> you need to ”be someone”, not ”understand something” or ”be able to do something”
This very succinctly describes the entire management class here in Sweden... The public sector is run by incompetent people who have to buy consultants to do anything and the private sector is led by the same kind of people to the point where actually competent people avoid going into management. I wonder how long we can keep this up.
The public sector isn't allowed to hire people and do things that could be perceived as competing with the private sector, which drives paying consultancies for things like software development as soon as the result could work as a product (i.e. more than one government body would want an instance).
Procurement ("lagen om offentlig upphandling"), one of the big wins for the right, is also fundamentally broken in that a lot of the public servants involved are fresh graduates that soon gets poached by private corporations and the organisational response is to sign long term contracts with huge corporations that supply many different things and are also allowed to bring in subcontractors for the things they don't. This effectively destroys any possibility of commercial competition.
It's purposefully designed this way by conservatives.
I consider that to be a problem, but for our local 'owner families', i.e. oligarchs or wealthy dynasties, it's not. It allows for very efficient capture of public institutions and a kind of glacial stability that makes people in power feel more safe even though some of them have to switch roles every three to ten years or so.
Historically regimes like this tend to incite a lot of violence, either through criminal organisations as people seek fame and fortune outside the paths controlled and largely captured by the elites, or through militant revolution that might turn into civil war. I consider it highly irresponsible by our large unions and mainstream labour parties to having given way to this situation, they should have 'learned from history' as the tankies of old put it.
Leave Sweden is the solution for people like you who don't appreciate how things are arranged. You can be much more successful in a more mature economy where there is a better connection between productivity and career opportunities / renumeration.
This very succinctly describes the entire management class here in Sweden... The public sector is run by incompetent people who have to buy consultants to do anything and the private sector is led by the same kind of people to the point where actually competent people avoid going into management. I wonder how long we can keep this up.