It’s nearly 5am, another of my interrupted by Carpel Tunnel Syndrome night. 2 months to go, I’m guessing – more frequently mixed with some weird, previously unknown to me symptoms. Human body is bloody amazing, so many things need to function simultaneously for us to be well. Get one thing is a bit off and your life becomes miserable. I’m still having it fairly easy and I’m thankful to my body for being so strong. I still train karate (maybe full bending, full contact fights and bowing is out of question for now but I’m excused) and go to the gym regularly.
I will mourn my independence when it comes to it, but at the same time I’m hopeful I will manage to keep being as active, both physically and career wise as I am now. They say – if you want to get more things done, take on additional responsibilities – it forces you to eliminate bs. Let’s see.
Each tap on my Mac keyboard causes a bit of pain. I’m waiting until paracetamol kicks in and so I can try to top up a bit more sleep, but I feel I need to pour down my thoughts here, when they are the freshest and most agitated, otherwise they will mellow down, and my morning rationale self will talk me into keeping my mouth shout with excuse of “patience” and “looking professional”.
I always thought poets and artists were the most prolific in art in their times of despair and unrequited love. That’s my version of that. Of corporate aversion.
And what do I feel?
Defeat. Against bureaucracy and illogical world of how things are done in larger organisations. Both public and private. How much waste, bullshit and responsibility avoidance there is. My unlimited – or so I thought -optimism has evaporated (please come back, I don’t want to be turn into indifferent zombie shaking off any responsibility that comes in my way). My hope that I can win in this system smoulders like a dying fire.
Maybe I will regret this and this post will bite me in the arse, but maybe that’s exactly the point. We’ve somehow convinced ourselves that “keep calm and carry on” is some kind of stoic / ancient wisdom, when really for many it’s become approval for indifference. That professional detachment means we don’t have to care about outcomes.
Are the people who shrug off waste and inefficiency more enlightened than those of us who get frustrated by it? Have they figured out something about detachment that I haven’t?
I keep thinking there’s got to be a difference between healthy detachment and just… not giving a damn about anything. Between accepting you can’t control outcomes and refusing to take responsibility for the bit you actually can control. The Stoics talked about focusing on what’s in your power and letting go of the rest, but I think they didn’t mean stop trying altogether. Did they?
Maybe caring about doing things properly isn’t the problem?. Maybe the problem is that too few people do.
Nothing matters
Where do I even start?
I knew it would be difficult, but I really believe in what we do at Untrite is important. There is so much noise in information and so much of what’s happening requires us to act fast to the best of our knowledge, and I think modern tech can brilliantly support that. Help police get a better picture of seriousness of the situation much faster (data is often there, it’ just impossible for a single mortal to manually dig into everything). Or an engineer understanding a problem and working on fixing a stranded plane, that messes up long awaited holiday plans for hundreds of families.
I really believed that decent people working on important problems would find a way. Instead I’m watching my talented colleagues burn out trying to navigate systems designed to prevent anything from actually happening. The incentives for those who are already anchored in the system are screwed. An it’s so hard for the status quo challengers to get in.
A few days ago I saw this Reddit post from civil service worker: “I do nothing and it is breaking me.”
The comments underneath were even more depressing. So many people admitting they sit at desks all day with nothing meaningful to do. Or watching millions disappear into consultant fees while basic problems remain unfixed. And I thought – at least they’re honest about it. At least they admit it’s breaking them rather than pretending this is all normal and fine.
Because that’s the real sickness, isn’t it? End-of-year budget dumps where departments blow money on random equipment that will eat dust, because if you don’t spend it, you lose it next year. Consultant merry-go-rounds where we pay someone £1200 a day to do work our own people could handle if we weren’t so terrified of actually hiring anyone permanent who takes responsibility. Procurement processes that take eighteen months to select the vendor everyone knew would win from day one (thanks, cousin).
We all pretend this is how serious organisations operate. We’ve created elaborate theatre around productivity while avoiding any actual responsibility for outcomes.
I keep thinking about Poppy Gustafsson quitting as Investment Minister after less than a year. I so admire what she’s accomplished with Darktrace and so much more, and I was excited to see her take public facing role. Someone with actual business experience brought in to attract investment, who discovered the government actively repels the thing she was hired to bring in. The slow pace, the inability to make decisions, the policies running in opposite directions to stated goals. She lasted ten months. Ten months before throwing in the towel and saying basically – I can’t work in a system designed to prevent work from happening.
Of course she’ll quote family reasons, just like Matt Clifford did when resigning from 10 Downing Street AI advisory role. I don’t blame them.
What’s broken in us?
Sometimes I wonder if we were different as children or we were already little fuckers, just doing smaller scale of damage. Before we learned that speaking up gets you labeled “difficult” and that challenging obvious stupidity makes you “not a team player.” Before we discovered that looking busy matters more than being useful. Just like our parents. Monkey see, monkey do?
There’s this Japanese way of decision making, where if the boss says we’re doing something, everyone does it. Not because they’re mindless drones, but because they’ve built systems where responsibility flows clearly and decisions stick. Here? We’ve created perfect diffusion of accountability. Everything requires consensus from people who won’t be around when the consequences hit. You send that vague email requiring three follow-ups because being clear the first time feels like effort. You sit silent in meetings when the proposed solution is obviously stupid because speaking up feels risky. You ask for “more research” when you’re really just afraid to commit to anything. And somehow we’ve convinced ourselves this is wisdom rather than cowardice dressed up in professional language.
I of course don’t think the Japanese system is perfect – it excludes a lot of great, but weaker in position voices.
But if to think about it -is it really that different in outcomes? In Western culture, you still get to take orders from those who know how to game the system and gain influence – not necessarily (even almost never) the most capable or qualified ones.
The great escape
Maybe that’s what’s really happening though. Maybe the smart ones have figured out the game already. My colleague Alison Taylor recently wrote on about how corporate jobs have basically dissolved into “bullshit jobs” that even the people doing them know are pointless. David Graeber’s term for roles that exist just to look like work is happening.
Maybe that’s what’s really happening though. Maybe the smart ones have figured out the game already. My colleague Alison Taylor recently wrote on about how corporate jobs have basically dissolved ( https://thestillwandering.substack.com/p/the-death-of-the-corporate-job?ref=thebrowser.com) into “bullshit jobs” that even the people doing them know are pointless. David Graeber’s term for roles that exist just to look like work is happening.
Those people aren’t quitting. They’re just quietly building parallel lives while keeping their corporate personas intact. Developers doing their “official” job in the morning then building their own products in the afternoon. Consultants who’ve automated their actual work and spend most time on side projects. Surely it’s a breach of contract, but they’re smart about it. Leave no traces. Publish afterwork.
They’re using the corporate infrastructure – the steady salary, the laptop, the stability – as a platform for building something real. One person called it “corporate entrepreneurship” – not the LinkedIn bullshit kind where you’re an “intrapreneur,” but actually using your corporate presence to subsidise work that matters to them.
Part of me thinks this is brilliant survival strategy. Part of me thinks it’s exactly why nothing ever gets fixed. All the capable people have mentally checked out and are building their real lives elsewhere. But you, as a startup or an organisation that in still influenced or dependant more or less directly from those corporations, suffer results of this mass apathism.
The art of not giving a fuck
Maybe that’s what successful people in these systems have learned – how to care just enough to keep their jobs but not enough to suffer when things inevitably go wrong. Maybe I’m the problem for expecting taxpayer money to be spent wisely or for thinking public servants should actually serve the public.
But I can’t seem to learn that trick. When I see obvious waste, it bothers me. When I watch good people give up because the system crushes initiative, it makes me sad. When I realise I’m becoming one of those people who complains but doesn’t change anything, it scares me.
My partner keeps telling me not to be so blunt. That honesty probably costs opportunities. But I don’t want a career built on pretending dysfunction is normal. And charging for something and not delivering. I’d rather build something based on facts and actual accomplishments than on managing perceptions and avoiding uncomfortable truths.
What if we actually … tried?
Sometimes I imagine what would happen if just for one week, everyone did their actual jobs. Responded to emails within 48 hours. Even if it’s a no, that helps somebody on the other side of the line to move on. Not doing empty promises. Made decisions instead of forming committees. Took ownership instead of managing stakeholders. Said “I don’t know” instead of commissioning studies to avoid admitting ignorance.
The system would probably collapse from shock.
But think about what that week would actually look like. That procurement process that normally takes 18 months? Done in three weeks because people actually read the proposals and made decisions based on merit instead of covering their arses. That project stuck in committee hell? Moving forward because someone said “I’ll take responsibility for this outcome” instead of “let’s get more stakeholders involved.”
And those budget meetings where everyone pretends the numbers make sense, replaced by honest conversations about what’s working and what isn’t. Bah! and offering a solution to test it quickly (even if on smaller scale). Gather insights. Reiterate if needed. But take the bloody action.
Yes, it would be harder. You’d have to use your brain instead of following process and dispersing responsibility. You’d have to take risks instead of hiding behind consensus. You’d have to admit when you’re wrong instead of burying mistakes in reviews and lessons-learned documents (that nobody reads and learns from).
But imagine the energy that would be unleashed. All those talented people currently trapped in productivity theatre suddenly able to solve actual problems. All that wasted money redirected toward things that matter. All those citizens getting services that actually work instead of excuses wrapped in corporate speak. We’d all be better off!
We’re not victims of some mysterious broken system. We are the system. Every time you forward an email instead of making a decision, every time you schedule another meeting instead of picking up the phone, every time you ask for more research when you already know what needs doing – you’re choosing the comfortable dysfunction over the hard work of making things better.
Indifference is the real disease here.
This collective shrugging that says “someone else will sort it out” or “that’s just how things work.” Waiting for the perfect leader or the right process change or the ideal conditions instead of using whatever power you actually have right now.
The system isn’t broken by accident. It’s broken by a thousand small choices to avoid accountability, to seek comfort, to let someone else deal with the hard stuff.
I don’t know if I’ll keep fighting this or if I’ll eventually learn the comfortable art of not giving a fuck. Right now the paracetamol is kicking in and I should try to sleep. Tomorrow I’ll probably read this and think about deleting it because it’s too honest, too unprofessional, too likely to bite me in the arse.
But maybe someone needs to say it. Maybe someone needs to admit that the emperor has no clothes and we’re all standing around pretending otherwise.
You have more power than you think. You’re just afraid to use it.
Ps. These days this is my anthem.
