Even social outcasts need haircuts now and then. Often the barbering function is adopted by a kind soul who owns a set of clippers, whose palm is crossed with crisps or stamps in return for his efforts. Everybody is happy.
Until the clippers break and matey puts in to buy new ones (out of his paltry wage). Some Manager decides this isn't on; clippers have been left off the list of permitted items - a shock to all those who have officially bought them...
This manager has now saddled the Governor with a problem. We are entitled to keep ourselves clean and tidy, and now he has to peek into the darker corners of his budget to pay for a proper barber. A happy and useful solution to a problem has been shredded, to no one's advantage, and a generation of lifers risk leaving prison looking like Cousin It. Genius.
The one thing that does not change regardless of which side of the gate is the power of bureaucracy to turn the very simple into the very complicated.
ReplyDeleteThis is not about bureaucracy - it's about fear. The fear that underconfident managers have when faced with the management of risk. They try to eliminate risk rather than manage and reduce it. I've seen it at work in the Health Service, and it's difficult to shift.
ReplyDelete