To think Dominic Cummings needs a clip round the ear?

[MoltoAgitato]

I mean, really, who does he think he is? He looks like Chris Evans’ scruffier older brother (with apologies to Chris Evans) and behaves like someone who wasn’t allowed into one of those dining societies at Oxford and is now extracting Revenge of the Nerds. And what’s with the privately educated, Oxford graduate bemoaning the high numbers of privately educated Oxbridge graduates in the Civil Service? A complete lack of self awareness to realise he is the problem.

I do think that the Civil Service will have him for breakfast though.

This is classic Dom

Isn't everything supposed be Classic Dom?

hamstersarse

Although you’re right that there is a two year qualifying period before which you can take an employer to tribunal for unfair dismissal, that doesn’t mean there is no such thing as unfair dismissal, just that there appears to be no penalty for it, except in circumstances where your dismissal is linked to a protected characteristic.

But that’s not really the point. Cummings wants to publicly recruit in a way that shows he has no respect for employment law. I don’t think he should be allowed to do so.

Service diversity report [[https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/civil-service-diversity-inclusion-dashboard/civil-service-diversity-and-inclusion-dashboard]]

I worked in the civil service for 30 years. It was probably the most diverse workforce I've even heard of, let alone experienced. Over half of civil servants are women; the guaranteed conditions of service are pretty family friendly. Nearly all the trans people I've (knowingly) met were in the civil service because it was one of the few places they could be themselves, before, during and after transition. Adjustments for disability, check. Ethnic minority inclusion, check. Mind you, it's fair enough to say that the further up the ladder you go the less diversity you encounter. I wonder how many lower grade civil servants (you know, the backbone of the service, the ones who get on with the nuts and bolts of actually running the place while politics plays out in the rarified atmosphere above them) Mr Cummings has ever talked to?

Ooh, what happened to that link? Annoying. Let's try again

www.gov.uk/government/publications/civil-service-diversity-inclusion-dashboard/civil-service-diversity-and-inclusion-dashboard

KatyCarrCan

I am aware of those thing. I don’t think DC being allowed to bypass recruitment processes will solve any of those problems.

Let’s take the point about people from deprived areas. How does Cummings’ requirement (below) do anything but ensure that a very bright university graduate from a deprived area won’t be eligible to work for him?

The ideal candidate might, for example, have a degree in maths and economics, worked at the LHC in one summer, worked with a quant fund another summer, and written software for a YC startup in a third summer!

This sort of language prefers people who can afford to do internships, and is indirectly discriminatory.

Let’s take the example of someone with a learning disability. How does Cummings’ requirement (below) do anything but ensure that someone with a processing disorder that affects the speed of their output (but not the quality) will be unable to work for him?

If you want an example of the sort of people we need to find in Britain, look at this on CC Myers — the legendary builders. SPEED. We urgently need people with these sort of skills and attitude. (If you think you are such a company and you could dual carriageway the A1 north of Newcastle in record time, then get in touch!)

He’s a rat. And he’s fooling a lot of gullible people here.

But you also have to bear in mind that sometimes the best people aren’t actively looking for a new job. What about people who are already happily employed elsewhere, or entrepreneurs, or people in research or entirely different fields who wouldn’t normally think about the sort of role you’re recruiting for? These people might be much more willing to send in a quick CV and have a conversation, and very actively put off by having to fill in 3 paragraphs on “why I want to join the civil service”. Again, this does not in any way make them more likely to be bullies and tyrants. It makes them innovative and busy and pre-occupied, and in recruitment it’s your job to find a way to their door, rather than the other way round.

Then headhunt then. But if, at the end of the day, they are not willing to jump through a reasonable number of hoops, then A) you are likely to hiring people who don’t fit and B) you have no way of knowing that they are actually going to be able to do the job.

I’ve worked in recruitment so I know how this works. And people who think they need to be courted and feel rules don’t apply to them will last no time at all in a huge and bureaucratic organisation like the Civil Service, unless - like Cummings - they have sufficient power to ignore the rules. And where are you then? That’s when people do become tyrants and bullies, because you allow it. And then other people have to go round cleaning up after their bulldozing tendencies.

So he wants to get young, inexperienced people in, appointed through non transparent routes. That means making politicised and nepotistic appointments.
A politicised and nepotistic civil service would be a complete disaster for the public under any government. If the civil service is not working well in parts, it’s because funding and staffing have been slashed since the Tories/coalition got in ten years ago. Any business would look the same after a decade of that and it’s a tribute to civil servants’ public service ethos that so many have stayed on.
This looks to me like political pay back to civil servants for them factually pointing out the obvious national problems across all areas created by a no deal Brexit. Now why would he want the civil service to shut up about that.?

He's a petulant manchild.

Given his background is so similar to those he is railing against in the Civil Service I find it amusing that he believes he is the one to make the changes. The civil service is monolithic and full of people who are just as clever as Dominic Cummings.

Do I believe that we should have more evidence-based policy? Of course. Do I believe we should just let mathematicians and physicists create models that we slavishly follow? No, that would be crazy.

The problem is that social science is fundamentally plagued with subjectivity and just pretending that it doesn't exist is ignorant.

What could do with changing is the Green Book methods for valuing public investments which currently encourage short-termism and do not value sustainable investments.

jolly I need to go out but to answer your last post. There are two issues.

Firstly, I was replying to your point about when you recruited for corporates and how you though the process was thorough but I thought it was usually discriminatory. The examples I posted show just some of the research that has found corporate recruitment processes are discriminatory.

Secondly, you're arguing a straw man. I didn't say all the posts he had mentioned were open to everyone. But I also didn't pretend that it was unusual to have internships or graduate recruitment jobs. There are posts on his blog that don't demand a degree. But you know that, because you deliberately didn't post them.

So, let me reiterate my position because (despite it being clear in all my posts some posters seem determined to misrepresent it) : the civil service needs overhauled. DC does not have the position to overhaul it on his own so all this 'drama' is nonsense. He isn't breaking employment law and his 'advertising campaign' doesn't represent an assault on everyone's employment rights.

Effective opposition to (a) an overhaul of the civil service or (b) how they plan to overhaul the civil service or (c) how they recruit would be more beneficial if it proposed alternatives rather than creating strawmen and launching personal attacks. All this sound and fury is a distraction but below it there are real issues about access, about recruitment, about government, transparency and accountability.

I’m an Oxbridge graduate AND a weirdo/misfit who climbed their way out of a hell hole, and I wouldn’t work for him if I was on fire and he had the last bucket in Britain.

@thejollyroger

I loathe Dominic Cummings - he has been and continues to be very bad for this country. God only knows how he is where he is, but the same goes for Boris so...

What could do with changing is the Green Book methods for valuing public investments which currently encourage short-termism and do not value sustainable investments.

I think this is already underway, ideologically driven of course to tip the balance back to projects in the north, but nonetheless Tver welcome.

Very

Britain won’t be fixed until we get rid of the “hell holes” that people think they need Oxbridge to “climb out of” ..

KatyCarrCan

But he is not allowed to specify ages or imply them with phrases like “recent graduates”. It’s not a straw man; he is contravening employment law.

It is your argument that is the straw man. I didn’t say that thorough recruitment processes couldn’t be discriminatory, or that no reform is needed. I am saying that the recruitment ‘process’ instigated by DC definitely is discriminatory, and in more than one respect.

And yes, a person with the amount of power he currently has being allowed to bypass all process and ignore the law could threaten employment law.

fascinated

What hell holes are you proposing we get rid of?

He’s like that Steve bloke that Cameron had. Also scruffy and messianic with a big belief in tech bros.

'Let’s take the example of someone with a learning disability. How does Cummings’ requirement (below) do anything but ensure that someone with a processing disorder that affects the speed of their output (but not the quality) will be unable to work for him?

If you want an example of the sort of people we need to find in Britain, look at this on CC Myers — the legendary builders. SPEED. We urgently need people with these sort of skills and attitude. (If you think you are such a company and you could dual carriageway the A1 north of Newcastle in record time, then get in touch!)'

Genuine question - are you not allowed to advertise jobs for which being able to do things quickly is a requirement?
I would have thought there were some roles where it is a core part of the skillset needed?

Genuine question - are you not allowed to advertise jobs for which being able to do things quickly is a requirement?
I would have thought there were some roles where it is a core part of the skillset needed?

No, or everyone would do it. People like Cummings worship speed, because they think speed equals efficiency and work is a good in itself. But speed isn’t a virtue in most roles. Taking the appropriate time to do a thing can often mean a better end result.

But in any case, I believe it contravenes the Equalities Act to specify speed, since for many people their output is limited (although not massively) by a disability.

I can’t get past how creepy he actually looks - especially when he stands in a corner wearing a t shirt. His eyes are indescribable.

TheCountessofFitzdotterel

But there will be exceptions to that, of course. There are jobs where ability to do things at speed is safety or business critical - surgeon, pilot, paramedic etc.

But that’s not a reasonable thing to suggest for a policy job, for example.

Getting things done quickly is fine as long as outcomes are just blindly imposed.

Standard civil service project management techniques demonstrate how each project will work for speed, cost or quality. The iron triangle. You can only have 2 of the 3 things at one time. So if speed is sacrificed it’s to focus on maintaining quality and not goi go over budget. Given budgets have been absolutely slashed in most civil service departments since 2010, then you can see why in order not to implement an utter pile of shit, speed suffers.

And atm employment law means you can be fired at will within a probationary period

Get the caveats right!

• an employer can dismiss someone using a relatively simplistic process not only during probation, but up until the employee has earned 2 years' employment rights;

• an employer could be confronted with an ET claim if the employee has a strong case with evidence of harrassment and discrimination on the basis of a protected characteristic (sex, pg, race, disability) - this protection is from Day 1.

Brexit may change all this, of course, but this is current law.

But in any case, I believe it contravenes the Equalities Act to specify speed, since for many people their output is limited (although not massively) by a disability.

It depends. It doesn't necessarily contravene the Equality Act (2010) to stipulate the requirements of a role, and in honesty how meaningless and open to interpretation would it be to stipulate "speed" other than a broad means of description.

You'd put something in the advert that gives a sense of the need for responsive, timely deliverables to meet stakeholder needs, to make it stack up as a valid requirement tied to a role specification. The ability for someone with a disability to call them on discrimination grounds would be very difficult. I'm not saying that's a good thing, but that's the reality of what DC would seek to achieve.

And actually securing the suitable candidate on the basis of "speed" is bollox imo. It's yet another government sound byte and double underlines the utter twattishness of the BJ/DC agenda.

The ability for someone with a disability to call them on discrimination grounds would be very difficult. I'm not saying that's a good thing, but that's the reality of what DC would seek to achieve.

And of course that doesn't in any way mean that someone with a disability wouldn't be just as ideal for the role as someone without. There are so many "wheels-within-wheels" to navigate in the dark world of CS recruitment, who even knows!

Would DC use CS Success Profiles, one wonders, or is he allowed to tear up the rule book in his maverick trendy style. One rule for him, one rule for everyone else...