You might be a bureaucrat if …

This column was originally published on Jeff Neal’s blog, ChiefHRO.com, and was republished here with permission from the author.

A recent Government Executive article quoted Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) saying “nothing makes me angry like hearing a member on the floor of the House use bureaucrat as an epithet.” Bureaucrat is one of those words that can be used as a slur, an epithet and/or an insult, but it can also be used to praise someone who understands how government works and uses that knowledge to make it work better. More often than not, we see it used to denigrate the contributions federal workers make. I can understand why Hoyer made his remarks.

Those of us who spent decades in government have seen federal workers who represent the best and worst meanings of “bureaucrat.” Most of the feds I have worked with represent “bureaucrat” in its higher form — those experts whose work makes government work. So, in honor of those good people, and with tongue firmly in cheek, I offer a few ways to tell if you are a bureaucrat (with apologies to Jeff Foxworthy).

• If you proposed to your wife-to-be by saying, “I have assessed a multitude of options and ascertained that the heretofore acceptable status of ‘single’ is an unsustainable option for the out years, therefore I am promulgating this proposal of marriage” — you might be a bureaucrat.

• If you don’t know if you will get paid when you show up for work on Oct. 1, because Congress forgot to pass a budget — you might be a bureaucrat.

• If your boss shifts gears faster than a Ferrari — you might be a bureaucrat.

• If your friends don’t care what you do for a living, until their kid gets out of college and wants a job — you might be a bureaucrat.

• If you regret signing up for telework when everyone else gets a snow day and you have to sit at home and work — you might be a bureaucrat.

• If the Cato (wasn’t he the Green Hornet’s partner?) Institute says you are overpaid by 34 percent and the President’s Pay Agent says you are underpaid by 25 percent, but all you know is you want is a QSI when you get your next rating — you might be a bureaucrat.

• If the new person who you had to train how to do his job just got promoted to be your boss — you might be a bureaucrat.

• If the boss who made you read “Who Moved My Cheese” is really a rat — you might be a bureaucrat.

• If you just got reorganized but you are still assigned to the job description from two reorganizations back — you might be a bureaucrat.

• If “close enough for government work” is offensive to you — you might be a bureaucrat.

• If your agency says, “People are our most important resource” but they put you in 6 foot cubicles to work — you might be a bureaucrat.

• IYKWTAM – you might be a bureaucrat.

And finally …

• If you go to work every day, do your job to the best of your ability, look out for the taxpayers’ interests, work overtime without compensation and care deeply about America — you might be a bureaucrat.

Jeff Neal is a senior vice president for ICF International and founder of the blog, ChiefHRO.com. Before coming to ICF, Neal was the chief human capital officer at the Department of Homeland Security and the chief human resources officer at the Defense Logistics Agency.

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