What Did You Do Last Week?

“What did you do last week?”, Elon Musk asked employees of the US Government. Many found the question to be patronizing, others found it to be revealing of an inefficient bureaucracy that needs reform and streamlining. This was the reason I left my position as a shoreside Electrical Engineer in 2022, in favor of a seagoing position as First Assistant Engineer. I was stuck in bureaucracy; I relied on other people to give me information, in order for me to analyze it and give recommendations to my supervisor. Oftentimes, I was waiting on the information from the field; or from supervisory decisions, which were made in a once-weekly committee. I feared that a performance review would leave the rater wondering what I was doing; instead, it was Elon Musk asking the question. I never got the email last week. I would have replied that “I activated an old cargo steamship for use by the US Navy”. I got something done last week. Venture capitalists (vulture capitalists) who perform, leveraged buyouts, Carl Icahn or Elon Musk, pride themselves on finding businesses with structural inefficiencies that they can correct, thereby releasing the full potential of its economic value. For example, Twitter (X) grew its workforce too fast, and found its headcount rife with what author David Graeber calls “BS jobs”. As the new owner, Elon Musk cut bureaucracy within the company, and applied shock treatment to its headcount, bringing it in line (and even less) with other tech companies of the same size. In reforming the civil service, a different approach must be used. The primary hallmarks of government employment are stability and public impact. Since the 1970s, federal employees have faced furloughs at every government shutdown. A private company would treat that period as a short-term layoff; however Congress has always proffered backpay in order to retain its workforce and keep the federal government’s role as a steady employer. Revoking work-from-home, at least on a temporary basis, is a good remedial step for a program that has become too gangly. Young federal employees feel disengaged when they can’t get facetime with mentors and supervisors. Shopping districts in suburban Washington, DC are suspiciously busy during core working hours. Falsified timecards are one of the ways to a quick removal from federal employment; pulling people back from the fire by bringing them back into the office, therefore, could be seen as a responsible act. It is also a soft form of a loyalty test: are you here with us hell and highwater, or are you a summer soldier? “Non sibi, sed patriae”: this is a Latin phrase which translate to “Not for myself, but for my country”. When federal hiring, in some agencies, has been about meeting minimum standards to fill seats, we lose the broader vision. One might call this “privilege” to think beyond the minutiae of “essential job functions”, but it is important to bring back a company culture to federal employment. Some of my neighbors in DC felt that we gave away the culture when the federal government ended defined-benefit pensions in the 1980s. I look to the Department of Defense, and its recent interest in the “warrior culture” (cue Jim Mattis and Pete Hegseth). In contrast are the bureaucrats who trained shiphandlers on CD ROMs (SWOS in a box) or impose byzantine policies that keep tradesmen from doing their jobs in a timely fashion. The “warrior culture” could be defined as “love of mission”, and at least for now, young people have been trickling back into recruiting offices for the armed forces. Ironically, soldiers do best when they are doing something; in peacetime, this includes innovative field exercises and humanitarian missions. Politically speaking, we understood that Trump and his supporters would want to “whack” the unelected bureaucrats who impose things like vaccine mandates. This was accomplished in high-profile firings. What I am concerned with is the across-the-board cuts in certain agencies, and among most first year (probationary) employees, which are taking place outside of the usual reduction-in-force plan. What I regret is the loss of a human touch. Would it really hurt the business objective if the Trump administration (the “You’re Fired” guy) to allow a few months’ lead time before layoffs, so that displaced employees can make suitable arrangements for their future employment, within the government or in the private sector?