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Discussion
FiF said:
Civil Service fast track seminar, attended by 1 (one) BAME female, rest white male Hooray Henry bull effluenters. Situation normal, nothing to see here, move along please those from poorer regions, you can't afford to live in London donchaknow. Cynical? Moi?
You sound quite bitter? Get turned down? It is not easy to get on the programme and no, knowing the right people doesn't make any difference.I joined the FastStream (not fast track) in 2013. No degree as I was an existing Civil Servant. My cohort were a good mix of male and female, with I would say 10% from a minority background. While the vast majority had Oxbridge degrees, most of them were not spoiled posh kids. Over 50% of my placements were outside of London and there are lots of opportunities if you aren't London based. In fact, a lot of departments are looking to move out of London as it's too expensive.
The big challenge entrants straight out of Uni have is a lack of life experience, especially when you might be leading a large team in your mid 20's. I don't care how talented people think they are, you have to practice management and leadership skills (two very different things) to have any chance of being seen as authentic. Most veteran employees, regardless of organisation, will see through bulls
t very quickly. Getting some new talent into government with some life experience behind them will be a great thing. I really hope this is a success.
Randy Winkman said:
FiF said:
Civil Service fast track seminar, attended by 1 (one) BAME female, rest white male Hooray Henry bull effluenters. Situation normal, nothing to see here, move along please those from poorer regions, you can't afford to live in London donchaknow. Cynical? Moi?
The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy currently has no black senior civil servants at all. Not one. And they have 100+ senior civil servants. Not through lack of trying, it seems - https://civilservice.blog.gov.uk/2019/10/28/revers...
pablo said:
Lol, couldn’t even get a .gov.uk email, You send the application to a gmail account.... stay classy number ten!
I like this, he couldn't be bothered messing around for days or months setting up mailboxes and dealing with a load of fannys in IT making him fill in forms and get approval and authorisation and all that pointless political and process st that takes forever, he's setting up his own little unit and has taken ownership of it himselfIs this the kind of thing Cummings is trying to put together, do you think, if you substitute HM’s government for Ford Motor Company The Whiz Kids, the love for organisational science and statistics seem eerily familiar.
El stovey said:
Isn’t he just saying he wants people like him but adding some specific backgrounds for different positions?
A bit more than just that I think - the reason it chimed with me is that I've been in a position to do - in modest microcosm - similar things to what I think he is trying to do. I'm certainly no intellectual but for years saw fundamental flaws in big corporate depts., I then found myself in a position to set something up from scratch for a Spanish international and convinced people to do everything differently; the nexus was the ground, not the office, hierarchy was flattened and communicative, documents for emergencies were reduced from 400 pages to 2, big crisis response committees changed to two man teams, risk methodologies used more meaningful techniques drawn from other disciplines, we changed the idea of fulfilling uniformity wants with bespoke needs, developed better ways to train people rather than the usual didactic, stopped using big consulting firms who produced big treatise no one read and used one-page impacts instead etc etc etc. I could write a book.A year later we had a big drama, the moment was handled quicker than the competition and the subsequent readjustments were done in a week with $20K while the other majors took 3 years and $50M to achieve the same thing. There are a dozen other examples like this.
My world has a lot of pompous spoofers who rely heavily on what they've been taught and regurgitate it as if gospel, think that paper stops bullets and peoples abilities depend on their 'rank' and think 'what do we want' and not 'what are we trying to do', they hire the 'best' people then deny them agency [McChrystal...], and have little humility or wit. Copy paste people. They wouldn't hire me in a month of Sundays, and for that I'm grateful!
This is nowhere near what you guys probably deal with but it's what I sensed from Cummings - pre-mortem, adversary path, red team and a few other things he mentioned are things I used to set things up as I did - I hope I don't come across as a pompous spoofer - it's all very modest!
Randy Winkman said:
The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy currently has no black senior civil servants at all. Not one. And they have 100+ senior civil servants.
You sound surprised. If my GCSE maths hasn't failed me then, given that 97% of the population are non-black, the probability of there being no black people in any random sample of 100 people is about 1 in 20. How many CS departments are there?His aspirations are very high and he (rightly imo) points out that if the UK continues to merely make incremental improvements in some key areas (education, science & project management in particular), other countries will eat (more of) our lunch. Multiple references to the few massively ambitious projects that have worked in the last 60 or so years is an indication of the level of aspiration he wants to surround himself with. Many will debate whether that is necessary, or desirable. But not many have as much of the governments' ears as he does.
In his job ads he says "If you think you are such a company and you could dual carriageway the A1 north of Newcastle in record time, then get in touch!"
We all know that China could & would dual an equivalent stretch of road in less time that it would take for 'stage 1 of the introduction to the terms of reference for the definition of the variables to be discussed for inclusion in the opening stage of the feasibility study' to be drafted here in the UK. Whilst there are many reasons for that, not all of them are sound in the world Dommie boy wants to play.
In his job ads he says "If you think you are such a company and you could dual carriageway the A1 north of Newcastle in record time, then get in touch!"
We all know that China could & would dual an equivalent stretch of road in less time that it would take for 'stage 1 of the introduction to the terms of reference for the definition of the variables to be discussed for inclusion in the opening stage of the feasibility study' to be drafted here in the UK. Whilst there are many reasons for that, not all of them are sound in the world Dommie boy wants to play.
There seems to me to be a lot of emphasis on what he's said which is radical. That's predictable, bright shiny new stuff always appeals.
But he's also said that the CS should get back to some of the ways it once was. Where people were in jobs because they had the right skills, and remained in that area, rather than bright young things (who have their place) moving up from one job to another - the furtherance of their career seemingly more important than the organisation as a whole.
But in all these things, summarising the Pub Sec as one entity makes as much sens as doing so for the Pri Sec. Very little.
For his immediate team, he'll struggle to get imaginative, outside the box people who are prepared to do it his way or leave. How much he can manage having his POV challenged will probably be a big factor.
But he's also said that the CS should get back to some of the ways it once was. Where people were in jobs because they had the right skills, and remained in that area, rather than bright young things (who have their place) moving up from one job to another - the furtherance of their career seemingly more important than the organisation as a whole.
But in all these things, summarising the Pub Sec as one entity makes as much sens as doing so for the Pri Sec. Very little.
For his immediate team, he'll struggle to get imaginative, outside the box people who are prepared to do it his way or leave. How much he can manage having his POV challenged will probably be a big factor.
princeperch said:
El stovey said:
There’s no way Cummings will be earning 100k he’s one of the most influential people in the country. Having that kind of influence and responsibility in the private sector would have him earning many times that.
The people he’s trying to attract could be earning that kind of money easily elsewhere.
https://politicshome.com/news/uk/government-and-public-sector/government-agencies/news/108742/dominic-cummings%E2%80%99-salaryThe people he’s trying to attract could be earning that kind of money easily elsewhere.
Looks like he's on less than 100k.
The pm is only on 160 or something isn't he?
But what-evs, after his No. 10 role, he'll be able to cash in. Advisory roles, the lecture tour, non-exec board positions, writing memoirs etc., etc.
If Clegg can relocate to Silicon Valley and get a 7 figure role for Facebook, just imagine what DC will be worth over there. I think we're safe to stand the GoFundMe page for him down.
andy_s said:
El stovey said:
Isn’t he just saying he wants people like him but adding some specific backgrounds for different positions?
A bit more than just that I think - the reason it chimed with me is that I've been in a position to do - in modest microcosm - similar things to what I think he is trying to do. I'm certainly no intellectual but for years saw fundamental flaws in big corporate depts., I then found myself in a position to set something up from scratch for a Spanish international and convinced people to do everything differently; the nexus was the ground, not the office, hierarchy was flattened and communicative, documents for emergencies were reduced from 400 pages to 2, big crisis response committees changed to two man teams, risk methodologies used more meaningful techniques drawn from other disciplines, we changed the idea of fulfilling uniformity wants with bespoke needs, developed better ways to train people rather than the usual didactic, stopped using big consulting firms who produced big treatise no one read and used one-page impacts instead etc etc etc. I could write a book.A year later we had a big drama, the moment was handled quicker than the competition and the subsequent readjustments were done in a week with $20K while the other majors took 3 years and $50M to achieve the same thing. There are a dozen other examples like this.
My world has a lot of pompous spoofers who rely heavily on what they've been taught and regurgitate it as if gospel, think that paper stops bullets and peoples abilities depend on their 'rank' and think 'what do we want' and not 'what are we trying to do', they hire the 'best' people then deny them agency [McChrystal...], and have little humility or wit. Copy paste people. They wouldn't hire me in a month of Sundays, and for that I'm grateful!
This is nowhere near what you guys probably deal with but it's what I sensed from Cummings - pre-mortem, adversary path, red team and a few other things he mentioned are things I used to set things up as I did - I hope I don't come across as a pompous spoofer - it's all very modest!
I have just rolled off a 5 year programme. Billions of $$ spent, global scale - blah, blah - but the key thing was the insistence on light touch governance. Run on a structure where everybody was only 2 steps away from the decision makers / budget holders. Meetings limited - for the last year it's been half an hour a week. Scope, resourcing, budget, design assumptions approved via a maximum 5 page deck, refreshed in stages as delivery approached for each territory. Each constituent project delivered on time and budget.
I don't claim that this is unique especially, but it really chimed in with my experience that organisations and programmes expend most of their time and effort navel gazing.
fblm said:
Randy Winkman said:
The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy currently has no black senior civil servants at all. Not one. And they have 100+ senior civil servants.
You sound surprised. If my GCSE maths hasn't failed me then, given that 97% of the population are non-black, the probability of there being no black people in any random sample of 100 people is about 1 in 20. How many CS departments are there?As an aside, how many black members of the NFU? (membership 55,000)
Camelot1971 said:
FiF said:
Civil Service fast track seminar, attended by 1 (one) BAME female, rest white male Hooray Henry bull effluenters. Situation normal, nothing to see here, move along please those from poorer regions, you can't afford to live in London donchaknow. Cynical? Moi?
You sound quite bitter? Get turned down? It is not easy to get on the programme and no, knowing the right people doesn't make any difference.I joined the FastStream (not fast track) in 2013. No degree as I was an existing Civil Servant. My cohort were a good mix of male and female, with I would say 10% from a minority background. While the vast majority had Oxbridge degrees, most of them were not spoiled posh kids. Over 50% of my placements were outside of London and there are lots of opportunities if you aren't London based. In fact, a lot of departments are looking to move out of London as it's too expensive.
The big challenge entrants straight out of Uni have is a lack of life experience, especially when you might be leading a large team in your mid 20's. I don't care how talented people think they are, you have to practice management and leadership skills (two very different things) to have any chance of being seen as authentic. Most veteran employees, regardless of organisation, will see through bulls
t very quickly. Getting some new talent into government with some life experience behind them will be a great thing. I really hope this is a success.
As for the sound bitter get turned down comment. No, just an observation, Though looking back I turned down an approach many decades ago, but didn't want to take the drop. In hindsight, knowing what I know now, by Christ was that a good decision, so jog on with the t
ttish comments.Moving on, the big issue all university applicants have, and not just civil service, is the utter lack of life experience, and it's just getting worse with universities considering adopting a position of 'in loco parentis'. We've even had applicants for masters courses who gave to get their mothers to call up. Firms are reporting that they have graduates who start and when asked to do a task involving making or answering phone calls simply refuse as it's something they don't do. FFS
PSB1 said:
I don't claim that this is unique especially, but it really chimed in with my experience that organisations and programmes expend most of their time and effort navel gazing.
A nice counter example is an organisation I recently worked for, run almost exclusively by Oxbridge educated individuals, and advised by leading academics and experts. They have just had to write off a hundred million pound 'transformation' project - all carefully planned for and designed. The monoculture of thought and reliance on traditional organisational structures led to a protracted and very expensive complete failure.You can recognise the same patterns in government every day.
berlintaxi said:
Sway said:
[b] The 'Workington man' doesn't give a st how the changes have come about, but that things change/improve.
He's going to end up massively disappointed then.t how the changes have come about, but that things change/improve. Still, it seems you've found a decent crystal ball manufacturer and calibrator - fancy sharing? If I can get the euro millions numbers, I'll pay the £100k a year to Cummins just to get involved.
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