The Witch Doctor

OK, OK, I’ve come late to the table!

But, in my experience, the reasons why public services employ this plethora of externals are

a) overwhelmingly, there is not the intellectual capacity or courage in-house to devise workable solutions and strategies;

b) if there are bright sparks in-house, they are soon very definitely closed down, shut up, ignored – a culture of mediocrity and unaccountability prevails in just about every public service I’ve had the privilege to serve;

c) the necessary solutions and strategies are often very simple. Even the most junior and/or lowly of staff can tell you what the problem is and how to sort it. These simple fixes are squashed at all costs – because they often mean some, at least, reduction of status/power/budget from those higher up who are, frankly, incompetent;

d) said bright sparks, who could be nurtured and developed into effective in-house leaders, very soon leave for one of the big externals where their talents are recognised and properly rewarded; and

e) public service seniors and heads covertly realise the paucity of in-house staff calibre (it’s one of the great unspokens) and are only too happy to ‘re-employ’ the good staff they lost through culture of mediocrity attrition. Because they pay the going rate for the job, they have respect for these people, where they have less for their staff.

Lots of words there. But it really is simple.

Deb

http://www.sheer-debacle.blogspot.com

So do I WD.

I can only read it as yet another KwikFix fad.

Clearly, the culture is one of fear. Changing that takes an enormous shift in values and principles – one that, because of the mammoth size of the NHS, necessarily involves the whole country.

It’s actually not difficult to do, IMHO, but not one single politician, ‘leader’, ‘manager’ has been able to overcome their fear and develop the vision and means by which to do it.

If you’re at all interested, I wrote a piece about the genesis of this infestation of ‘management’ in the NHS [http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dfs7vbfx_57gz9v9fcg] and the inappropriate tools they use (including targets).