There is a culture of silence within some government departments that makes it difficult for people to speak openly about the problems they see. Bullying, cronyism, waste, inefficiency and poor management can become entrenched, while employees who try to raise concerns can find themselves constrained by employment agreements, confidentiality clauses, legal threats or concerns about their careers. We have seen examples of people who have experienced sexual harassment or bullying and then felt unable to speak publicly about what happened, staff whose careers have been threatened for commenting on major issues, and public servants who have been warned against making comments that could be considered political. Whatever the individual circumstances of these cases, the broader question is whether we have created a public sector where people are sometimes more afraid of speaking about problems than the public is of not knowing about them.

If we want to reform government departments, reduce waste and make better use of public money, we need a system that allows people to bring problems to light without fear of retaliation. That does not mean every public servant should have an unrestricted right to publicly disclose confidential information or campaign against government policy. There are legitimate reasons for confidentiality and political neutrality. But there must be a protected and credible way for people inside government to say, “This isn't working, this is why it isn't working, and here is what would be required to fix it.”

One of the biggest structural problems is the way government departments are given a budget and a set of responsibilities, without necessarily establishing whether the two are actually compatible. When the budget isn't sufficient to perform the task properly, managers still have to produce results. They then have to find ways to reconcile an impossible situation. They can redefine the task, reduce the scope of the service, delay or ignore some of the work, claim that part of the problem has been addressed when it hasn't, or solve today's problem in a way that simply creates a larger problem for tomorrow. Sometimes one highly visible task receives additional resources by taking them from another, less visible task, allowing the government to demonstrate that the important problem has been dealt with while other responsibilities quietly deteriorate.

The problem is that we don't have a sufficiently transparent mechanism for saying publicly, “This task cannot be properly completed with the resources we have been given.” Instead, there can be an enormous incentive for departments to make the available resources appear sufficient. The government doesn't necessarily want to admit that a service requires more money, because increasing spending is politically difficult. Cutting services is unpopular, and raising taxes is unpopular, so there is an incentive to say that efficiencies can be found and that everything will be fine. But eventually the gap between what we have asked government to do and what we are prepared to fund has to show up somewhere. If it doesn't show up honestly in the budget, it will show up in the quality of services, the workload of employees, the risks being accepted, or the people who don't receive the help they need.

This becomes particularly serious when we are talking about vulnerable people. If, as a society, we decide that children being left in abusive situations is something we will not tolerate, then we have to accept that decision has a resource implication. We cannot simply tell a department that protecting children is an absolute priority and then provide whatever funding happens to be available after everything else has been accounted for. If the resources aren't sufficient to meet the obligation, the honest choices are to provide more resources, reduce the scope of the obligation, or openly acknowledge the level of risk we are prepared to accept. What we should not do is leave frontline workers and managers to quietly make those decisions for us while maintaining the appearance that the system is meeting its responsibilities.

This is why openness and protected disclosure are so important. The people working inside government departments are often the people who know first when a system isn't functioning. They know when targets are being met only because the definition of success has changed.

They know when staffing levels are inadequate, when processes are creating unnecessary work, when money is being wasted, and when a service is being quietly rationed. They also know when senior management is presenting a much more positive picture I call it happy washing than the reality experienced by people doing the work. If those people are afraid that speaking honestly will damage their careers, breach their employment agreements or result in legal action, then government loses access to some of the most important information it has.

We need a system where a public servant can say, without fear of retaliation, “We have been given responsibility for doing X, but with the resources available we can only realistically do Y, and here are the consequences.” That information should then have a pathway to independent scrutiny and, where appropriate, Parliament and the public. It should not simply become an employment dispute about whether the employee was permitted to say it.

Ultimately, this isn't just an argument for more government spending. Government departments can and should be challenged to eliminate waste, improve management and find better ways of doing things. But efficiency cannot mean pretending that an impossible workload can be completed with insufficient resources. We need to make the trade-offs visible. If a department can deliver the required service for less, excellent. If it needs more resources to do the job properly, that needs to be known. If the government deliberately decides that a lower level of service is acceptable, that should also be an explicit political decision. Key systems that our public servants use to get the job done lack proper funding, workers cannot do their jobs well. They face constant delays, high stress, and poor results. This problem hurts both staff and the people they serve. Being told to cut down on delivery times even further when you are already stretched.

What we should not accept is a system where nobody openly makes the decision, but the service quietly deteriorates anyway. A healthy democracy needs accurate information about what its public sector are actually capable of doing. If the people who understand those institutions best are prevented from telling us when something is going wrong, then we shouldn't be surprised when problems persist, money is wasted and vulnerable people fall through the gaps.

Public servants should not be punished for telling the truth about whether the government is actually capable of delivering what it has promised.

There is a culture of silence within some government departments that makes it difficult for people to speak openly about the problems they see. Bullying, cronyism, waste, inefficiency and poor management can become entrenched, while employees who try to raise concerns can find themselves constrained by employment agreements, confidentiality clauses, legal threats or concerns about their careers. We have seen examples of people who have experienced sexual harassment or bullying and then felt unable to speak publicly about what happened, staff whose careers have been threatened for commenting on major issues, and public servants who have been warned against making comments that could be considered political. Whatever the individual circumstances of these cases, the broader question is whether we have created a public sector where people are sometimes more afraid of speaking about problems than the public is of not knowing about them.

If we want to reform government departments, reduce waste and make better use of public money, we need a system that allows people to bring problems to light without fear of retaliation. That does not mean every public servant should have an unrestricted right to publicly disclose confidential information or campaign against government policy. There are legitimate reasons for confidentiality and political neutrality. But there must be a protected and credible way for people inside government to say, “This isn't working, this is why it isn't working, and here is what would be required to fix it.”

One of the biggest structural problems is the way government departments are given a budget and a set of responsibilities, without necessarily establishing whether the two are actually compatible. When the budget isn't sufficient to perform the task properly, managers still have to produce results. They then have to find ways to reconcile an impossible situation. They can redefine the task, reduce the scope of the service, delay or ignore some of the work, claim that part of the problem has been addressed when it hasn't, or solve today's problem in a way that simply creates a larger problem for tomorrow. Sometimes one highly visible task receives additional resources by taking them from another, less visible task, allowing the government to demonstrate that the important problem has been dealt with while other responsibilities quietly deteriorate.

The problem is that we don't have a sufficiently transparent mechanism for saying publicly, “This task cannot be properly completed with the resources we have been given.” Instead, there can be an enormous incentive for departments to make the available resources appear sufficient. The government doesn't necessarily want to admit that a service requires more money, because increasing spending is politically difficult. Cutting services is unpopular, and raising taxes is unpopular, so there is an incentive to say that efficiencies can be found and that everything will be fine. But eventually the gap between what we have asked government to do and what we are prepared to fund has to show up somewhere. If it doesn't show up honestly in the budget, it will show up in the quality of services, the workload of employees, the risks being accepted, or the people who don't receive the help they need.

This becomes particularly serious when we are talking about vulnerable people. If, as a society, we decide that children being left in abusive situations is something we will not tolerate, then we have to accept that decision has a resource implication. We cannot simply tell a department that protecting children is an absolute priority and then provide whatever funding happens to be available after everything else has been accounted for. If the resources aren't sufficient to meet the obligation, the honest choices are to provide more resources, reduce the scope of the obligation, or openly acknowledge the level of risk we are prepared to accept. What we should not do is leave frontline workers and managers to quietly make those decisions for us while maintaining the appearance that the system is meeting its responsibilities.

This is why openness and protected disclosure are so important. The people working inside government departments are often the people who know first when a system isn't functioning. They know when targets are being met only because the definition of success has changed.

They know when staffing levels are inadequate, when processes are creating unnecessary work, when money is being wasted, and when a service is being quietly rationed. They also know when senior management is presenting a much more positive picture I call it happy washing than the reality experienced by people doing the work. If those people are afraid that speaking honestly will damage their careers, breach their employment agreements or result in legal action, then government loses access to some of the most important information it has.

We need a system where a public servant can say, without fear of retaliation, “We have been given responsibility for doing X, but with the resources available we can only realistically do Y, and here are the consequences.” That information should then have a pathway to independent scrutiny and, where appropriate, Parliament and the public. It should not simply become an employment dispute about whether the employee was permitted to say it.

Ultimately, this isn't just an argument for more government spending. Government departments can and should be challenged to eliminate waste, improve management and find better ways of doing things. But efficiency cannot mean pretending that an impossible workload can be completed with insufficient resources. We need to make the trade-offs visible. If a department can deliver the required service for less, excellent. If it needs more resources to do the job properly, that needs to be known. If the government deliberately decides that a lower level of service is acceptable, that should also be an explicit political decision. Key systems that our public servants use to get the job done lack proper funding, workers cannot do their jobs well. They face constant delays, high stress, and poor results. This problem hurts both staff and the people they serve. Being told to cut down on delivery times even further when you are already stretched.

What we should not accept is a system where nobody openly makes the decision, but the service quietly deteriorates anyway. A healthy democracy needs accurate information about what its public sector are actually capable of doing. If the people who understand those institutions best are prevented from telling us when something is going wrong, then we shouldn't be surprised when problems persist, money is wasted and vulnerable people fall through the gaps.

Public servants should not be punished for telling the truth about whether the government is actually capable of delivering what it has promised.

I work as an engineer in a very highly regulated, very technical industry at a massive company. There are countless forms, processes, procedures, regulations, requirements, etc that need to be navigated in order to get even the smallest little thing done. Absolutely no one fully understands how all of this shit works together because everyone is so siloed into their incredibly narrow scope of work. In order to get any information from people, you need to ask absurdly specific questions that require in-depth understanding of all this shit that I, who started 6 months ago, do not possess.

Okay so you would think I get training on all this once I start? Fuck no. I get chucked into the deep end because my lead likes "on the job training" and "learn by doing". What he really means is I don't want to train you at all so good luck! Every project inevitably results in me beating my head against a brick wall trying to eek out the smallest clues from people about what to do next because A) I don't even know the right questions I should be asking and B) like I said before, no one actually understands all this shit in its entirety and everyone has their own opinions and interpretations. There's 2 dozen people at a minimum involved in any particular project and 95% of them will flat out ignore all emails too. All of the "experts" and actual decision makers are so noncommittal and vague in their responses to my questions and requests that it ends up creating more confusion, at least on my end.

I've gotten zero training on how to navigate this fucking labyrinth of bureaucracy. My lead is borderline useless and I might get an hour of his time a week for detailed questions. The company as a whole offers no formal training on how to actually do your job but by god they've got hours upon hours of "training" on "quality management" garbage that is so high level and vague, I couldn't even begin to tell you how it might apply to my day to day work.

Every single place I've worked is like this to varying degrees and it drives me insane. It makes everyone's job so needlessly difficult.

Hey everyone,

I work in HR and one of my responsibilities is sending out our Employee Satisfaction Surveys. You know the ones: “How are you feeling at work?”, “Do you feel recognized?”, “Would you recommend working here to a friend?”, etc.

The thing is… I’m starting to feel like no one actually takes them seriously. Responses are often rushed, vague, or worse.... nonexistent. And I get it. People are busy, skeptical, or just don’t believe anything will change. But from the HR side, I do want to make this useful and meaningful, for everyone involved.

So, I wanted to ask:

Do you fill out your company’s surveys? Why or why not?

What would make these surveys feel more worth your time?

Have you ever actually seen leadership respond to results in a way that made you feel heard?

What would make you care about these surveys?

I’m trying to rethink how we approach them, maybe shorter surveys, more transparency about what we do with the results, or even just better timing. Open to any ideas.

Appreciate any honest thoughts!

The word for me is trepidatious. This was a common feeling I felt in my childhood.

I feel like I need to pivot and switch up careers.

What field do you work in and are you happy?

Ever since the Government announced further cuts across the public service morale has dipped.

"Look at the silver lining, you still have a job"

It is this kind of mentality gives employers more power to mistreat staff. Is this asking for the bare minimum now?

I feel like I need to pivot and switch up careers.

What field do you work in and are you happy?

Ever since the Government announced further cuts across the public service morale has dipped.

"Look at the silver lining, you still have a job"

It is this kind of mentality gives employers more power to mistreat staff. Is this asking for the bare minimum now?

What you are going through is a normal thing we go through as humans when we separate from another person and are not the one making that decision.

Your brain tricks you into wanting someone MORE when you feel rejected. It's an ego survival thing.

You want their validation. You want them to confirm that you’re not disposable. You’re not worthy of rejection. And so, to prove it, you want back the person who implied that you were.

You’re not worthy of rejection. Here’s why.

One person saying this isn’t for me isn’t a declaration of the entire world saying you’re bad or something’s wrong with you. It’s one person.

When the feeling is that someone rejected you, usually, if you’re really honest with yourself, you weren’t content in that situation anyway.

When someone rejects you, the ego steps in and demands they take it back. You don’t want to feel like you are dismissible. You want to feel essential, especially if that someone felt essential to you. The feeling of rejection can break your heart and make you question your worth all at the same time.

When you feel a pull to the person who rejected you, realize what you’re wanting is not that person. It’s reassurance that you’re worthy of acceptance. It’s the apologetic expression of the rejecter that they made a mistake and should never have let you walk out of their lives. It’s bandage for a wound. It’s healing to make you feel whole again.

But they don’t have that thing you need. It’s not with them, it's inside you.

Oftentimes, people simply don’t match up. You may have compatible pieces with someone but not a compatible whole.

After some time, this trick in your brain, this love drug withdrawal you are feeling, is going to end.

On a personal note, it will feel a lot better when you make the decision that they really are not good for your future and you leave them. Even if it's just in your heart and she doesn't know it. It starts to counteract the ego's need for validation.

I am wondering if anyone else is the same?

I see the good in people and tend to attract service level connections.

I am part of a few midlife crisis support groups on Facebook and I see a lot people referring to their MLC spouse and/or partner as avoidant.

Can anyone else relate?

A message, check-in, small sign that someone thought of you. That matters, right?

Things that should feel ordinary start feeling disproportionately significant when you’ve gone too long without being emotionally reached for. So far so good.

Now the unsettling part. Not the desire, infact, the recognising how quickly neglected people become grateful for crumbs they would once have considered basic human warmth. You tell yourself you’re composed, independent, rational.

Then one person consistently notices you and suddenly your mood begins depending on a notification.

To me, there’s something quietly humiliating about that because discovering your standards for connection were lowered not by weakness, but by starvation.

So, I wonder how many people here are less shocked by their choices than by how hungry they had become without admitting it.

This isn’t the first time there has been distance between us. We’ve known each other for twenty years and reconnected in 2020. Since then, things have been on and off.

There have been several disappearing acts in the past, but I think this one hurts more because it happened after we were intimate. It feels especially painful to be discarded in that way. I can't help but think I said or did something wrong. I must have given him the ick.

He even deactivated his social media accounts, which only adds to the sense of confusion and finality.