AMERICA…IS FAST BECOMING A NEW BANANA REPUBLIC…
(from those disordered bureaucratic minds using automated systems as a substitute for customer service because everyone is…literally…out to lunch!)

We’ve encountered a number of instances in our day of disordered bureaucratic dysfunction in both government and corporate organizations. To describe such instances with old-Army terminology these were –FUBAR – moments (F….d up…beyond all recognition). Aggravating and irritating as these were, one way or the other, we were always able to get them resolved in relatively quick order.

These days, however, such situations are no longer so easily resolved. The main reason for that is because America is fast becoming a new banana republic…from those disordered bureaucratic minds using automated systems as a substitute for customer service because everyone is…literally… out to lunch!

Far from improving the level of efficiency and quality of response to any “customer” or tax- paying voters’ complaints, needs, or requests, technology has created bureaucratic mindsets no longer concerned with being of service, or solving problems, but simply focused on doing as little as possible about any situation, and, preferably, to dump the issue into the lap of someone else, in effect saying…not my job…Mac!

Our solution for this state of affairs is to make it a practice to go straight to the very top of whatever “chain of command” is involved…and pound on it by saying…What the hell kind of operation are you running here?…Are you in charge or what?…This not only reflects badly on your organization but on you personally as well!…etc., until something is done about a situation. For the most part such an approach works pretty well. It certainly eliminates a lot of aggravation from having to deal with any part of that mass of inertia existing below it.

The thing to keep in mind is that any bureaucracy will fight to its last paper clip…not to perform what it is supposed to perform, or, to admit that it has goofed in any way. Thus, one should never have any qualms about applying as much public ridicule as possible to it, because that has the same effect as the shining of a light on cockroaches…making them all scamper like mad to head for cover… just to get out of the glare of that kind of bad publicity…with your problem…solved in a New York minute.

CENTURION