bout de papier, Vol. 10, No. 3 (1993) — Summer 1993 // Été 1993, pp. 8–9
by Daryl Copeland
Surprise … It’s a fabulous time to be a Foreign Service Officer.
With the world changing at breakneck speed, the need for efficient operations at headquarters and effective program delivery abroad has never been greater. CNN and the New York Times are no substitute for hands-on engagement governed by the particular requirements of Canadian policies and interests.
In Ottawa, the pace of change within EAITC — much of it technologically driven — has been head-spinning. First centralized word processors. Then the ambitious attempt to develop integrated secure communications (COSICS). Then the random introduction of personal computers. The creation of the MITNET telephone network. Now the SIGNET system of global interaction and the wonders of the “windows environment”. All have combined and compounded to alter the workplace radically.
Little of this wizardry, however, has been reflected in the structure of the Department’s decision-making process or organizational architecture, even though many of the new features will almost certainly prove to be profoundly subversive to existing culture and constructs. Leaner may be meaner, and smaller more beautiful, but when it comes to bureaucracy, flatter is best. And in public administration, as in politics, fundamental change come from the bottom up.
The Department has, until recently, proven itself largely incapable of self-reform. Remember “Corporate Review”…? In part as a result, a serious disconnect has emerged between actual and potential performance, and the spread of debilitating ferment has continued unchecked.
The rehabilitation and reconstruction of the position of the desk officer is fundamental to restoring successful management of the Department’s human resources — its best, and most neglected asset.
Desk officers make External Affairs go ’round. With the regrettable exception of deep cuts abroad, however, this level has been forsaken or ignored. Among those in the best position to know, it is clear that the quality of working life has been severely degraded by the absence of promotional opportunities, the withdrawal of support resources and the over-substitution of technology for labour. As can be seen at almost every photocopying machine, these decisions have resulted in a serious misallocation of Foreign Service talent. Moreover, the current, hierarchic organization of labour is unnecessarily costly and often counterproductive.
Desk officers remain the heart of the Foreign Service enterprise: they initiate, they undertake, they deal with the public and other government departments, they produce. With structural and demograph factors combining to ensure the continued greying of the working level, this group does not need or want much by way of supervision. Desk officers know the job; most have been doing it for 5, 10, 15 years or more. That experience must be harnessed, not shackled.
Gone are the days of large recruitments of untested, inexperienced undergraduates. Real greenhorns are very hard to find; most newcomers tend to have several degrees and established professional competence. Yet, at the professional working level, the Department is still set up to provide close supervision to the uninitiated. This may have made some sense in the days of 22-year-old undergraduates learning-by-doing. But most serving desk officers are approaching or have entered middle-age; seasoned veterans with a posting or two under their belts are naturally depressed to find themselves stuck on a treadmill or vested with a largely meaningless title after years in the trenches.
The Department has recently started to move decision-making authority down the hierarchy and out to posts. But in Ottawa the movement has stopped at the level of Director, and the process has been incomplete. It is now necessary to remove the obstacles which impede maximum performance, liberate individuals to achieve their full potential, and renovate the trenches by reconfiguring the jobs of the occupants. The trend towards devolution should be extended to its logical conclusion: the transfer of operational responsibility to those who are operationally responsible. This need not be a complex exercise: upgrade the positions, empower the incumbents, and delayer by eliminating supervisory redundance.
At the FS-2 level (or higher in the event of a restructuring) throughout the Department, senior desk officers could become, within clearly defined spans of control, country (or functional program managers. Consulting when necessary, program managers would sign off on all routine matters and refer upwards only when appropriate. Existing divisional units would, at least initially, remain unchanged. The results would almost certainly include greater efficiency, increased productivity, and improved morale, all at no incremental costs to the Treasury, and without recourse to central agencies or Parliament.
In this new dispensation, deputy directors would be abolished. Almost no-one would lament their passing, since few have much real authority, and none receive additional compensation. Yet former deputy directors, and many of their colleagues, would both gain authority and become more immediately accountable for their decisions and actions. Divisional directors would retain overall responsibility, but would be freed from supervisory duties to concentrate on larger, longer-term, regional and issue-related matters: a genuine management and leadership mandate. Directors could plan, advocate, integrate and harmonize. They would have time to reflect on salient issues, track emerging developments, devise options and formulate approaches to real and potential problems. These are all things that directors should do, but rarely get around to as a result of the epidemic preoccupation with supervisory minutae, all of which could be delegated to the newly created program managers.
Any inexperienced recruits, after adequate training in the Canadian Foreign Service Institute, could start their careers as deputy or assistant program managers. This would introduce a clear substantive and structural distinction which does not exist now between FS-Is and FS-2s, in that elevation to the senior working level would entail a change in responsibilities as well as title. Promotions would become meaningful in more than a strictly economic sense.
In this regard, the time-in-grade requirement has long ago outlived its usefulness, and all FS-1s should be promoted automatically upon receipt of three outstanding, four superior, or five fully satisfactory appraisals. The retention of significant numbers of demonstrably capable officers at the entry level over a protracted period was never intended, produces enduring economic and psychological hardship, and is inimical to Departmental interests. The status quo cannot be justified and should be scrapped without further delay.
In another era, most of the Department’s serving desk officers would have been, or could at least expect to be promoted. In the present environment, this is not on. Frustration and anxiety over the present career impasse is finding expression in departures (in many cases not of those whose departure was solicited), burn-outs, and worse. An acceleration of these disturbing trends can be avoided by moving to express confidence and restore self-esteem.
As a particularly welcome by-product, the trend towards delegation of more engaging duties to support staff would be greatly abetted. Responsibility for a wide range of administrative and logistical functions could be transferred as computer literacy among the FS community makes possible the redesign of the whole. FS staffing and the assignment process would be enormously facilitated, as the pool of attractive jobs would multiply. Above all, the growing contradiction between the high quality of the Department’s cadre of professionals at the working level and the deteriorating quality of job contents might finally be resolved
The siege of the public sector shows no signs of abating, and creativity, innovation and energy are in short supply throughout government. When qualified professionals are prepared to run — or, not infrequently, sprint — they should at minimum be provided with appropriate footwear. Too often, the most inspired and capable staff are the first to be turned off as their best ideas and most lofty intentions end up lost in an impenetrable labyrinth or mired in a bureaucratic swamp. Inevitably, the conclusion is drawn that it is better to follow than to lead; that initiative does impaled on the horns of the diplomacy-bureaucracy dilemma for too long. Let’s stop moaning, and do something about the bull. With some creative thinking, much can be achieved outside the moribund realm of compensation and contracts. This proposal, or something like it, is the least that can be done for a group with dedication, skills and knowledge at least equivalent to, and often surpassing that of their superiors. With its surfeit of good minds, this department should be on the leading edge — not the reactive rump — of public service reform.
The notion of transforming desk officers into program managers is entirely consonant with the thinking of some of today’s more enlightened management theorists. In the absence of compelling reasons not to provide those at the working level within greater recognition, responsibility and a strengthened sense of their own self-worth, what, exactly, is anyone waiting for?
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Originally published in bout de papier, Vol. 10, No. 3 (1993) — Summer 1993 // Été 1993, pp. 8–9. Read the rest of this issue →
