To think becoming a senior civil servant gives you the right to make grown men cry

[dietcokehead]

Disclaimer: I know some very senior civil servants are lovely.

I am a regular who has name changed for reasons that will be obvious!

I have recently joined a Central Government department. In the past few weeks I have heard countless tales of very senior staff throwing more junior colleagues out of meetings, telling them they're crap, reducing them to tears, threatening to end careers. Offences include missing an item from an agenda, being perceived to not be fully prepared, having forgotten to make a phone call, 'mumbling'...

In the department I work in there are a handful of people who think this is allowed as they have reached a certain point in their career, and admittedly done very well indeed. And get away with it. People are genuinely scared by them.

Probably less an am I being unreasonable, and more an am I being naive? I've had twenty years in the private sector and heard the odd story like this, but this behaviour seems to be engrained in my Gov Dept, and I have heard it is not uncommon in others

SCS can be erm, 'blunt'.

Never seen the behaviour you described in 38 years in CS (in the dept that other posters think is notorious for it - IYSWIM)

It's the B1s who are still climbing the greasy pole who are the worst.

Er, no. Not in Welsh Gov. Not tolerated these days. Can't speak for creaky old English central gov though.....

I've worked in three different Whitehall departments over the past 15 years and have only ever come across that kind of behaviour once, with a notorious perm sec.

But if you do want to witness rude, boorish bullying on a more regular basis then I can thoroughly recomend working with senior police officers.

I've seen it happening. A SCS instructing a female officer (only female in the group) to take the minutes at a meeting even though she was not from the SCS's area nor the main person involved in the meeting. (He hadn't arranged for the person FROM his area to take the notes). Same SCS regularly instructs female officers to "do the photocopying so everyone has a copy" of docs for meetings, even though that is not their job and he has his own staff whose job it is. Bit of a twunt. I have had nasty anti-female type comments from him on a few occasions (but I don't take them - I will, very VERY politely but clearly, call him on it).

Certain men, particularly if they have served time on 1 of 2 other Departments, have a serious superiority complex. Tend to be rising, tend to be in a certain age-cohort, and it seems to be often against the women who are also very capable and "should be well squashed to avoid causing competition for us now or in the future" (ok, generalising, but seems to be the mindset!).

When you can see it happening though, it is funny to watch - especially if you call them on it in front of others (and always smiling sweeetly, prefereably with a laugh).

"X, your pc is connected directly to the photocopier too, and you can easily collect them on the way to the meeting room if your staff are too busy to print extra copies. But what we do over here is tell everyone to bring their own copies as we won't be doing spare copies to avoid wasting paper - doesn't the finance and resources bit come under your responsibility?"

"Y, could you say that again please? I'm not sure I heard you correctly because I thought you implied that as a woman, I matter less - Z here is actually the more junior of us and in your area so HE is the one you should be asking to do that. I am here to represent my own area and A (my boss's boss - senior to Y) has asked me to make sure that a number of very important points are made, that's why I am here representing her."

I am in a different jurisdiction though - but I reckon that male officials who have spent time in a Finance-type Ministry in particular, are reknowned everywhere for their superiority complexes (FAR more than Foreign Affairs types - they are usually just important, not sneeringly superior). Having talked to colleagues across Ministries in a number of EU countries.

Generally though, people who were "raised" in my Ministry or come in from a couple of others tend to be a pretty decent bunch.

It also tends to come from the top down. My best G7 friend once witnessed her Minister, her actual Minister, jumping up and down and stamping his feet in frustration in his office, and ordering his (female) office jr to change her blouse because he "didn't like the colour and it made her look butch". He was well known for his misogynistic tendancies and was protected only because of his own very specific, highly sensitive, needs. I have also witnessed many a dinosaur in my own department, especially when I started nearly 15 years ago, though it's got a lot better in the past eight years or so I'd say.

Ministers can be a breed apart though, not least because there is no effective way of disciplining them within any kind of HR guided structure! That said, I've also seen some really inspirational ministers and SoSs.

Agree there are some truly great ministers around. I feel really privileged to have worked with some. I've known two who have had chats from the Perm Sec about their behaviour (and you'd have thought zero applications to be their PS would be a clue to them that they have a bit of a reputation...)

Yes I agree. Some of the ministers I worked with were inspirational. I think amid all the argy bargy about MPs' expenses etc, we are in danger of forgetting that the people who choose to do these jobs are pretty impressive people. They work incredibly hard, can master a brief and care. We might not agree with their politics but most of them do actually care and want a better society even if we don't agree on how to get there.

Should we do public honours?

David Milliband was the best I worked under. Incredibly hard-working; intelligent; gave the impression of having his own principles (rather than just blindly sharing party ones) and of being true to them; managed to retain the air of being a nice man; seemed to make an effort with staff - coming to directorate Christmas parties, turning up at team' desks to say thank you for something, etc.

Nice idea Northey. Funnily enough, I worked a lot with Ed Miliband when he was special adviser. He was lovely. Clever, thoughtful, accessible. Not sure if he's a leader though.

Gordon Brown was terrifying but inspiring. I just don't know what happened to him at Number 10.

Could also do one's we'd have liked to experience :) I think Jack Straw might have been rather inspirational, in a gentle but unyielding sort of way. That's only a view from outside though.

ooh yes. Apparently Michael Portillo was lovely and much less bumptious than he appeared.

On the other hand, I have a deep prejudice against Digby Jones and was horrified when he was brought into govt. I bet he was obnoxious (no evidence to back this up other than the utter horror of his choices on Desert Island Discs which were truly the mark of an idiot).

Ooh, I actually had direct experience of him in one particular role! He didn't make me want to hitch my star to his, put it that way.

Do you mean DJ? I'm so pleased if you do - I love having my prejudices confirmed. If you ever want a good laugh, listen to the Desert Island Discs on iplayer. What a plonker.

I do mean DJ. He somehow managed to be jowly and greasy in character as well as appearance. It was hard to keep a neutral face and not squawk "eurghhh". (NB I did manage to keep a neutral face. I was only a child in my head)

jowly and greasy Perfect!

I liked John Reid... Blunt but in a good way, very polite, turned up to staff events and seemed genuinely to care about us. appreciated hard work.

Charles Clark was too nice to survive. He'd have been a great civil servant IYSWIM.

Jack Straw got good reviews from older colleagues.

Yes, I have outed myself as HO....

Um nope, currently do and have worked with lots of Whitehall SCSs including 3 Permanent Secretaries and have never encountered this. The only bullying I've experienced or witnessed was early on in my career years ago by EOs, a couple of HEOs and an SEO.

Thankfully though I have never had the displeasure to be anywhere near to Digby Jones!

Charles Clark looked great from outside, though I totally get what you mean about "too nice to survive". Such a pity when that happens.

My supervisor has made pretty much everyone in our team cry at one point or another. She's an academic though, so I'm pretty sure it is allowed or at least tolerated .

Are you in some kind of ndpb, wibble?

I'm liking the idea of a hidden community of MNetters bustling around Whitehall

I'm looking at the little network with interest, as I am hoping to end up working alongside Whitehall in a few years (our Department has a post in our Embassy in London that I am hoping to go to for a stint). Even an informal "like-minded" group could be good (there are plenty of those for serious things - there could be good reasons to set up a similar, less formal version for sharing of vital information across borders )

Devora Me too! So, how would members of the "hidden community" make themselves known to other members? What would be an appropriate Mumsnet Civil Servant code or signal? Suggestions please...!