As when times are good no one in the private enterprise environment gives a flying f**k about those in the public domain. i.e. Nurses, military, etc but only when times turn south do those in private enterprise gripe about the perceived advantage of having a steady (low paid job).
I do haev very very strong feelings about the public sector, and i'm not apologetic about them. Mainly feel that the public sector provides essential services which the private sector shouldn't, but that it is a horribly bloated, over micro-manager, hideously inefficient throwback to the days of empire. I spent the last 7 years of my life earning (which means producing from nothing), a lot of cash, of which almost half was knicked by the government and wasted.
When times are tight the private sector whinges because it faces ALL the risks of a downturn, having already paid for ALL The benefits during the upturn. The gubbment often forgets that it doesn't earn its own money!
It would seem that like in other service sectors NATS is already being affected by the management culture of the civil service and NHS- ie stick managers in who know nothing, get the job because they have a degree (and i have a very good degree in Accounting and Finance before anyone starts to accuse me of bias), but provide useless management services because they have no experience or real world knowledge. So yes i DO get entirely frustrated with the public sector, and not unreasonably- we do NOT need to give the gubment 46.9% of GDP in order to run the country with hundreds of thousands of managers and "management consultants".
Wow rant over
There is one HUGE proviso to that rant- my experience of working in the public sector (having been a officer in the Light Infrantry, and a unpaid consultant in the NHS), is that frontline operational staff often provide brilliant services, but are in almost all cases effectively and completely demorilised by middle management and targets. The Ethos in many gubbment departments is one of rewarding (or at least showing complete indifference to) failure and incompetence, and thus penalising excellence and demorilising all the excellent staff!
What worries me now is that public sector management are attempting to run the services like the private sector- a total impossibility and one destined to failue in my eyes. You need competition to run an organisation effectively for profit (you also need the possibility of abject failure and bankruptcy on one hand, and cash in your pocket on total success!) and the public sector can never have external competition.
Trust me i'm about as far from public sector management as you can get-and Cushty is often used in my circles- mainly because of a mate who is a Saaaaaaaarth Londoner and uses it ALL the time in conversation.
Undoubtedly i will now have upset a darn sight more people- BUT please remember that i am going through the application process of becoming an ATCO, because the people and work look extremely interesting and stimulating. My comments above will, i hope (and in my experience), be echoed by some of you guys already. The private sectors gripe is never with front line staff, but with civil servants and middle managers. If you are frontline staff then i applaud you, if you are management ............well i think you can work out what i think.
