Rule XXX

I've been mentoring some young bureaucrats over the last few months. They're all basically kids, fresh out of school, wide eyed, looking to make "a difference" in the world. And, while I look forward to the world crushing them into cynical oblivion, at this point they're still pliant enough to work for 60 hours a week on projects that will be crumpled up and filed in the little round container next to the Assistant Deputy Director's desk.

Ah! To be young again!*

The mentoring thing, however, makes me think back to when I was a young, naive bureaucrat, just learning when to leap over the stick or creep under the stick. When you're new it's amazing to watch your seniors and how adept they are at leaping and creeping, and you wonder how long it'll take you to develop those skills.

You never notice it, but eventually you find yourself saying loudly in meetings "Well, that's a #2757B... you need form 7F which needs to be signed by Jim, Margaret, and Ray and submitted to Council by next Thursday...", and watching the novices around the table sit there, scribbling like mad, jaws agape.

So anyway...

Rule #30: If you hang around long enough, eventually you will become an expert in something.

If you hang around even longer, you might even get a pension... but you'll also develop rickets, so there's a trade off... and at the rate we're going I wouldn't actually hold my breath about the pension.

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* Before you ask, no, I'm not mentoring these kids in cynicism. My master class in Bureaucratic Cynicism is only available at an advanced level.