A meeting with Sir Humphrey
Midterms are over! And yet, glutton for punishment that I am, I choose to attend a WBS event featuring the ex-head of Britain's Civil Service (Lord Turnball) rather than head down Varsity to get wasted with the others. I kill me, I really do.
Lord Andrew Turnball inspires somewhat mixed feelings. The content of his speech - he's been at the centre of many Blair/Brown battles during the last decade, and is one of the best people on earth to ask about what really happened during the Blair era. A real-life Sir Humphrey Appleby from 'Yes Prime Minister'. But his delivery - soft-spoken, reliant on notes, head down and poor projection - fails to keep the room's attention. Which, as a civil servant to the core, he's probably quite pleased about. These guys are all about shrinking into the shadows.
And he's sitting about one metre away from me.
The speech ends, and what I can't believe as Q&A begins is the utter, infinite, unbelievable patience of the man.
There are a lot of local government / civil servant types in the small lecture hall - Warwick Business School offers MPAs in all sorts of public sectory stuff, like local government finance - and once again I'm struck at the behaviour of public sector people, so different to anyone in business.
Yet he lets these strutting posturing nonentities speak, with a benign, tolerant air. Let's face it, this guy mediated the worst bickerings of Blair and Brown; to him, chestbeating academics represent a challenge somewhat equivalent to fighting cockroaches.
Whereas business types will engage in debate and make cutting remarks, parrying and attacking in cut-and-thrust back and forths, civil service types just want to talk. Question and Answer sessions in the public sector aren't about give and take. They're about giving a speech, establishing your political credentials, and if we're all very lucky there might even be a small question at the end of it.
There's one WBS guy embarking on a lengthy oratory worthy of Thucydides, at the end of which there may or may be have been a question; only a rising intonation spurs Lord Turnball to answer. (He correctly surmises the content of his answer isn't important; this is just about giving respect, not answering a question.) Next comes a Sociology person from the University, equally desperate to demonstrate how very, very clever she is. She's about 55, but There Was A Time, and I catch myself checking for a wedding ring (there isn't one.) Two of my MBA pals have just shuffled into the hall: BEHAVE!
Really, it's that bad. I have to keep remembering where I am, or I'd be rolleye'd and drumming on the desk. It's all I can do from spouting my mantra for successful meetings at the congregation: "GET THE F**K ON WITH IT!"
More questions come in from local government types, of the lank-haired, bespectacled indicative type you'd expect. (The people, not the questions.) Why do so many people who work in local government just seem to have... given up? I mean, these are young women and men studying hard to gain higher ed quals; they're not stupid, not are they naturally unattractive, although most are somewhat slablike. These politicians of the future aren't bad people. They're just a little... dull.
I sidle up and introduce myself to Turnball later over the post-speech cocktails, and he turns out to be just as affable in the flesh as at the podium. Like a lot of civil servants intelligent enough to have done other things (and probably made a lot more money, if fewer gongs) he's an interesting character.
While a bit of a marathon after 2 midterm exams today, the evening has been worthwhile: yet another example of just how my life's changed in the last few weeks, largely for the better. And I manage to snaffle a couple of WBS pens on the way out: everything's a bonus.
Lord Andrew Turnball inspires somewhat mixed feelings. The content of his speech - he's been at the centre of many Blair/Brown battles during the last decade, and is one of the best people on earth to ask about what really happened during the Blair era. A real-life Sir Humphrey Appleby from 'Yes Prime Minister'. But his delivery - soft-spoken, reliant on notes, head down and poor projection - fails to keep the room's attention. Which, as a civil servant to the core, he's probably quite pleased about. These guys are all about shrinking into the shadows.
And he's sitting about one metre away from me.
The speech ends, and what I can't believe as Q&A begins is the utter, infinite, unbelievable patience of the man.
There are a lot of local government / civil servant types in the small lecture hall - Warwick Business School offers MPAs in all sorts of public sectory stuff, like local government finance - and once again I'm struck at the behaviour of public sector people, so different to anyone in business.
Yet he lets these strutting posturing nonentities speak, with a benign, tolerant air. Let's face it, this guy mediated the worst bickerings of Blair and Brown; to him, chestbeating academics represent a challenge somewhat equivalent to fighting cockroaches.
Whereas business types will engage in debate and make cutting remarks, parrying and attacking in cut-and-thrust back and forths, civil service types just want to talk. Question and Answer sessions in the public sector aren't about give and take. They're about giving a speech, establishing your political credentials, and if we're all very lucky there might even be a small question at the end of it.
There's one WBS guy embarking on a lengthy oratory worthy of Thucydides, at the end of which there may or may be have been a question; only a rising intonation spurs Lord Turnball to answer. (He correctly surmises the content of his answer isn't important; this is just about giving respect, not answering a question.) Next comes a Sociology person from the University, equally desperate to demonstrate how very, very clever she is. She's about 55, but There Was A Time, and I catch myself checking for a wedding ring (there isn't one.) Two of my MBA pals have just shuffled into the hall: BEHAVE!
Really, it's that bad. I have to keep remembering where I am, or I'd be rolleye'd and drumming on the desk. It's all I can do from spouting my mantra for successful meetings at the congregation: "GET THE F**K ON WITH IT!"
More questions come in from local government types, of the lank-haired, bespectacled indicative type you'd expect. (The people, not the questions.) Why do so many people who work in local government just seem to have... given up? I mean, these are young women and men studying hard to gain higher ed quals; they're not stupid, not are they naturally unattractive, although most are somewhat slablike. These politicians of the future aren't bad people. They're just a little... dull.
I sidle up and introduce myself to Turnball later over the post-speech cocktails, and he turns out to be just as affable in the flesh as at the podium. Like a lot of civil servants intelligent enough to have done other things (and probably made a lot more money, if fewer gongs) he's an interesting character.
While a bit of a marathon after 2 midterm exams today, the evening has been worthwhile: yet another example of just how my life's changed in the last few weeks, largely for the better. And I manage to snaffle a couple of WBS pens on the way out: everything's a bonus.
Labels: Warwick University, WBS
posted by chrisworth at 9:16 PM
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