Fascinating news from the Wide World of PS News this week from sunny Kazakhstan revealing that computerisation had reached the dizziest of heights, taking on the onerous task of deciding which public sector employees are to be promoted and which are not.
According to the Kazakhstan public service, a computer system called ‘E-kyzmet’ passed a trial run leading to the promotion of 7,000 young PS employees last year alone.
“The system has proved its effectiveness in the pilot,” the head of the Kazakhstan PS declared.
“The program would ensure the principle of meritocracy.”
She said the cold, hard career system monitored all the necessary information needed to support promotions in the PS with its data taken into account when making decisions on bonuses, promotions, training and rotations.
Less prominently she also delivered the equally cold, hard observation that the computer’s data could also be used to support “demotions or dismissal from public office”.
The lesson: Let’s be careful what we wish for!
Hop onto this PS News link for the full story.
Batting beyond the crease
To our regular, if relatively irregularly regular, recognition of the rollicking originators of remarkable and rememberable headings on official statements now in which another HOTWA award for wittiness and wisdom is presented for PS creativity above and beyond the call of duty.
This week the winner of the PS News Heading of the Week Award (HOTWA) goes to the Federal Government’s National Capital Authority which has the dizzy responsibility of managing that slice of Canberra used for Parliament and other assorted bastions of Australia’s plucky democracy.
Announcing that it had engaged consultants to help manage the intrusion of a community of flying foxes which had taken up residence in one of the people’s Parliamentary parks, the NCA stretched the bounds of creative brilliance to another level, heading its news thus: ‘Going into bat for the Commonwealth Park Flying-Foxes’.
For the non-foxaphiles amongst us, what Australia calls flying foxes (Pteropus poliocephalus), the rest of the world calls a bat!
Bill Lawry would be so proud!
As dim as it sims
Credit: michaelztong
To the usually polite, if strident, commentary from a public sector union now, reflecting on an announcement by the Prime Minister that the Commonwealth Public Service should gird its loins in readiness for deep and widespread reforms.
Pointing out that the PS workforce was already under-resourced, under-funded and under-appreciated, the union’s spokesperson revealed her deep frustration by dredging up an old-world aspersion levelled at PS leadership by critics in years gone by as a diligent display of disrespect.
“Our ‘mandarins’ aren’t miracle-workers,” the union leader pleaded from the heart, reviving the ancient term ‘mandarins’ which, even today, Wikipedia defines as ‘satirical’ when used in the PS context.
Of course its replacement – Clyde Cameron’s ‘fat cats’ – is just as demeaning but at least comes with the irony that it was penned by a politician, a calling widely and wisely regarded as the fattest cats of all.
PS-sssst!’s favoured epithet, if we have to have one, is a choice between angel, saint and hero.
The union’s plea would then read “Our ‘angels’ aren’t miracle-workers’, a far more satisfying image to leave the PM with!
Weed all about it!
To the redoubtable Rama’s regular rumble of giveaways now in which lucky winners stand the chance of going home booked or DVD-ed up with freebies from Rama’s fabulous collection of gratuitous giveaway goodies.
This week Rama has two copies of the high-flying documentary Breaking Habits, for readers who can name the founding member of America’s marijuana-pushing religious order the Sisters of the Valley.
The first correct entrants to weed their way out of the PS News Barrel of Booty and identify Christine Meeusen as Sister Kate were James G from the Australian Government Solicitor, and David H from the South Australian Department of Environment, Water and Natural Resources.
Congratulations to James and David and thanks to everyone who joined in. The winners’ DVD’s will be on their way to their new owners shortly.
For another chance to win a Rama giveaway gift, grant or gratuity, simply get going to this PS News giveaway link and give it a go.
Good giveaway luck to all who do!
Sheet wave
And finally another pointless exercise in pedantry as the national Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Cities and Regional Development publishes an information sheet on a pilot program to collect more data about the behaviour of trucks and other heavy vehicles on the nation’s roads.
The highly informative and very useful fact-sheet can be accessed at this PS News link but the first thing one notices is that it runs to 2 pages.
PS-sssst! the pedant asks the obvious question: Can a fact ‘sheet’ run to more than one page without having to rename itself fact ‘sheets’, and if so, how many pages can a ‘fact sheet’ have before it becomes a fact ‘paper’?
Ideas, insults or innuendos to [email protected] where fabulous PS-ssssst! Packs await the most entertaining.
Till next week……
