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DoI not fit for purpose


joebean

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15 minutes ago, Ramseyboi said:

We should be paying top dollar for the best people.

Something like CEO of DOI with that many staff and the size of budget should match or better the CEO salary of a similar sized business in the Uk.

About 200k to attract the best people and save money in the long run.

I agree.  However what we seem to do is pay top dollar for mediocrity, hence my comment. 

Wonder how good the due diligence is at engagement. 

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The 'best' people for the job are not always the top earners or the most expensive. It's not about the 'best' people. We should've learnt that lesson long ago. I'll take good common sense,  practicality and real world knowledge, experience and a dose of modesty over most of the high-fliers government have appointed in my lifetime. I've seen too many career civil servants with big egos and big ambitions come and waste taxpayers money on grandiose vanity projects. Government thought they were getting the 'best' but they often turned out to be the worst. 

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47 minutes ago, Shake me up Judy said:

The length of time it's taken to acknowledge this is part of the problem. They've looked the other way for years and years. Nothing will happen now either, apart from bringing over more expensive 'experts' and consultants; spending more wonga; rearranging the chairs and tables, and promoting, retiring (with pension uplift) or reshuffling those senior managers who've failed. Until there is real accountability and consequences for failure, absolutely nothing will change. The only positive is that at least Alf has recognised and admitted there's a problem. Fixing it will be out of his reach.

Exactly this. All of this. Alf didn't suddenly receive a Damascene revelation two weeks ago, he knew this for years and said and did precisely nothing. Splitting the department in half will lead to increased cost and bureaucracy, and is more likely to swell the total number of inexperienced and incompetent managers than to reduce them. It's most unlikely that the new blood required is sitting around elsewhere on-Island just waiting to be head hunted, so we'll end up with more Charters-type appointments, and some Titantic deckchair reshuffling to complement them.

That said, I'm not exactly bursting with alternative solutions myself, and I suppose it is progress that at least it's now up for discussion and analysis.

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The first step in dealing with a problem is admitting you have a problem. Alf has had the balls to publicly admit DoI has (is) a problem and I'm hopeful this bodes well for the future.

Can anyone here imagine Quayle doing this? I certainly can't. The report came out during his tenure and IIRC he barely acknowledged its existence.  

Next we need to hear the same admission from Crookall - along with a concrete, detailed plan of what changes are to be made and how they will be implemented. Then I'll be even more optimistic that positive change will finally happen. 

It's not going to happen overnight but I find it encouraging that it would seem the wheels have been put in motion and right at the beginning of the new administration. 

Ask me again in six months to a year how optimistic I am - hopefully my faith in their ability to improve the DoI will be vindicated. I don't expect it to be done and dusted by then but I do expect progress. We shall see.

 

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The hope is that AC has the intellect and cajones to recognise and call out bullshit when he sees it.  Those attributes were missing in the previous incumbent and, I suppose, Covid did play a part in pushing many things to the back burner.  In retrospect, though, Covid was exactly the issue to make facing up to costly inefficiencies even more urgent. 

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AC coming out and saying what most if not all here have been saying for years is totally refreshing. Probably his first chance really with everything else he has had to set up. Compare this with Quayle who when asked by Moulton on the day of Princes Annes visit just laughed and said ahhh yes the promenade. As others have said though, saying is alot easier than doing so really interested to see how this progresses. Clearly there needs to be a clearout and will be more than interesting how the Chief Secretary feels about his minions being shown the door. The Beaman report shows the way however it also says the dept require a further 7 project managers which suggests a big outlay on top of any redundancy packages that should happen. Interesting days ahead in DOI and not before time. Mind blowing that many have winged it for so long I'm sure protected by Will Greenhow .

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1 hour ago, Shake me up Judy said:

The 'best' people for the job are not always the top earners or the most expensive. It's not about the 'best' people. We should've learnt that lesson long ago. I'll take good common sense,  practicality and real world knowledge, experience and a dose of modesty over most of the high-fliers government have appointed in my lifetime. I've seen too many career civil servants with big egos and big ambitions come and waste taxpayers money on grandiose vanity projects. Government thought they were getting the 'best' but they often turned out to be the worst. 

Whilst I agree with the idea. You find me a good engineer that works for mediocre salary.

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1 hour ago, Gladys said:

The hope is that AC has the intellect and cajones to recognise and call out bullshit when he sees it.  Those attributes were missing in the previous incumbent and, I suppose, Covid did play a part in pushing many things to the back burner.  In retrospect, though, Covid was exactly the issue to make facing up to costly inefficiencies even more urgent. 

there was NO covid for the first 3 years of Fat Boys incumbency and fuck all got done then either.

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