Managing Out

 

Press release from the RCSC: Click LINK

        If today’s press release by the Royal Civil Service Commission (RCSC) is credible, it appears that the RCSC has awakened from its long-term hypersomnia. 

 

        If the RCSC practically manage out the 50% of the executives who failed to meet the expectations as conveyed in the report, it will be the beginning to end its laissez-faire attitude for leadership assessment they had thus far. 

 

        If the RCSC roll out a similar leadership evaluation drill in other segments of the civil service as declared in the statement, they have eventually realised their mandate in fulling the vision of ensuring Excellence in Service. 

 

        If the RCSC introduce this leadership appraisal right from their organisation and first, hold those RCSC members accountable for promoting those underachieving 50% of executives (because it is the RCSC who is responsible for the selection and promotion of the executives), then they will have read between the lines of His Majesty the King’s 114^th National Day address. 

        We have heard a plethora of stories about leadership crises happening in the left, right, and centre of civil service. 

        We have witnessed the saga of management failures practically at every level. 

        We have experienced a lack of transparency due to authoritative leadership. 

        We have a history of leadership malfunctions that have ironically resulted in the dismissal of subordinates in some situations. 

        We have evident examples of employees who have been denied career privileges because of selfish and opportunistic leaders.

     We have read stories of civil servants pouring frustrations, expressing a lack of faith in the system, and their active disengagement all due to autocratic leadership. 

        We have foolishly sympathised with decent and honest people who lost their jobs while serving the nation under the tyrant leadership. 

            We have consciously appreciated corrupt leaders in our organisation because the fate of our future lies in their signature.  

        We have publicly sung a song of praises to those crooked leaders because it has become the accepted DNA of our culture if we wish to climb up the career pyramid and succeed in our professional life.

        We have leaders who are habituated running upstairs and running down people. 

            The list goes on. We don’t require hiring any foreign expats (as we often do) to examine this phenomenon. Neither do we need any subtitles to understand this catastrophe. 

 

        But what we need to understand is that, for a small Kingdom like ours where civil servants account for 4.05 percent of the total population, i.e a ratio of 1:25 (refer December 31, 2019, page 3) that derives their monthly salary from the government coffer, this is costly. There is no room for complacency because we are playing in the stadium of the national coffer.  

        However, post press release by the RCSC, some individuals opined that every one of us owes those executives gratitude for their long years of service. Long years of service? OK. But what virtue is it to preserve the broken roof if it does not function in protecting the house that contains valuable assets? 

        I propose these perspectives with no malicious intent. But during the past 12 years of my service under numerous bosses, I have experienced this never-ending pandemic of leadership crisis in different working environments. The eyes awashed with tears always see things better.

        If the RCSC genuinely plan to reshape and revolutionise the structure of the civil service, we must first prune out the failing leaders instead of looking for ways to discipline subordinates. When the system is led by talented and perceptive leaders, change will be easy and obvious. A good leader should be a good follower first. 

            This recent leadership assessment exercise by the RCSC, nonetheless, is welcoming and greatly needed, if not long overdue. This indicates that the RCSC has diagnosed itself as the prime player in cultivating this sickness and that now they are looking for a remedy to contain it before it is delayed. This clearly demonstrates that the RCSC recognised the flaws in their recruiting process that culminated in the selection of unsuitable candidates, necessitating the search for a newer and transparent approach to selecting the right candidates.  

            However, if they fail to execute their own press release, it will also imply that they are a commission established to blame others for their own failures. As vouchsafed in this report, we anxiously anticipate the RCSC managing out those failed executives transparently and immediately.

The image that speaks volumes: Courtest Click LINK

            For now, the faculty of every Bhutanese sight and hearing are fixated on the RCSC to tune the frequency of their words into action. But none of us would buy this claim unless they demonstrate it in practice. 

 

            We will witness again to gauge how competent they are in mitigating the mess of these leadership crises which they have created. Lest we forget, how we watched their bold action in removing  500 positions in the civil service – positions that afforded a modest living for many low-income families; positions that they once established and dismantled altogether. 

 

FORM is Temporary, CLASS is permanent

            This metaphor is sporadically used in the sporting domain – precisely football. 

 

        The underlying message in this statement is that great players are worth keeping on the squad, no matter how poorly they perform in that specific season. Because of their class of talents, they will do well again at some point. 

        However, this statement has a very limited scope to operationalise in the actual world. 

        As footballing increasingly become 1% entertainment and 99% business, every movement of players during the match heavily costs the permanency of both the players and the coach. 

 

            While the description of players in terms of their class remains intriguing, club owners do not imbibe the luxury to prejudice the player’s class of footballing geniuses to recur.  Neither bank on the ideals that a player’s form is temporary. This is one of the reasons why we frequently witness highly ranked footballers tossed into the auction yard – either in the middle or end of the season.

        This declaration - form is temporary, class is permanent, equally applies to understanding several phenomena in our everyday lives as it does to the sporting world.   

        I take the recent song by Mr Hemlal Darjay as one classic specimen to decipher this metaphor.  

   

Click the link for the full version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eu6fbVbJ0yc 

Full version here (Added by Mr Hemlal, May 8, 2020): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVnfqUNCje0

Original Song by Mr Rinchen Namgay and Ms Tshering Dolkar https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4uUtvjE6Etc

        A few years back, Mr Hemlal was one of the contenders in the singing reality show. Almost every weekend during the show, he kept mesmerising audiences with his epic stage performance by showcasing his class of vocal endowment. For many, he became an instant singing sensation. But unfortunately, his class of singing power was short-lived after he failed to garner adequate voting support from the public. 

 

        Outperforming fellow candidates in such singing battles is often overshadowed by the volume of people we know or the financially booming social circle we have rather than by the singing finesse one displays. This is one of the reasons why we periodically see people with genuine vocal talent crumble in singing competitions.

 

        Audiences lack to comprehend that in a singing contest, the euphonous voice a person has is the class, and the voting technique used by the organisers to rank the contestants is the form. 

 

        Footballers who are marketed to other teams because they lack class easily create magic at their new teams by reviving their footballing talents. They may not be the finest teams in the league, but their class of performance is unquestionably the best for leaving footprints in any stadium.

 

        Mr Hemlal may not have won the singing competition, but his class of singing maintains his blooming in the industry. While individuals who won the top singing prizes in numerous singing shows are mysteriously lost and remain unknown about their whereabouts, this guy is continually colonising every forum that demands singing potency. He has already shown that his mellifluous voice is the class. The form of a class that is permanent.  

One Decade Down; More to Go

10 years before, on this day, I started blogging. 

Thanks to the Chiphen Rigpel Project, the undertaking of the Druk Phuensum Tshogpa Government, the first politically elected government of Bhutan. 

Chiphen Rigpel accreditation for participation 

Chiphen Rigpel was an ambitious project launched with the support of the Government of India in 2010, on the sidelines of the SAARC Summit held for the first time in Bhutan. As delivered through its motto, Enabling a Society, Empowering a Nation, it was a human capacity building project that provided ICT skills to empower citizens to be skilled in this ICT enabled world. More than 5000 teachers working across the nation attended the workshop for 10 days. 

 

It was a blessing for me to have learned multiple things during this workshop besides knowing how to construct my page. Initially, I submitted my appeals to a few individuals who had a registered trademark as popular bloggers to assist me in building a blog for me, but to no effect. But it did not deter me to explore myself because I was internally drenched with a downpour of zeal and passion to create it anyway, anytime.   

 

After exploring it with the minimal ideas and resources at my disposal, I was efficacious in crafting one. Since then, I enjoyed baking pieces of literary stuff – albeit it is not as eloquent and material. Yet it is significant to me beyond compare.  

 

Since my schooling, I had prurience in scribbling anything, anytime, anywhere. Even as a science student, I took a lead role in several undertakings that demanded linguistic capacities – both at school and the College level. 

 

In 2002, while I was in Year 11, I had the privilege to be one of the student editors (male) of the first school newsletter entitled, Loden Rigsel - the name I proposed. That same year, I won 3^rd place in National Essay Competition for High School category organised for the schools across the country. 

 

3rd Place: High School Category Essay

At the Samtse College of Education, I was engaged as a student editor for the Kalapingka – the college newsletter. In 2007, I was the lead editor for 2 class magazines, Fountain of Insights and Some Common Uncommon Whys launched under the leadership of Mr K C Jose (one of the most instrumental literary icons of my life). The same year, I initiated the publication of An Oratorical Omnibus, that archived assembly speeches delivered by teacher trainees in the college. I took the contentment in naming these two publications (Fountain of Insights and An Oratorical Omnibus). 

In addition, I was granted the Institute Prize for Valuable Contribution, which is presented to trainee teachers who make significant contributions to the institution.

Certificate of Merit: Institute Prize for Valuable Contribution

 

First class magazine: Some Common Uncommon Whys

This award was a boost to me as I was also conferred the F L Gorospe Prize for Academic Proficiency in B.Ed Secondary Science for securing the highest aggregate. It is an academic individual award to science teacher candidates who have continuously excelled in their studies.

Certificate of Excellence: F L Gorospe Prize for Academic Proficiency in B.Ed Secondary Science

 

Before graduating from college, like many others, I was equipped with lofty ambitions and tall enthusiasm to put up my best in school. However, these resilient dreams were short-lived. 

 

I was deployed into a remote Community Primary School that was driven with multigrade teaching approach. In multigrade teaching, a teacher tutors two grades that are housed together within a classroom. Teaching the subject that I was trained in (Secondary Physics) was completely out of a dream. I survived teaching everything except Dzongkha (national language) as there was one language teacher in the school. 

 

Following that year, I was sent to a Lower Secondary School that required a science teacher. I got a chance to teach science to Year 8 students. By all measures, compared to my previous school, I found the students at the new school capable to do some serious academic work if I delivered my utmost support and guidance. 

 

I floated the idea of having a class magazine for my students. Students were excited because they would be engaged in such a literary task for the first time. We worked tirelessly for almost a year. But in the end, we could not publish it for some unknown reasons. However, with the support of my friend who had access to stationery and printing facilities, I printed one coloured copy and showed my students what it would have looked like. Not only the students were disappointed for the failure that we could not publish, but I was also equally engulfed with shame and disgrace. 

 

It was the first murder of my dreams!  

 

In the following years, I attempt to breed my ideas but many of my opinions were often perceived as remonstrations. Any idea that originated from me who possessed a very limited working experience was witnessed unworthy to believe and unrealistic to follow. Constant insistence from my side was often deemed as being confrontational and provocative that on several occasions, I was subjected to numerous investigation teams – citing that I was not showing respect to the managers or being non-compliant. 

 

Although I could not keep the momentum of literary works in school, back at home, I had my diary. But archiving everything in a diary was not secured in many forms. I have written a lot of things and they have all gotten lost at some point. Consequently, I have been obliged to eye for a space online where I can landfill my writings and recycle them if required. This is how my blog was born.  

 

And here, I write it at my own pace and form. For ten years, I outlived by the motto of my blog: Does not always have to be a rose to smell sweet. For more years to come, I will cultivate this impetus to keep writing for the rest of my life.  

Doesn't always have to be a rose to smell sweet