How do you picture the average civil servant? If you are one yourself, you're not allowed to play. So, if you're not a civil servant yourself, how do you picture the average civil servant?

I bet your bottom Dollar, Yen, EURO or whatever you pay your bills with, it wasn't anything like this. Am I right? This is a picture of the LEF (which means "guts" or "courage" in Dutch) Future Center, a Dutch governmental initiative, aimed at provoking/nurturing creativity within the administration, paid for with taxpayer's money. Price tag: 5.000.000 EURO.
It's a place where civil servants come to have brainstorms, share ideas, have team building sessions, you know, the works.

What is your initial response when reading this? Is it somewhere along the lines of the responses I read on the Internet? "A perfect example of how government wastes our money", "I am embarrassed", "How will you ever prove that this place is where an idea came to live and that this place was needed to make that happen, period?"

A number of politicians felt similarly: One MP wanted to know whether the administration had plans to build more of these "esoteric lounges". Another one wants to find out how many days were saved on major infrastructure works "thanks to this gimmick". "Why are we confronted with a 4,5% increase in the cost of a bus ticket only to find out that our government is spending our money on things like this?"

Some of these remarks would be excellent questions, if they weren't rhetorically asked. And herein lies the very nature of the problem with initiatives such as the LEF Future Center. Let's face it. Can you think of an easier target than a civil servant on a multi colored yoga mat? I didn't think so.

And this is why:
a) we hate taxes,
b) we hate civil servants,
c) we're all for creativity…just not in combination with taxes and civil servants.

Let's just say it as it is: no one wants to pay taxes. We might tell ourselves that we're in favor of public education, well-maintained roads and a fair public health system, but we don't like to pay taxes. Not really. And so, by default, every cent spent by the powers that be on just about anything is something we are opposed to. After all, it's OUR money and to add insult to injury, we don't even have the least thing to say in how, where and when OUR money is used…sorry…misused!

Secondly, as a society, we are not particularly fond of civil servants. We do not hold them as the hallmark of human achievement, to say the least. Why? Well, they are paid with OUR tax money for starters. In fact, we don't really know why there are so many of them and we don't really care for that matter. We don't really know what it is they do and they make us do things we do not like: wait at counters, fill out forms, get approvals, make copies, etc. And what really ticks us off is that these are the same people that – yes indeed – collect taxes. So, dear civil servant, unless you're the fireman that just saved my kitty, seek your acknowledgement as a human being elsewhere.

And then there's creativity. Creativity is good. Most people would eagerly agree that their children should benefit from everything their creativity can come up with. That their creative aptitudes should be developed and nurtured. That creativity is one of the quintessential ingredients for leading a successful and fulfilling life…unless you become a civil servant and your yoga mat is being paid for with my tax money, that is.

But one of the skeptic remarks made about the LEF Future Center was right on the mark though. It said that creativity is a process that can be provoked but not guaranteed and that therefore a place like the LEF Future Center is an irrelevant investment because creativity will not be confined to a single space. I agree.

I agree that creativity is an immensely complex process. I agree that creative thought can be provoked. I agree that creativity by its very nature will not be held in captivity, no matter how comfortable the yoga mat. I even agree that the LEF Future Center is an irrelevant investment, but only if the government were to decide to provide their – and in a very real way, MY – staff with spaces like these as a rare exception to the rule of neon lights and grey concrete boxes. 

We may still have truckloads of unanswered questions about the effectiveness and efficiency of creative thought provoking places as LEF, but we do however know for certain what neon lights and grey concrete meeting rooms do to our creative impulses. So if we are going to err, why not on the side of a pleasant work environment? And I mean truly pleasant, provocative, joyful, colorful and fun. It beats putting people in a cages so that we can move them to future centers and graciously allow them to be creative for 4 hours a year.   

So please, by all means, keep asking questions about investments such as these. But at least have the intellectual honesty to ask fair questions that seek to understand and build on ideas rather than to just vent and score easy points. Have the courage to act on the answers you get, even if they prove you wrong, especially if they prove you wrong. That would be a creative twist right there.

So here's the 5 million EURO question: Would you be prepared to have your taxes spent on multicolored walls, video screens with picturesque images of water falls, galaxies and fire places at the chance of a better functioning administration? Would you be prepared to pay more?
What would you need, to feel comfortable with a civil servant, lying on his back, playfully juggling ideas?
Tough one, isn't it?

Come to think of it: a civil servant that feels and acts creatively, making the best of his/her own potential, consciously and willingly building up the society that he/she serves, the very one I and my children live in…darn…I almost feel like paying taxes.

Take care,
Karl

Share

« Back