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“...the street
smart politician is better at making the wheels of the bureaucracy creak,
however slowly in favour of his constituents” said RBI Governor Mr.
Raghuram Rajan in a recent speech. We often hear similar statements from
politicians, academicians and the general public. The statements more often
than not use adjectives such as slow, creaky, rusty etc., for the “government
machinery”. I think it’s fair to say that these hold the bureaucracy responsible
for all the frustration in working with the government.
Having been in close contact with top bureaucrats in
the country and also the ones far below in the food chain and having worked
with them for a while now, I find the above statements grossly unjustified. I’m
not saying that the system isn’t slow but that there’s only so little that the
system can do in its present state. Firstly, what is a system if not the people
in it? The processes and structures? End of the day isn’t it a human who
adheres to them?
The top guys on an average have to look at 10-15
different departments at a time. Each department uniquely different in terms of
its composition and work mandate. I don’t think even they can put a number to
the amount of things they are juggling with at any given moment. One meeting
that is missed costs hundreds of crores and eventually a lot of issues for the public.
They get pulled up and chastised in front of peers and sometimes even the
media. The demoralization is real. I shudder to imagine myself in their shoes.
One paper lost or one meeting missed and the world around starts crumbling. (By
the way, how many times have I gone late or not returned a phone call?)
The guys below work under greater stress because they
can’t even pull a string here and throw an order there like the ones on the
top. They work in obscurity and many times in vain. I myself have sat printing
hundreds of pages for a full hour just because, “what if they ask?” And those
pages probably never met the eyes they were meant for and got thrown away in
some random bin. I’m sure these guys end up doing due-diligence every other
hour in vain. I’m not saying it’s unnecessary but it’s draining and largely
demotivating if it happens every single day. Over a period of time I think it
is bound to get to you where you either quit or succumb to the status-quo. How
else is it justified for young, passionate and smart individuals getting into
the civil service turning out to become the red-tape we all love to criticize?
For all the management books, speeches and theories
out there, I haven’t seen one being applied. Everybody is just fire-fighting.
One of the more hard-working and impressive bureaucrats I met said, “I wake up every morning with a plan to do 15
odd things. After one or two of them, events take over and at the end of the
day I realise I haven’t done anything.” What are these events that come up
every day, I wondered. Spending an hour in one of their offices shed light on
it. It is a bad combination of people seeking help, politicians passing on
orders of work, bosses chastising for a stone unturned, media demanding
answers, phone calls from peers wanting assistance, I could go on. In all of
this I am so sure they have personal issues to sort out as well. A child at
home, a wife expecting, a leaky tap, and an ending internet plan, all of which
shout for attention.
Top or down, all bureaucrats get pulled up for
something undone, something which they might not even be aware was an
expectation in the first place. There’s absolutely no incentive for being
better and sometimes no skill either. This lack of skill is very systemic.
Because everybody is fire-fighting and being diligent, they forget to pick up
skills. Skills as simple as making a presentation to as complex as managing a
department, it all gets lost in the chaos of their world. They are “trained”
for this apparently, but we all know that what is on record in a file in the
store room, accounts to nothing in reality! I believe simple things like giving
them public credit for a job well done, providing breathing space every day,
creating a good physical environment etc., can go a long way. All these things
are known by everyone and fulfilled in the corporate world but never in the
social sector. It might be a function of our very mind-set as a society. People
in “social service” cannot be rich or have personal goals, bureaucrats are
“servants of the public”, they have to be humble and be nice to all people etc.
Why can’t someone working in this sector also have a personal life of may be
even opulence? Only the corporates are entitled to luxury and the others have
to “sacrifice”? While the entire world is raving over the new Apple product,
these guys are expected to work away in their space crunched offices?
We need to go back to the drawing board about
bureaucracy because obviously it needs someone to take a look at it. Someone
who’s going to be empathetic and nuanced in approach. We need better training
(most of their trainings are around what the new rule or guideline says),
better management, better work environment, incentives, and above all some room
for them to lead their lives and enjoy a peaceful Sunday just switching
channels on their TVs!
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