Yep the Parent & Children is only an analogy to explain it in lay-man’s terms. I do agree that the gov’t does have to preserve the expectation of not having mistakes since the public is who they serve and also who give them crap for mistakes. The public are like children who look up to parents and if they don’t do what they want, the kids will cry

I do agree that a real corporation has the flexibility to perform faster and develop ideas quicker with or without the risk of penalty to their customers. However the gov’t doesn’t have that ability. But I’m pretty sure they can perform in house R&D or trials to iron out the bugs and to perfect any mistakes they find! However its probably on a smaller or trial basis. I’m pretty sure they must develop some ideas before rolling it out. Bureaucracy is good if its meant to correct or avoid potential problems, however too much does stifle innovation. I think innovation & bureaucracy must go hand in hand to not fall behind. If you don’t have innovation, all you have is bureaucracy and nothing but policy then you’ve got a gov’t that won’t do much but police people with out dated policy.

Thanks for the nice write up!

I think you’re nicer to the government and the bureaucracy than I am, though. I don’t think it’s a matter of “parental concern” that leads to government’s intense risk averseness. It’s a matter of personal self-preservation by the political heads of government and the fact that the voting public will not allow a government or officials to make mistakes.

Trying to avoid any and all mistakes is not the way to high-performance. Mistakes don’t need to be big – in fact, the objective is to make your mistakes small and fast, learn from them and adjust. But mistakes of any size, except for mistakes of inaction, are terrifying to the bureaucracy.

Governing isn’t easy. It never will be. However, I think our governments and the public services that do the work are hamstrung by a public expectation and internal culture that don’t tolerate mistakes of any degree.

In any case, I’m glad you found the post useful, Ray!

You’ve got a great analysis!