contradictory advice. This will muddy the waters even further. 5 . Finish off with a sentence or two that states that the relevant, most important issues are not dealt with by your department. DO NOT tell them which departments do deal with these issues this will not win you friends within the bureaucracy. This is not being obstructive; it is merely playing your part in the ongoing education of the public and the development of their resourcefulness. This could be thought of as community capacity building.

6. Review your letter to make sure you have used confusing

acronyms (without definition) and jargon when possible, and have not given any contact details. 7. Send your suitably crafted government letter out to the public. To improve the educational experience I have drafted an example letter to illustrate how you might want to format such a letter. I wish you all the best in your future communications. Example letter Dear Mr Smith, I refer to your letter dated 1/8/09 in which you describe the difficulty you are having in getting a response concerning the management of the reserve adjacent to your property Lot 25 Mercer Road. The Government has a broad range of powers relating to the control of reserved land. These are easily found in your local library or on the Internet. The Parks and Gardens Act (1913) along with its subsidiary legislation - the Planting Regulations, Park Management Regulations and Unauthorised Interference Regulations allow the State to control what occurs on its reserves.

This agency (Department Overseeing Parks and Environment DOPE) provides a great deal of input into decisions made under the aforementioned legislation and does its best to ensure good environmental and social outcomes. This is part of the governments triple-bottom-line Sustainability Program, which has been operating for the last 10 years and has held workshops in many suburbs, including yours. However, while this department has many powers in relation to park management, it does not have a role in the day-to-day maintenance of the park adjacent to your property Lot 25 Mercer Road. Thank you for your interest in DOPE.

Dealing with Other Departmental Branches Unfortunately there is no way around dealing with other branches within your department, no matter how independent you want to be. Whether it is getting a publication out, getting invoices paid, or ensuring that your leave balances are correct, you will need to engage with other branches to achieve your objectives. The most crucial branches will be related to these areas communications, human resources, finance, and helpdesk. Communications/Publications Publications provide an excellent method to give the impression that decisions are being made and your project is moving forward. A small publication can be relatively cheap to produce, so even if your budget is limited you can take advantage of this opportunity. If you have a large budget, glossy colour brochures that contain numerous pages can be delivered at far greater cost, allowing you to use up some of your precious budget before someone takes it off you. Once you have negotiated approval of your potential publication, you will need to deal with the departmental communications branch to get it successfully completed and distributed. This branch is full of frustrated journalists who, for one reason or another, never made the grade and are reduced to writing meaningless speeches for politicians and senior public servants. They are all still secretly looking for that one scoop that will free them from their current drudgery and allow them to fly off to accept world-

renowned journalistic awards. These people will offer to help you write articles and publications, but this should be avoided if at all possible. You need to keep control of content yourself to make sure that the target readers expectations are kept suitably realistic. The communications team is bound to misinterpret what you want and go off on numerous tangents. This has the potential to cause you a lot of work. However, once you insist on writing the publication yourself, they will do everything they can to make your life difficult. The format will be wrong, the style will be wrong, the fonts will not be correct, the choice of colours will be wrong, it will be too complex for your target audience, or it will be too simplistic for your target audience. The potential hurdles are many and will slow down the progress of your publication. This in itself may not appear to be a problem, however it is serious as it could potentially prevent you from spending your allocated budget. Also, being arty types, there is not likely to be any firm and understandable publications procedure. If by some miracle there is a procedure, it will change on a regular basis so that staff members are constantly finding that they are working with the wrong assumptions about whom they should be talking to, and when. This is not a deliberate strategy; they just keep changing their minds. Human Resources Depending on where you work, you are probably going to be asked to write job descriptions (perhaps even your own) or go

through the process of hiring new staff members. To do this you will need to get assistance and approval from the Human Resources Branch. They will send you on a merry-go-round of filling in forms, talking to senior officers, searching through files, and generally tearing your hair out in your attempt to achieve whatever it is that you want. See the chapter on employing a staff member for a detailed example of an HR process. Human Resource Officers jump at the chance to slow down your progress as much as possible. They like to make sure that you do not do anything that may be construed as unethical or illegal. To make sure that every employee has no excuse for such behaviour, a complex and incomprehensible Induction System is produced, usually on-line. This requires employees to spend weeks, possibly months, laboriously going through all the relevant policies for their job. Human Resources believe that all policies are related to all jobs, so there is no way out of this. By the time a new employee has read everything they need to, they will have forgotten most of it and be totally confused as to what should and should not be done in most situations. Human Resource Officers also ensure that your leave balances are always slightly wrong, so that you never really know how much leave you have available. Such issues will distract employees and result in less concentration on the work at hand. Human Resources use these valuable tools to slow down decision-making processes and instill caution, and also mild panic, in employees from their very first week in the job.

Finance To spend your money, and you do need to spend your money, you need to get invoices processed through the Finance Branch. This should be a relatively simple process; however, the Finance Branch often treats the money as their own and is consequently reluctant to let you spend it. This is of course, patently not the case. Most people are reluctant to point this out, as they are likely to find it increasingly hard to spend their money if they do. Finance will put hurdles in your way, such as getting numerous quotes for jobs that cost minimal amounts of money. They will also have spending limits that each level of officer is authorised to sign-off on. These are usually set just below what many relevant tasks are going to cost. Finance will do their utmost to stop you spending your budget. Much like Human Resources, there will be a form for doing almost anything. A form for getting quotes, a form for transferring money from one account another, a form for requesting a form to transfer money the list is endless. It is a little known fact that whatever money the Finance Branch stops you spending goes towards paying them next years Christmas bonus that they insist doesnt exist (being a Finance branch they can cook the books so that a bonus is disguised as purchases of miscellaneous stationery items). Finance Officers are an essential cog in the machinery of government. When projects are going too quickly, or it appears a decision is likely to be made, they can successfully apply the brakes. They have a direct line to the CEOs phone and supply covert information on all branches. This allows the CEO to know when to

take appropriate action to reign in rogue decision-makers. Helpdesk / IT To avoid confusion you should remember that Helpdesks are rarely that much help. There has been many a public servant that has sat waiting in vain for assistance from Helpdesks, their computer completely frozen. The reason for this is that when the job descriptions are written for the Helpdesk, they insist that there is a criterion that applicants provide evidence that they have no social skills. This means that employees are mostly introverts who would be at their happiest if they did not come across other actual humans while carrying out their work. These people are happiest in the company of other introverts and techno-geeks, but only if the company of computer hardware is not available and they have no software to talk to. When they do finally summon up the courage to venture outside their domain, they often make the mistake of trying to provide to a bemused and bored civil servant a technical explanation of the problem. At this point, the civil servants eyes glaze over and they wonder what the Helpdesk person is talking about. They just want the problem fixed quickly. Because of their natural ability to resist all forms of communication, the Helpdesk employee will always prefer to be emailed, or phoned, if matters are really urgent. Their phones will always be switched to message bank, and e-mails will be answered in the fullness of time. New technology has meant that they can now

access computers remotely and do not have to have actual face-toface contact with other humans. If you finally lose patience and venture down to the Helpdesk domain, be prepared to experience startled glances and mild panic, as they realise that an outsider has entered. The CEO has a close relationship with the head of the Helpdesk. These people have a great deal of control over the efficiency of the services provided by the department. They can therefore slow down processes and put the brakes on areas where decisions are apparently imminent.

Project Management Tasks and Milestones To begin the section on skills for intermediate-level bureaucrats the focus will be on project management skills. When you are asked to define your projects for the upcoming business plan, you will be told to outline the major tasks that you intend to undertake and the milestones by which your projects progress can be measured. Most projects are ill defined and cobbled together in a hurry when people realise that they only have a week, or even a day, to complete their part of the business plan. As a result, the tasks and milestones need to be extremely vague; this ensures that accountability is kept to a minimum. The setting of tasks is the easier of the two actions, as you should be able to define, very loosely, what it is that you think should be done. These tasks should be over-arching tasks such the preparation of a report, the commissioning of a consultants study, or the ongoing actions of a required government process. This is important because these are likely to run for large chunks of the year, or in the case of processes, all year. This allows you to draw long coloured lines on your Gant chart. Setting milestones within these tasks is a trickier proposition. Proper government milestones should not relate to tangible outcomes, but more to points where progress has been made. A government statutory process needs no milestones, as it simply exists and must be done; however, the usual milestones for other types of projects

revolve around the commissioning of a consultant. Such milestones will mark the progress of the relevant report rather than any outcomes. These can include the awarding of work to a consultant, the production of draft report from the consultant, and the receipt of the final report. In the case of projects where consultants are not used (and this is certainly not the sort of project that you want to be involved in), the production of publications, and Ministerial launches of such publications, can be used. None of these milestones relates to any actual progress, however they do give a reasonable impression that progress is being made. It is all about perception rather than reality. Where a staff member is silly enough to seriously consider putting milestones in a project that would show actual progress, they are setting themselves up for failure, as the machinery of government will do all in its power to make sure that the project does not achieve these milestones. After a few of these aborted attempts at progress most employees settle into the comfortable world of inert projects with achievable milestones.

Spending Your Allocated Budget When working in government, one of the essential activities that should be focused on at all times, is spending your allocated budget. There are always people out there who are intent on expanding their own budgets and who will take any opportunity to stick the knives into you if you are seen to be underspending. In that case you obviously dont need the money and should not be unhappy to transfer it to other projects, preferably theirs. The size of a budget being managed by a civil servant is a measure of their worth in the organisation, and can also look impressive when applying for promotion. I currently manage a budget of one point five million pounds, sounds far more impressive than I currently manage a budget of two hundred and fifty thousand pounds. The fact that you spend your small budget efficiently and gain the same, or even better, outputs than your more cashed-up colleague counts for nothing in the scramble for promotion. This being the case, it is essential that you work hard to spend your budget, leaving no chance that you will end the financial year with Carryovers - anything left over. People who dont spend all their money run a considerable risk that their budget will be reduced the next year, as they obviously dont need as much as was previously allocated. It is far better to have overspent by a small amount, as you can then point out that you were, in fact, underfunded for the work that you were required to carry out. Overspending by a large amount is just incompetence. The dreaded spectre of Carryovers must be avoided at all costs.

So, during the quarterly reviews (a process designed identify all those staff members who are not spending at the required rate) you should ensure that where you can see you are behind in expenditure, you can find a suitable reason why the money is languishing in the account, rather than lining the pockets of a consultant. The actual use to which the money is put comes second to shovelling it out of the door; the more studies or background reports that you can commission, the better. The production of publications also helps, particularly if they are large and glossy. Remember, that while managers and directors always talk about results, the most important result is that the money has been spent; other transgressions are more easily forgiven than having Carryovers. Publications Use a lot of publications, they help you to spend your money and are good milestones to have in the business plan.

Policy Development The government, and all bureaucracies, need policies that provide a solid base on which to carry out the long-winded decision-making process, however, having clear and concise policies would conflict with the paradigm of delaying decisions. Therefore, it is essential to have a process that will ensure that such policies are written with the utmost care so that they will perform the required function, i.e. delaying decisions. The following question must therefore be asked: How do you write a good government policy? Understanding the context What form should a policy take? Some short-sighted departments take the view that the production of clear and concise policies will be beneficial to their stakeholders and will reduce the workloads in the department. Under no circumstances should you follow this example as it will send you along the perilous decision-making path. A proper government policy should be a lengthy document that begins with a seemingly straightforward statement, only one or two sentences at most; it should then go into a lengthy explanation and discussion of the reasons why the policy statement reads as it does. The more that people read this, ideally structured and written with lots of jargon by one of the departments boffins, the more confused they will become. The meaning of the initial statement will then be

cast into doubt. Some people will, at their peril, take the opening policy statement at face value. This is a sure way to begin a downward spiral into confusion and depression. This is particularly so if it is taken as guidance in relation to the development of a project needing government approvals. Many boffins in the public service still write documents in the form of academic papers complete with detailed methodologies, complex equations and graphs, and numerous references. This will be meaningless to the majority of the general public. These policy documents are only of interest to other boffins; their only use is to be read at technical conferences. This is why boffins are ideal for the policy-writing task. Once you have decided what the policy is going to achieve, you then need to start the writing process. Writing the policy

1. Write the draft concentrating on your own knowledge of the

issue, making sure that you ignore past documents. This gives you an entirely new perspective on the matter at hand. Of course, some may say that you need to use these documents so that you can be comfortable that you are aware of the history that has led to this particular policy being required. However, these people are dinosaurs who probably wrote previous drafts of the policy and who have egos that will be hurt if you ignore their work. These are often bitter old bureaucrats who have not mastered the five paradigms of government.

2. Send the policy out for comment. While we may believe

that our work is great, there is a slim possibility that our stakeholders may not agree with our point of view. We could go out and consult during the composition of the draft to make sure that these issues are addressed, however, this may result in a coherent policy and decisions being made as a result. Delaying consultation until after the draft has been written will ensure that all sorts of stakeholders will be upset and feel that they have been ignored. They will then raise all sorts of issues with the proposed policy. 3. Deal with submissions from the consultation period. Dont ignore them - that would be rude. Register and assess the comments, then comment on their relevance. The time taken for the evaluation is usually a matter of months. To incorporate all the comments from diverse stakeholders adds to the length of time taken to write the policy, and ensures that all concerned will regard the final document as unworkable. If you have done your job properly, the policy will be a huge leap backward. Advanced bureaucrats can mistakenly leak the comments to the relevant stakeholders and cause further upset when it is discovered that a submission has been regarded as misguided or irrelevant by the department. This is guaranteed to cause the offended or ignored stakeholder to write to the Minister responsible for the department, causing long delays if the Minister decides to get involved. 4 . Release the policy in a frenzy of publicity. Invite politicians, the CEO, Board Chair, and any other relevant

bigwig that can be found, as well as any person who has had any remote role in the generation of the policy. The writer of the policy is advised to make sure that they get no publicity whatsoever and are not in any way associated with the policy (arse-covering paradigm). 5 . Sit back and watch the policy in action and deny all knowledge of how it came about. People will discover that it is hard to implement and that there are even more problems than when it was decided that a new policy was needed. It will be too late to go back to the old policy. You can shift blame to other departments or branches within your own department, and, more importantly, the industries that complained about uncertainty in decision-making and wanted the policy in the first place.

Solving a Policy Problem The Bog We have covered the general process for policy writing in the previous chapter; however, we now need to ask What happens if you already have a policy and there is a suggestion that it needs to be revised? On some occasions, and these will hopefully be rare, there will come a time when a policy problem of such magnitude arises that decisions will have to be made and actions taken. The policy in question may need to be revised, or even replaced. Such a situation is likely to be due to advances in technology or science, or perhaps a government insisting that policies are revised, and this being so patently beneficial to the public that even career bureaucrats will be reluctant to get in the way for too long. This may affect regulatory agencies ability to operate, cause impacts on a departmental budget, or cause an even greater catastrophe such as the workload increasing. Experienced civil servants will start to realise something is wrong some time before the bog occurs. Just as when you are driving over soft ground, you will get a sinking feeling that comes when you realise that the ground you are on is not as robust as you thought it was. Very soon you find yourself sinking and in danger of becoming bogged. An experienced civil servant will try to keep a steady foot on the accelerator and keep the policy viable for as long as possible through a variety of procrastination techniques. The inexperienced will put their foot down in an all-out attempt to prove that their policy

vehicle can swiftly ride away from trouble and continue to maintain its relevance. The first approach may work, but in all likelihood will not if the ground is as soft as it feels. The second approach will result in a rapid descent into the mire and the civil servant will become well and truly stuck. At times like this, it is traditional to invoke the Im bogged method or approach. All geologists (at least those that can drag themselves out from behind their computer and into the field), field assistants, and four-wheel drive enthusiasts will be aware of this 3staged approach. Step 1

I am not really bogged; we will be out of here soon.

What usually happens is that a cursory inspection of the bog situation is carried out and a decision is quickly reached that the problem is not too severe, and all that needs to be done is to get back behind the wheel, crank up the revs and well be out of here in no time. This is complete denial and a result of self-delusion of the highest order. Government does this too. It refuses to admit that a problem exists and simply asks everyone to work harder. No change of policy or approach occurs, as this would show a dangerous level of initiative. No decisions will be made, as it will be hoped that the problem will

just go away. All this time you are spinning your wheels furiously and splattering mud over all those trying to be helpful and to get you out of the trouble you are in. After some six months or so, it might become apparent that there is actually a problem and that it has become a lot worse. You have also covered all your potential allies in mud! Step 2

OK. I am a little bit stuck, but if we dig out the tyres, we will be out of
here in no time. This is still a form of denial. There is still a refusal to accept the truth of what is patently there for all to see. Therefore, out you get with your shovel, dig out each of the tyres, and put a bog-mat under each one to ensure they get traction. Then it is back to revving up the engine once more before the joy of traction is felt. In government, this translates to a realisation that a problem does exist. A new policy is indeed required. Someone is charged with evaluating the current policy and making changes to accommodate the new circumstances. A pathetically inadequate amount of time is given to this process along with an insubstantial budget. This approach is trumpeted loudly with the suggestion that everything is in hand and that it will be fixed very soon. This policy is then released for public comment and is roundly condemned as being unworkable; it has simply addressed the symptoms rather than the fundamental causes

of the problem. You are not bogged because your wheels are in the mud, you are bogged because you did not keep an eye out and turn before you got into the soft ground. You gain a grand total of about two metres before you once again sink up to your axles in the mud. You are still stuck and this process has taken about a year. Step 3

I accept that I am bogged. I need to build a road to solid ground.

Yes, it is time to go for a walk and survey the landscape. Youll need to find where the hard ground is and then it will be time to go and find the resources to build a road that will get you there. Tree branches, rocks and anything else that might be available will need to be gathered and laid to provide passage to solid ground. It is time to admit that your current policy is not up to scratch, and that a brand new policy is required. A great deal of time and effort is needed to research what needs to be done and a great deal of consultation needs to be carried out. We are talking innovation, communication and decision-making, and these are all areas foreign to many civil servants who have survived through implementing the five paradigms of government. The smart civil servant will have realised all this and will have already been working on solutions. When the CEO, under pressure from the politicians, is desperately seeking an escape route, the savvy

bureaucrat will be able to come to the rescue. The CEO will love them for it, as it will get them out of a tricky situation. They will then, of course, realise that the civil servant in question is possibly a lot smarter than they are and therefore possibly dangerous. The most likely outcome is that hints will be dropped that there are senior opportunities in another departments, and that a glowing reference is available to go with them. This is the quick way to achieve promotion, and only comes along once in a while. All civil servants should learn to look out for such circumstances. After an exhaustive eighteen months there will be a new policy produced that nobody is happy with, that is probably about a year behind the times, but is better than nothing. The whole process from becoming bogged to finding a passable if slightly inadequate solution will take almost three years.

Basic Jargon Jargon To ensure that you can carry out your government writing skills in a professional and appropriately vague manner, you should make sure that you are aware of the relevant jargon that you can use. The good use of jargon will give your letters, reports, policies and briefing notes a soothing and confidence-building feel, while at the same time leaving the reader with no real idea of what you are talking about. For instance, when writing a policy you can use scientific terms and names that will only be understandable to a very few academics who specialise in that area. When writing letters to the public you can make use of acronyms that you know will mean nothing to them. You can also use this method when writing briefing notes to a board or your senior management, as they will not admit that they do not know what you are talking about if you make it convincing enough. See below for an example of what should be included in such a briefing. I wish to bring to the Boards attention a matter of crucial importance to the future of this department. The JVNOS subcommittee recently had correspondence from the GJPC that the FNO was not happy with the way the Board was using its SOPs to gain knowledge construed by the FNO to be its own domain. After some contact with the FNO, and with reference to our own KPIs, the NNTB was contacted to see if their were any legal concerns

that may leave the Board open to being sued pursuant to clause 13B(iv)a(iii) of the EJPA Regulations under the EJPA Act (1927). A successful prosecution under these provisions would result in a failure to meet the KPIs and have a potential negative impact on the perceived integrity and capability of the Board. This would cause the SRF to ask questions and the SAG to run for cover. The performance of Board members would be most likely to be called into question, raising the possibility that the Minister ask for a judicial enquiry under the WATIB Act (1978). Board members would have a defence through the NFIWGO clause( s178(b)3 of the EJP A Regulations), though this may not be enough to save their positions on the Board or prevent a jail term if found guilty. This sounds serious and of major importance. However, the number of acronyms and vague terms mean that most Board members would have no idea what is going on. They will be worried, and probably inclined to approve any recommendation asked for that sounds like it will avert the major disaster. Acronyms Used

JVNOS Joint Venture National Ocean Study FNO Federation of Norwegian Oceanographers GJPC Global Joint Projects Committee SPO Standard Operating Procedures

KPI Key Performance Indicators EJPA Environmental Jurisdictions and Prosecutions in Antarctica SRF Stakeholder Reference Group SAG Stakeholder Advisory Group WATIB Who Are These Idiots on the Board NFIWGO No Fucking Idea Whats Going On Weasel Words This type of briefing note can be followed with a relatively meaningless recommendation that will give the Board comfort that actions are indeed being taken. For an example see below. It is recommended that the Board resolve that in the future they are committed to expressing an interest in supporting further research within the JVNOS project and its triple-bottom-line analysis to be carried out by the JSVEnv. What does this mean? Does anything have to be done as a result and will it cause an environment where decisions will need to be made? In short, it says absolutely nothing and does not ask for any actions or decisions to be taken in the near future. This is a successful recommendation. This example clearly shows that even when writing to a Board

that does nothing other than administer funding arrangements for foreshore restoration projects, they can have the willies put up them with some creative jargon. When you consider this, just imagine what this sort of jargon would mean to a member of the public. It would cause total confusion and hopefully a further letter requesting clarification about what you actually meant. This will slow down the wheels of government and ensure that every aspect of an issue is carefully scrutinised prior to any thought of making a decision. A final word on the use of weasel words and terms, so called because they are vague enough to allow the writer to weasel out of any tight corner that they may inadvertently find themselves in. A few examples of these terms include the following: Sustainable What does this really relate to? Basically whatever you like. Without context it could mean pretty much anything. Sustainable income, sustainable environment, sustainable wage packet, its really up to you. Community Capacity Building Nobody really knows what this means. It is a term that has grown in popularity in recent years and is often used by politicians who want to sound like they know what they are talking about.

Externalities Who cares what this really means? It could mean anything, and will most likely be misinterpreted by the reader, and possibly the writer. Facilitate This is a wonderful weasel word. When used it doesnt specify what steps will actually be taken and so it cannot be definitely attributed to any particular action. This is pure gold for the procrastinator.

Subject to This is usually part of a very slippery phrase that is used to promise the world, but only on the condition that a number of other things happen first. It is often used in government approvals and can then be used in court when a contractor decides that they havent received what they thought they were entitled to.

Strategic Planning Every government department needs a five-year plan, whether they realise this or not. Many departments even get their act together to actually produce such a plan. You should be familiar with the standard process, so that when the time comes you can participate with an appropriate level of skill. The process usually follows a path similar to this: Step 1 The executive management team gets together when the realisation dawns that the department or branch has been doing the same thing for many years, and they are now so far behind everyone else in their area that they are almost completely irrelevant and in danger of becoming a joke. Worse than this, the department may be disbanded. If this happens it is the managers that would be most at risk of losing their jobs. Something must be done to regain the illusion of usefulness and relevance. Step 2 Firstly, the staff have to be kept in the dark about the need for a new plan. This ignores the fact that the staff have been muttering and grumbling about the lack of direction for years and pleading for a new strategy.

However, involving the staff is to be avoided at all costs as it will only complicate the process through the involvement of too many people, or worse still, it will attract numerous sensible and practical ideas that necessitate decisions to be made and actions to be undertaken. Step 3 (Meeting 1) The management team must meet behind closed doors to discuss the future direction. These discussions must follow the pattern of such documents, so the first step is to define the Vision and Mission Statement. A great deal of time is spent on this task as these set the scene for the final strategic plan. The Vision is usually a one or two line statement that encompasses the dreams of the organisation. It should be noted that these dreams cannot relate to wishes of permanent anonymity and increased funding, as this is a public statement. In normal circumstances the first two hours of a three-hour meeting are taken up creating and refining the Vision. In fact this usually involves lots of arguing over the precise wording, as personal preferences in language and grammar take over and the meeting degenerates into an argument about whether the word provides or the word presents is a better option. An experienced procrastinator can ensure that the whole meeting can be taken up by this debate without a definite resolution. However, a great deal of skill is required for this and it should not be attempted by beginners. A tip for first-timers is to initially stir the waters by bringing up a deeply philosophical question such as At its

core, what exactly is the purpose behind coming up with a vision? And what is the difference between the Vision and Mission Statement anyway? It is guaranteed that most people in the room, if not all, will not really know the answer and are just following the standard headings without question. Some will attempt to answer and in the process derail the meeting and demonstrate their own lack of knowledge, tailing off into silence as they realise the hole they are digging. Hopefully by then it will be too late and numerous arguments will have broken out about what the differences actually are. Step 4 (Meeting 2) A repeat the previous meeting, but this time relating to the Mission Statement. Cast doubt on the progress made so far and reopen the battles that were apparently left unresolved concerning the Vision. These battles are never completely resolved, as an experienced civil servant knows the value of holding a grudge for long periods of time. Step 5 (Meeting 3) This meeting will move on from the debacle of trying to define the Vision and Mission Statement, leaving them poorly worded and open to ridicule, and preferably meaningless. Now it will be time to agree on the Objectives and Desired Outcomes. It goes without saying that the same confusion about the meanings of these two terms will

cause this meeting to degenerate in the same way as the previous meetings. What is a Desired Outcome? What is an Objective? Surely the Outcomes you are working towards are the same as the Objectivesarent they? Say no more. Step 6 (Meeting 4) If there is any will left to continue this process, and in reality it has often disappeared by this stage, it is now time to look at Actions and Responsibilities. However, in all likelihood what happens is that the procrastinators have successfully ground their colleagues into the dust and they are only able to come up with vague general statements about intent, with no substance. Where responsibilities are assigned, the vague nature of the actions is such that nobody knows what they mean and nothing will happen. And there you have the generic government strategic plan.

Employing a New Staff Member I have previously discussed the process of applying for a job within government, however, now that you have reached the level of an intermediate bureaucrat you will need to know how to employ a person. There can be a significant turnover of people in government and many positions to be filled, so this is an essential skill. To employ someone you will have to negotiate the minefield of bureaucracy that comes with the Human Resources Branch. In the great tradition of bureaucracy, there will be numerous forms to fill in and a long line of people who need to sign-off on the position prior to it being advertised in the press (all permanent jobs will need to be advertised, thus ensuring that a long process will be made just a little bit longer). In the meantime, you will need to fill the position temporarily. This will require an internal advertisement and yet more forms that you will have to fill in and find the right people to sign them. To advertise a job you need a Job Description. Irrespective of what the job entails it is best to take an existing description and fit it to the job. Getting a new description will otherwise take you months. While this may sound appealing in terms of the usual procrastination required in government, you should remember that you need people to whom to can allocate work so that you do not have to it yourself. In this case you want things to go smoothly. Of course, there is a chance that using an existing job description may mean that what is advertised may not relate closely to what the job actually entails, but what the hell, it gets around a time-consuming

process. To ensure that the successful applicant cannot complain about this, most Human Resource branches have developed generic job descriptions that are so vague that you could probably attach them to 90% of the available jobs, with only minor alterations. The job tasks are usually written in such a way that they appear far more difficult and complex than they are. For instance Coordinates the daily distribution of communications throughout the department, while ensuring the process is sufficiently lubricated actually relates to delivering the mail and making people cups of tea and coffee. The crucial part of a Job Description are the selection criteria. These criteria have been developed to ensure that the applicants creative writing skills are suitably developed for a government environment. Nobody expects truthful answers, just an idea of how well the applicant can write without actually saying anything meaningful. The process also allows the applicant to write reams of paper as a response, and causes them to think carefully about whether they are up to the challenges of working in government. Much like the job tasks, the criteria are usually written in such a way that they appear to require more of an answer than they actually do. This process has, apparently, been developed to ensure that all applicants are dealt with on their merits. So, for the permanent position an external consultant will be brought in and they will usually be asked to collate the shortlist of applicants for interview, based on the selection criteria. They will, ideally, have no idea about what the job actually entails and will therefore come up with a

shortlist based purely on the ability of the applicants to write believable bullshit. Then you can start the interview process. The questions that will be asked will be almost carbon copies of the selection criteria and will not challenge any of the applicants in any way. Those unfit for government will take the initiative to try to find numerous examples of their abilities and try to impress with their varied and exciting previous experience, while those more suited to government will take a more cautious approach, carefully deciding what answers got them to the interview in the first place and regurgitating them without any flair or deviation from the previously accepted statements in their application. Once the interview process is complete, a selection report will be required. This should be given to the consultant to complete as they will be far more used to doing this. You shouldnt waste your time on it. The report will usually take a few weeks to come through and it will then need to get signed off by Human Resources and numerous other officers within your division, prior to any offer of employment being made. This process can take over six months. It is often the case that by the time a staff member is employed, the project for which they were required has ceased, or at least been changed so significantly that they are no longer needed. Once this has happened the new staff member will be put on a project for which they have no interest or previous knowledge. This is perfectly acceptable as the Job Description will have been suitably vague. Of course there is also a distinct possibility that all the applicants will have secured employment in other jobs prior to the

process being completed and you will then to start from scratch once again.

Section 4: Advanced Bureaucracy

Reviews, Restructures and Reorganisation When in government, there is likely to come a time when you have honed your bureaucratic skills to such a point that you have achieved promotion to a reasonably senior level in your department. It is at this point that you will be in a position to implement advanced bureaucratic methods. Now that you are in charge of large numbers of people, you will find yourself responsible for human resource issues, business planning, staff accommodation, and many more important administrative matters. All of these areas significantly broaden your influence and increase your ability to cause obstruction to progress. The Operational Review Whenever a branch, or even department, appears to be on the verge of achieving decision-making status, the correct step is to order a review of the branch in question. Whether this is because an overzealous manager has somehow gained the erroneous belief that decisions need to be made, or that procrastination options have been exhausted, there is a need to investigate whether it is delivering the appropriate level of service. A well timed review is what is required, and this will take up considerable time as well as distracting the senior branch officers by requiring them to sit down and write tedious explanations and justifications of their activities. An external consultant is often brought in to carry out the review. This consultant is unlikely to have any knowledge of the

actual activities of the branch or the areas within which staff work, causing a great deal of time to be expended with repetitive explanations. Their lack of knowledge is likely to lead to an extended review period and a good chance that their conclusions and recommendations will be totally inappropriate. A bonus associated with the review process and the lengthy period of time that it takes, is that staff within the branch are distracted and find concentrating on their work difficult because of the all the uncertainty that a review brings. Added to this, rumours and stories are bound to start circulating about the likely outcomes of the review (often based on other rumours), which will further reduce productivity and stall decision-making processes. A review is a grand opportunity to defer all decision-making until the outcome is known. As every department is reviewed on a semiregular basis, it is almost guaranteed that one in every three years will be taken up with such a review and its consequences. The Restructure Once a review has been completed, one of the usual recommendations is that a restructure of the branch or department is required in order to accommodate the suggested changes. This restructure will need to be carefully considered as there will be robust debate about where different responsibilities should reside. The review will suggest one thing while the staff actually involved with the relevant areas will, in all probability, have a different perspective based on practical and sensible considerations. These poor souls

would be the ruin of the civil service if they were allowed to get their way. The possibility of a restructure will cause as much angst as the review process. Section Managers will all be jostling to ensure that they dont lose staff members (whoever manages the most people wins!) or worse still, lose responsibilities. Junior staff members will worry about who they will be working for and what they will be doing. The ultimate aim of the restructure is to reposition people into areas that they know little about, with the stated aim of broadening their corporate knowledge. Of course, this also means that much time is needed to familiarise themselves with the new area and overcome the uncertainty that results from knowing they need to avoid making decisions on things that they know nothing about. Decision-making is thus considerably slowed down. Office Re-organisation Following the review and restructure, there will be a need to reorganise the office layout and dynamics. This will further disrupt the branch and cause arguments about who sits next to whom and who gets the window seats etc. This can go on for years, and be the cause of long-held grudges. New Procedures A restructure often means that new administrative procedures

need to be developed. This has the potential to cause confusion and delays to process-based operations. A good administrative process will involve as many steps as possible and have timelines that are not achievable. This presents yet another opportunity to employ a consultant to review and/or redesign the process. This will take a very long time and be the cause of many arguments between the consultant and the people who will need to make the process work. As with many consultations, it has the potential to spawn a number of further consultant contracts, ensuring that someone somewhere gets to spend their budget by the end of the financial year.

Business Planning Of course, once all the reviews and restructures have taken place, they need to be incorporated into the next years Business Plan. This is a golden opportunity for the senior bureaucrat to delay decisionmaking, cause untold stress to their employees, as well as cause havoc among stakeholders who have just got their head around the previous direction of the department or branch. Changing the requirements of the business plan from one year to the next will not only be fun, but you can then sit back and watch the chaos unfold. Changing the format, the headings, the length of justifications required, and the time frames in which the planning must be completed, can foster such indecision and distraction from the core business of the organisation that months can be spent unproductively arguing over the new format and whether it provides a good basis from which to work. Stakeholders will have gnawed most of their fingernails away waiting for confirmation that projects will continue or that support will still be given by the time their project or funding application is approved. Where a Board is involved in the business planning, this adds an extra layer of complexity to the process and has the potential to delay the process to such an extent that the business plan may not be approved until six months into the year for which it has been written.

Scheduling and Avoidance The more senior and experienced the bureaucrat, the more opportunities will arise to better implement the business of government. The following options will give you more hints at how to keep yourself remote from decision-making instances. Scheduling Your Day All experienced civil servants know that planning your day is of utmost importance when carrying out the business of government. This will increase your opportunities to implement the five paradigms of government and ensure that you keep yourself suitably comfortable in your position. To properly schedule your day you need to have numerous meetings with like-minded civil servants. If you all book each other for an hour meeting at different times on one day, and there are five of you, you have successfully booked out five hours of your 7.5-hour day. You can spend a large part of the remainder of the day organising your five hours of meetings for the next day. This fills up your electronic calendar and makes finding time for anyone else very problematic. Such a full schedule, provided it is only with other suitable experienced bureaucrats (and not necessarily ones within your own agency) will dramatically slow down any projects that you have on the go, as well as making contacting you more difficult. The more time you spend discussing projects, rather than implementing them, the better. After all, you must ensure that all aspects have been

thoroughly investigated. The Hospital Pass If you see the opportunity arising, or can find a way in which to make this opportunity arise, you may be able to avoid being put in the position of making a decision. Experienced operators make a habit of gazing into their crystal ball so that they are not caught out, and so have the best chance of taking evasive action. Where you can see a decision-point lurking on the horizon, look for a way to pass the responsibility onto another branch, division, or even department. To do this, some hard work will be required. You will need to have a good knowledge of the legislation and policies under which you work, and which other areas of government work. A classic example of such a hospital pass is where a planning authority redraws its boundaries to exclude a potentially contentious site, and leaves the responsibility with another authority.

Evaluating a Consultants Report If you are following the paradigms of government you will be commissioning numerous reports from external consultants in the course of your activities. These reports take time and make good milestones for projects as they give the impression that things are

happening and progress is being made. However, once you have a report the process does not have to be over. An evaluation of the report is required and, as an expert is required to carry out this evaluation, there is need to commission another consultant to carry out this evaluation. This requires another scope of works, another tendering process, and another panel to be convened to assess submissions before the work is awarded. An experienced operator can then cast doubt on both reports, as there are likely to be significant differences due to the second consultant feeling the need to justify their exorbitant fee by expressing some reservations about the initial report and suggesting another course of action. Of course, what then needs to happen is that a further consultant be commissioned to evaluate both previous reports and suggest what really needs to be done. A top-flight bureaucrat can keep this process going on for years.

Crisis Management There will be a time in your career, in fact many times in all probability, that the shit will really hit the fan. These are the times when a government department, or government-owned enterprise, is found to be responsible for some major cock-up. If you are the Environmental Department you may be found to be complicit in the pollution of a river, affecting peoples health as a result. If you are the Police Department you may find that someone is syphoning funds or committing some other crime. Alternatively, perhaps if you are the Treasury Department you may find that you have made a huge cock-up in the governments finances. In all these cases, the public will be outraged, the press will be having a field day calling for heads to roll, and the Minister will be put in such a position that he also wants heads to roll. It will turn into a circus of monumental proportions, focusing more on finding someone to blame than solving the problem at hand. This is the traditional and correct approach for governments and politicians. In these circumstances, your ability to implement the five paradigms of government will be tested. If you have put in the required groundwork you will be good shape, finding yourself able to ride out the storm in some comfort, while having a good laugh on the sidelines. If you have played your cards right you will not have been silly enough to be the one named as the decision-maker, or any of those tainted by association; in other words your arse will be well and truly covered with industrial strength armour. Ideally, one of the people caught in the maelstrom of emotion

and stress is the subject of one or more of your carefully cultivated grudges. The advanced bureaucrat will have been working for years to put this person in the firing line and will gain some considerable satisfaction from the trouble they have caused this person. Of course, in person you should express great sympathy for people caught in these predicaments, so make sure your muffled laughter does not start until you are safely off their floor. Once you are safely back at your desk, you can let rip with a full belly laugh.

Government Efficiency Drives You may have noticed that the government rarely seems to change. Sure, politicians change every now and then, but the system does not. Periodically, however, industry finds an amenable government and the civil service is put under pressure to make the system work faster. You hear cries of The system must be streamlined!, There are too many approvals needed for each project, or We need to deal with fewer departments, or most likely, Its taking too long and we are losing money. A good example of how this works is in the area of approvals, be they environmental, planning or any other sort of statutory process. The government will then come out and say, We are going to make government more efficient! There will be intense pressure and when, not if but when, the politicians have overcome all the strenuous efforts of the majority of civil servants, it is time for those most senior bureaucrats, Directors General, Chief Executive Officers and General Managers, to act. This is where it is necessary for them to use all their experience and abilities to protect their establishment. It is then time to talk about cutbacks or, as politicians call them, efficiency dividends. Its all in the terminology, you know. Governments all over the world come to power with the stated aim of improving the efficiency of the civil service. They gain mileage in the press by launching attacks on the process, the amount of red tape, and the inconvenience this causes to business and therefore the economy. They arrive at Parliament frothing at the mouth in their

eagerness to make a difference. The poor, misguided souls are simply not aware that they are destined for failure. They are dealing with the most experienced and able bureaucrats - the Heads of Departments. The first step to deal with such troublesome politicians is to wrap up their efficiency drives in the very red tape that they are trying to overcome. The formation of working groups, steering committees and industry reference groups will ensure that all stakeholders are represented and all have a say. The very advanced bureaucrat will get the politicians involved in the process through Ministerial working groups. This will put politicians in the position of actually taking responsibility and ownership of the decisions that occur. Politicians entwined in the system will be reluctant to admit failure and will therefore be able to be manipulated for the benefit of bureaucrats everywhere. Each new efficiency drive will end up requiring the writing of many reports, the compilation of many recommendations, and the taking of people away from everyday activities to carry out this work. The result will be a backlog of work building up and the impression that a department is getting slower, thus annoying industry even more. At this time, the more perceptive politicians will realise that they are caught in the civil service web and will look for ways to escape but it will already be too late. They will look on with dismay as their speechwriters give them many opportunities to talk-up the improvements that are on the way, knowing full well that things are, in fact, getting worse because of the time and effort spent trying to make them better. After a suitably lengthy time, consultants reports will start to

arrive. They will have various terrible conclusions. The civil service needs to be changed. There are serious systemic problems. The publics money is not being spent in an efficient manner. The list will go on and on giving the Press many opportunities to stick the knife into the government and its departments. The inexperienced civil servant may find this upsetting, but those with a better understanding will realize that they have already won. As soon as the committees were formed there was never any prospect of any serious change occurring. In successful cases, there will, paradoxically, be further levels of bureaucracy added to processes in the name of efficiency. For instance, a Lead Agency System may be initiated. This is where one agency is put in charge of facilitating the approvals for a project. They will then need to keep a raft of other agencies in line and on time. So, in addition to the old process, there is now another layer of the public service. This new layer will lack the necessary expertise in other approvals areas and cause more harm than good in the process, thus further frustrating the relevant industries. Another popular outcome is the Interdepartmental Forum. This is a group of department leaders that meets on a semi-regular basis to talk a lot about how terrible the delays are and express the opinion that something must be done. They also have very long lunches and meet at country clubs, five-star hotels, and major sporting events. Where possible they link up with similar groups in other countries and have conferences on tropical islands. As the politicians realise the situation they are in, they will do most of the work needed to sell the new and non-existent changes to the public. This will further buffer the civil service from direct

impacts and provide a five-year timeframe within which no further requests for changes need to be acted upon. They will also ensure that they are invited to conferences on tropical islands. This is bureaucracy at its most advanced. Only those with many, many years of experience should attempt this sort of complex manipulation. One wrong move and you will find yourself in charge of issuing drivers licenses in some remote corner of your country. Many right moves and you will find a nice pension when retirement comes knocking.

Dealing With the Ministers Office The Ministers Office is at the top of the ladder where work priorities are concerned. It is also at the top of the ladder where unreasonable requests and deadlines are concerned. It is full of people who believe that the world revolves around them and their whims. The Minister, while likely to be an opportunist and political animal, is unlikely to be the source of too many unreasonable demands, however their staff will be falling over themselves to climb political ladders and show themselves to be a sharp operator. There are a number of requests that are likely to come down from the Ministers Office. The Ministerial Response Many people write to the minister to ask for information about matters that concern them. They do not realise that the person who actually responds to their letter is the person they spent ages talking to on the phone; the person who did not give them the response that they wanted. These letters will work their way through your departmental system to the senior person most likely to be able to able to respond most effectively. This person will then decide that they havent got the time to deal with the letter, and will pass it on. It will then end up on your desk, with a deadline that indicates a response was due yesterday. Therefore, when a ministerial response lands on your desk, drop everything and concentrate on providing the appropriate

response to the person you have probably said the same thing to over the phone. The response should be short and to the point. The structure of the letter should be a maximum of four paragraphs with the clear statement that the minister understands their concerns but really doesnt want to waste his time worrying about them when someone else has already taken the initiative to start worrying. A healthy amount of long words and government jargon should be used. Do not be shy about getting a thesaurus out to ensure you use enough long words to thoroughly confuse even the most widely read person. The ultimate aim of the letter is give the impression that matters are in hand and that the government is currently addressing the issue in one way or another, without actually detailing what is being done (in the unlikely event that anything is actually being done). This way you will put their mind at rest, or at the very least confuse and disorientate them, and relieve the pressure for hasty decisions.

Briefing Notes The Ministers policy officers can request these at any time. These people really should be called political officers; as they spend most of their time worrying about politics rather than good outcomes. Much like ministerial letters, the response time for briefing notes is usually unreasonable. The art of writing a briefing note is not to fully inform the Minister about the issue at hand. It is to give enough information that the Minister realises that there is a lot of work still to be done before any government policy direction can be safely announced. The recommendations should exclude any definite course of action, as this is likely to lead to policy officers making huge leaps in the dark and insisting that decisions are made quickly. Recommendations should always include a strong suggestion that further work is required prior to any decision being taken. To back this up you should include a full outline of the potential contentious issues that exist around the area under discussion. Most Ministers will see this and immediately dive for cover. This involves a request that further research and consultation are undertaken in this area, usually in the hope that they are no longer Minister when the public starts agitating for a decision to be made. A department may also generate a briefing note of its own accord when it decides that a particular process needs slowing down. Experienced civil servants know that ministerial involvement in the decision-making process, rather like public involvement, slows things down considerably. When both the Minister and the public are

involved in a process, reaching a decision becomes almost impossible. Various sections of the community and industry clamour for different outcomes and the Minister becomes paralysed and unable to make a decision. In this case they are likely to ask that a committee be formed to conduct an enquiry into the matter. Media Opportunities Ministers are generally media junkies and suffer from feelings of irrelevancy and insecurity if they have not been in the news recently. As the departments job is to make the Minister look good, at least according to the policy officers you will have do deal with, there will be constant pressure to find ways to get the Ministers face on TV , or to get a throng of journalists out to hear him or her speak. These affairs need to be managed carefully. Ministers have a habit of using their own initiative if not properly briefed and directed. While this can be beneficial in some rare instances, most of the time it results in promises being made that actions will be taken. These actions will not have had the proper level of scrutiny and evaluation. Following one of these instances, a great deal of time and effort is required to fix the damage that has been done and to bring the situation back to a manageable status quo. So, speeches need to be written for the Minister that say a lot and promise nothing. Plenty of fluffy language should be used, and the whole event should take place at a site with lots of kids, disadvantaged people, animals, or anything that can be considered cute that will distract from the actual speech.

Organising these events takes weeks, sometimes months, if the diaries of more than one Minister need to be coordinated. This takes people away from the real business of government, that of properly evaluating and assessing issues prior to making decisions and can create a great deal of ill-will between the department and the Ministers Office. Policy Officers A final note about Policy Officers. Because of their inflated sense of their own importance, they often take it upon themselves to call staff members directly, thus bypassing the formal contact process that requires them to go through the Director or Manager. Their justification for this is that the proper protocol is time-consuming and causes delays. They wish to impress with quick, and often rash, responses to emerging issues in the hope of making a name for themselves. They often hope that such ineptness and recklessness will see them gain a place on the party election ticket at the next branch-stacked selection meeting. The correct procedure in this case is to direct them to appropriately experienced public servants who have the ability and confidence to gently bring them closer to a grip on reality. They are unlikely ever to get a grip on reality, but the properly trained civil servant can at least deflect their misguided enthusiasm for a few weeks.

Working with Boards Depending on where you work in the civil service, there is a significant likelihood that you have to present papers or reports to a Board of Management, or perhaps an advisory body, charged with overseeing a particular policy area or work program. For many people the first time they are required to do this they feel nervous and even a little intimidated. This is understandable, as the experience is a new one and there is often a mystique that goes with the idea of a Board. However, there is no need to feel intimidated, and you will not, once you understand who the Board are and how they work. Board Members Each Board is made up of, usually, between five and seven members. While everybody is different, there are a number of common characters that you will meet. The following are the most common and you should make sure that you familiarise yourself with them as soon as possible once you begin work.

The Chairperson The Chair of the Board is the most important person and, very generally, is charged with ensuring that decisions are rarely made in good time and that the Board remains as dysfunctional as possible. When decisions are made, the Chair tries to ensure that other Board members have as little information as possible to minimise the chance of any person challenging his or her point of view. Chairs do not like to waste their time reading the agenda papers and instead book a meeting with the relevant Chief Executive Officer to have it all explained. This ensures that there is not the tiresome need to wade through all of the boring bits. There are many different styles of chairing a meeting. Some Chairs simply use the agenda for Board meetings as a list of items for discussion and jump around in anything but the order that the discussion items appear. This ensures that, while they are making a swift suggestion on a certain course of action, other Board members are reduced to flipping desperately through the agenda pages in a futile attempt to find the relevant item before the Chair utters the dreaded phrase - No objections then? Right, motion carried. Next item. Once this has happened the Board Secretary will have recorded the decision in the minutes and be desperately worrying where the Chair is going to head next within the agenda. Another method often used by the Chair is constant deferral of items on the pretext that there is more information required prior to the Board being in a position to make a decision. This could come in the form of a request for more detail from the relevant project officer

on a certain matter, or a request to consult more widely with stakeholders. In circumstances where the Chair feels that a really long delay would be a good idea, a statement will be made suggesting that the current relevant guideline or policy is not clear enough and that legal advice will be necessary. Of course, within government, legal advice takes months, and this together with the deadlines for submitting items to a Board meeting, is likely to delay a matter for a very long time indeed, possibly years if the advice received is considered inadequate and the Board requests further advice. I have just mentioned policies and guidelines and I feel that I should, at this point, discuss what these are and how they relate to the Board. If, for instance, you work in a government agency charged with overseeing planning applications and making decisions on whether to approve or reject them, there are likely to be numerous policies that guide how to assess an application. This gives the planning officers much-needed structure within which they can work. The Board, however, sees policies as optional documents that can be used, or not, depending on whether they agree with the Boards (or probably, and more realistically, Chairs) view. Where a policy agrees with the decision the Board wishes to make, it is championed as a vital document that provides essential guidance and a good rationale for the decision. However, where the opposite is the case, the policy becomes an out-of-date viewpoint that is in need of urgent revision. Both of these occurrences have been known to

happen to the same policy in the same meeting. It is, apparently, simply a matter of perspective. Once we have accepted that the Chair runs the Board how they choose, we then have to get used to how they interact with staff members. The Board is there to set the overall direction of an organisation, at least in theory, and the Chair oversees this. As the Captain of the ship, when they suggest that it should turn, it turns. There is no need to get involved in how it actually happens, just to be happy that the bows begin to change direction. Realistically, this is rare. Many Chairs cannot keep their hands off the minutiae of everyday operational matters, constantly compromising the reporting lines by trying to talk directly to staff members without informing Managers. Once this has become common practice, the Chair is in total control of everything and all other office-bearers are reduced to nervous wrecks in their quest to find out what is going on. The Chair also has the responsibility of being the public face of the Board. This often involves him releasing media statements and fronting cameras to express the Boards opinions on numerous matters. On these occasions, the Chair is bound by their job description to make statements that contradict key policies and ideas on which the Board and its support staff have been working for the past year or two. A good Chair also makes promises about work that will be carried out in the next twelve months, without any reference to what is included in the business plan, or to how the additional resources will be found for the new ideas and projects he has just plucked out of the air. In short, the Chair is a walking disaster that will have long-lasting

impacts on the organisation. Of course, when a new Chair is appointed, they will feel obliged to review the actions of the previous Chair and change direction as quickly as possible, thus ensuring that the Board members are kept well off balance, and that support staff are reduced to quivering wrecks in their attempts to keep up with the pace of change. The Deputy Chair The Chair, although the premier member of the Board, needs to have a deputy, who will have the responsibility of chairing the board in his absence. There a number of pre-requisites for this position, the most important being incompetence and unpredictability; the more unpredictable the deputy-chair, the better. Support staff are petrified at the thought of this person being in control of even one Board meeting. The deputy is likely to be even more reluctant than the Chair to make a decision, but very unskilled in achieving this in the appropriate manner. They will often make meetings last at least half as long again as they are supposed to. This person is also likely to be prone to making dramatic u-turns in their opinions mid-discussion. They are often the first person to state their opinion on a matter and will speak passionately and directly. Then, after it becomes clear that they are in a minority of one, they will attempt to agree wholeheartedly with the other Board members without showing any sign that they ever had a differing opinion. Their initial opinions are often out-dated, bigoted and show that they still live in the 1950s.

While the incompetence of this member is widely known, it is inevitable that such incompetence and inability has led this individual to be appointed to many more than just one Board. Any cursory investigation is likely to reveal that they sit on a number of boards, committees, or other advisory bodies, and may even have risen to become Chair of one of them usually one where 1950s opinions are regarded as modern thinking.

The Boffin Every Board has a boffin who sits on it. This is one of the rules of the universe (a law of physics that was, in fact, discovered by boffins themselves after a long period where they had no standing or relevance and were not invited to sit on any boards or committees). It does not appear to be able to be proved in any solid way, but is considered to be incontrovertible, especially by boffins. The boffin is often an academic from one of the local universities who has a research interest in a relevant subject. They are regarded, not least by themselves, as an expert in their field. Boffins are prone to getting tangled up in their own jargon and often have to be asked to explain to other board members what exactly they have been talking about for the last half hour. They are one of the few Board members who actually read the agenda items prior to the meeting. They are prone to overcomplicate matters and add a generous measure of

confusion and frustration into any discussion. The boffin never has enough information to make a decision. Their constant line of argument is that more information needs to be collected prior to their being able to form an opinion. This is often a Godsend for the Chair when a quick decision seems inevitable; a fortuitous request by the boffin can be all the Chair needs to postpone a decision for at least one further meeting. A detailed request requiring much research can put a decision back three months. The Lawyer The Lawyer is also likely to read the agenda papers prior to the meeting, and will have decided where the legal minefield lies with each item. Once the meeting has begun they will proceed to pick holes in the reports and various agenda items, constantly suggesting that further legal advice will be necessary and casting doubts about the legality of proposed actions. Most of the time the Chair sees this as an opportunity, a permanent reason to delay making decisions. Lawyers are reluctant to give legal advice themselves, as they are too close to the decision and feel that an independent view is required. Where a decision is made, lawyers will do their utmost to make the decision into a legal document with clauses and sub-clauses riddling the original text. These often significantly change the nature of the decision, or in some circumstances, render the decision meaningless, thus ensuring that there is one more victory for bureaucracy.

The Freeloader This person very rarely makes any notable contribution to any discussion that takes place by the Board. In fact, the only reason that they turn up to meetings is to enable them to collect their sitting fees. The Freeloader will normally snooze through the whole meeting and often has to be woken when their snoring disturbs other members. When the time comes to vote on a particular matter, the freeloader will usually vote with the Chair, as this keeps them popular with the Boss and enables them to prolong their tenure on the Board. The Chair is usually happy to put up with this person as long as their vote does not change. Their lack of interest is reflected in the fact that they never read the agenda, and as a result, on rare occasions ask completely inane questions that cause audible groans from other members. What they are interested in is whether morning tea, or lunch, is on time. They will be the first to complain if it is late or considered inadequate. The Reluctant Member Most Boards have at least one member who has no interest in what is going on and would rather be elsewhere. This person has most often been nominated by another stakeholder, who wishes to be involved in the Board, but has no desire to attend themselves; so a more junior representative is press-ganged into attending. The reluctant member attends very few Board meetings, in fact as few as is possible without being kicked off. This member always

wants decisions to be made quickly (on those rare occasions when they attend) so that the meeting can be over as soon as possible, and really does not give a rats arse about what the decision is. The Idealist There is generally one Idealist that sits on Boards. Often this person is a Community Representative. They are there to articulate the views, at least in their own minds, of the general public. They make passionate and directionless speeches that often fizzle out when they realise that they have no structured argument, only a general vibe. Other Board members listen with a degree of sympathy, but also with the knowledge that it will most likely lead nowhere. Because of the lack of structure of their arguments, they often find themselves at odds with policies that they have previously supported, and then have to make a weak sounding argument about why things are different this time. The Idealist does sometimes provide a good reason for the Chair to defer an item pending more consultation with the local community. This also proves to those on the outside that the community really does have a voice where the Boards decision-making is concerned. Support Staff In addition to the formal Board members, two other people attend all the Board meetings. These are the Chief Executive Officer

and the Board Secretary. The Chief Executive Officer The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) is bound to attend every Board meeting. They are in the unfortunate position that they have to sit and listen to the never-ending drivel that passes for conversation and debate at such meetings. Because of this they are often seen after Board meetings methodically bashing their head against the nearest available wall. If you should happen to pass by their office before a meeting, they may be seen breaking out in cold sweats and mumbling to themselves. If you are lucky, you may even hear them plotting assassination attempts against various Board members. This is more dangerous than it may sound as the CEO sits to the right of Chairman. They are often banned from coming near sharp implements. After Board meetings, their glassy smile indicates that they should not be approached for a number of hours. Certainly never ask complex questions in this time, as you may find yourself being murdered. When a CEO has reached an advanced stage of Board Fever, they may become convinced that they can manipulate the Board to gain outcomes that they feel are useful to their organisation. Once this has occurred, it is time to call for the men in white coats as it clear that they have lost all grip on reality. The Board Secretary

The Secretary is often heard plotting with the CEO about ways to remove various Board members from their lives. It must be remembered that this person is responsible for collating the Board agenda and, as such, has significant power. It is not beyond the bounds of possibility that this person will thunder up to your desk, give you a glare that suggests you are a lower form of life than pond scum, and then demand the Board report you have been told you must prepare only five minutes previously. The Secretary is often only one inadvisable comment away from a state of hysteria, and is often on valium due to the constant and unrealistic demands placed on them by the Chairman, who thinks of them as a personal slave. So, loud noises and sharp objects must be kept away from this person. The worst time to disturb this person or make any unwise comment to them is when they are trying to make sense of the minutes. This is a job that would challenge most, if not all, of the members of MENSA, let alone a humble secretary. When the minutes come back from the Chair with numerous alterations to reflect what he wants them to say that have no relation to what was actually said during the meeting, the Secretary can be observed in a drooling and gibbering state. Be very wary of this person, and remember, they have a direct line to, and much in common with, the CEO.

Writing a Report for the Board The first thing to realise when you are writing a report to be presented at a Board meeting is that the required format changes on a regular basis, depending on the whims of the Chair. It is a completely random matter and no amount of research or requests for clear direction will do you any good. You will undoubtedly find yourself being roasted for your incompetence on an equally random basis with no recourse possible, however, you should still try to get the right template so that you have a plausible defence which will not dissolve like ice-cream on a hot day. Some people would suggest that the content of the report would be far more important than the layout; these people are clearly not experts in government procedure. Its all about process and politics. To get the up-to-date template you will need to get past the Board Secretary who will guard the information as if it were a State secret. In all probability you will be interrogated about the need to get the information, what you will use it for, and whether you have actually been requested (from the appropriate high-level officer) to provide a report to the Board. Assuming that you have gained access to the sacred templates, you can then go about writing the necessary report. To get your report on the next agenda you need to get the CEOs approval. It is therefore important to ensure you speak with your Manager to ensure that they understand the urgency of the report and why it needs to go on the agenda. As you get more experienced in government you will find that you are able to write reports that, at first glance, appear to be logical

and rational pieces of work, but when read closely, say very little and recommend absolutely nothing. This allows the Board to do whatever they like, in the unlikely instance that they actually get around to making a decision. It also allows you to keep up the appearance of being productive and/or useful. As reports can vary in content and urgency, the following helpful hints are in a generic format. Remember that you will be presenting this to the Board in person and so should think carefully about how the content will help you do this. Jargon When writing the report it is important to trawl up as many pieces of jargon that you can think of. Scientific phrases, for example, are bound to cause confusion and be misinterpreted by board members. Acronyms are another valuable tool that you can use to muddy the previously clear waters. There should be so much jargon in the report that when you proof-read your document, even you are not 100% clear on what you are trying to say, or what actually needs to be done. Always refer to Stakeholders Stakeholders is a gloriously vague term that is guaranteed to cause members to talk at cross-purposes as they all have different ideas about who is being referred to. This makes discussions twice as

long, directionless and confusing as they otherwise would be. You gain brownie points from the Chair for this. Contentious points Always include a contentious point in the document; it will drive a wedge between two of the Board members. There is nothing as effective at delaying decision-making as an individual who gets emotional and irrational when they see a sentence that strikes at the heart of their beliefs. This sentence should be open to interpretation, so that another member will see it in a totally different light and fuel the argument. The longer you write reports for the Board, the more adept you will become at sowing such discontent and chaos.

Contradictory statements Include sufficiently well-spaced statements that can be seen as contradictory. This is bound to cause confusion as different members remember different parts of the report that they have only skim-read at best. Those who havent read the report will hurriedly flick through to the paragraph in question and read it totally out of context. This ensures that contributions they make to the debate are irrelevant and annoying to those who try to explain the real meaning. Board policies Make sure that you are aware of all the relevant policies, but always remember that the Board can, and will, ignore them whenever they so wish. The ambiguity of your report should allow the Board to make whatever decision they like without contradicting anything that you have written. Do not try to get a clear report acceptedyou will go mad very quickly.

Section 5: Overarching Phenomena: Dark Matter

Dark Matter and its Relationship to Bureaucracy The search for dark matter has occupied the minds of many of the brightest scientists in the world. They cant see it and are continually searching for signs of its existence. In a surprising development, progress in this area of research has come not from the geophysical or astronomical community, but from a collaboration between medical social scientists. Addressing the long held notion that visible matter only makes up a fraction of the weight of the universe, Dr Paul de Oddorwan (a neuroscientist) and his team of researchers at Noncomprendia University, believe they have discovered where some of this dark matter lies. To explain this, we need to look at the current search for dark matter and how it relates to gravity, and indeed, bureaucracy. Dr Oddorwan and his current PhD candidate, Grant Spender who is studying the physics of government philosophy, have spent many years trying to track down dark matter, and how it might relate to gravitational anomalies. They believe they have proven that, not only can dark matter be the cause of such anomalies, but that it also drawn to situations where there is already significant gravity. Through a combination of empirical analysis and experimentation, they have found that the gravity of situations is exponentially increased by the presence of a type of dark matter, which they have called dim matter. When there is too much dim matter present, the gravity of some situations can get to the point of implosion, or explosion, depending on the nature of the matter at hand.

When they examined dim matter in detail, they found it to be an isotope of the recently discovered element, yet to be formally named, currently called Futilium. This element has a half-life of approximately 280 milliseconds, almost equal to the life of a good idea in government. However, work by Mr Spender has shown that the structure can be changed to make it more stable in the short term. This isotope has one extra electron and has been named bureaucrium. The normal structure of Futilium is 195 neutrons and 122 each of protons and electrons, giving it an atomic mass of 317. Usually in and out of existence in the blink of an eye, this elements negatively charged electrons can, in some instances, start attracting a new type of particle the positively energized moron. These morons, while never being part of the bureaucrium, hang around and cause the element to become increasingly reactive until saturation point is reached. Once so overwhelmed, in begins to suck any energy it can out of the surrounding environment. Once this occurs morons are repelled, however this does not appear to stop increasing numbers of morons wanting to attach themselves. These excess morons then hang in a cloud around any situation of gravity that they can find, awaiting the opportunity to latch on. They then travel around in ever decreasing circles until they crash into the nucleus, at which point they can cause an explosion. Positively energized morons have been shown to add no weight to any situation and, in fact, consist mainly of a vacuum with very little surrounding substance. The sheer number of morons that are attracted to situations of significant gravity eventually leads to increased mass

and instability. However, this was only half of the story. Researchers then needed to find out where the dim matter (and all the additional morons) came from. By studying situations of significant gravity, they soon realised that there were carriers of dim matter would quietly attach themselves to unstable situations dangerously increasing the gravity. Drama Queens have been identified as the major carriers, but politicians, bureaucrats and fanatics of all sorts are also carriers. They then had to track where this dim matter was picked up by the carriers. One theory that the team is following up is that there is a huge black hole composed of dim matter within each of the parliaments around the world and that these are major attractors of drama queens, and other carriers, to those institutions. These carriers then go and spread gravity to situations throughout their country, often taking positively energized morons with them. Dim matter also appears to replace grey matter in carriers. Once bureaucrium had been characterized, the search for more of the morons was on. It has since been proven that there are indeed large numbers of positively energized morons in governments and all major bureaucracies throughout the world. They add extended life to bureaucrium through their leaching of energy from the environment and have been attracting increasing numbers of similar morons to affected institutions. So, the dark matter that resides in bureaucracies is really dim matter that symbiotically reacts with many, many morons that travel around in ever-decreasing circles before reaching critical mass and

exploding. Fallout from bureaucratic explosions (and implosions) has a half-life in excess of 20 years.

About the Author

About the Author

George Fripley has worked in government, the mining industry, as a private consultant and at a university. He has also travelled extensively. He has steadily climbed the ranks within government and he has briefly occupied the chair of head of a department, but was soon told move back to his own chair. George is well-versed in general and advanced bureaucracy and spends his spare time dreaming up ways to add value to processes and procedures. He believes that the best way to move forward is through the invention of jargon and the application of administration. His major talent is writing and speaking shallow comforting words that mean absolutely nothing. His abilities and talents are widely recognised within his department. In the words of his superior, Bartholomew Smythe Mr Fripley is completely unqualified to comment on anything and should be ignored except by those who don't know any better. George currently lurks somewhere within Western Australia and is probably at this very moment writing his next book with the help of a glass or two of Vasse Felix Cabernet Merlot.