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I was a kind of pushed by the newly heated topic on Facebook
these hours about public office consultant salary to write down this entry. Literally,
it opens my eyes, truly, as wide as the Atlantic Ocean. I have heard of such a
level of salary, but I have never seen that type of elitist list.
As a human being, I am eager to be in that position, of
course. Who does not want money receiving $ 11K per month? Of course no body. Based
on this ideal, I would argue that none of those mentioned advisers, who are in
the published list, deserves any blame from us. They are just ordinary people
who were looking for a job, they got it, and now they are sustaining their life.
Instead, my take is whether they deserve it.
My personal experiences and anecdotes. Have you ever seen an
adviser who acts like the actual boss in public offices? I have seen and worked
with some. Some national and international advisers in Timor act like they are
the boss, so you imagine what they would do. Treating an adviser like a boss is
making him/her not deserve a special salary. They may come to the office at
will. They would expect making instruction rather than being instructed to do
jobs. The system has become acute that no body can revolutionize it. One thing
to remember is, for example, the relationship between an adviser and a boss is
not random. You background check them, they are from one coin with two sides.
How can a boss treat an adviser like a real adviser? Although working with such
a challenge, bosses and advisers can still overcome their special relationship
that hinders their productivity if they value professionalism and, most
importantly, the national interest higher than anything else they hold.
The real advisers provide technical services. Their brains
should be more “sophisticated” than bosses’ and regular staffs’ whom they
advise. Some advisers complain that they do their best, but politic decides
everything. This slot is where advisers demonstrate their expertise. They come
up with complicated equations/engineering models/fact-based reasoning to
explain which decision is reasonable and which one is not. They are sitting at the
second row of the seat to provide numbers/ideas/opinions for bosses to inform
or to negotiate with others. Advisers work with the existing system to improve,
and innovate working systems, to solve problems rationally, and to transfer
know-how.
These are what I see real advisers will deserve super high
salary if they function that way. I don’t quantify to what extent those money spent
have had impacts on the variables of public services in the country. But I
would say, advisors’ expertise has not been tapped to the fullest. I am not
saying to eliminate them nor decrease their salary, instead creating a
management system in order to put them in the maximum function mode. Force them
to work as how they are paid. This is what I cant see.
Hope this gives you an inspiration.
