With respect to number two, I think learning how to write memoranda quickly and succinctly is critical. Part of meeting deadlines is anticipating when your bosses have gaps in their schedules to clear your work so your principals have time to really consider it.
Great point. Often, unfortunately, the timeliness and rhetorical punch of a memo seem far more predictive of policy impact than the quality of one's ideas. It helps explain why speechwriters gain immense influence in national security.
Check your stats on FSI. Are "800" courses really offered, or are there 800 courses in the catalog? The two aren't the same. My experience trying to take courses at FSI (way back when I was in a position to do so) was *every single course I tried to take* was not offered nor was it likely to be offered in the foreseeable future despite being on the list of "available" courses. I had a relationship with FSI and I had spoke at FSI several times, so it wasn't entirely a foreign place to me. (I gave up trying to find a course after 10-12 picks and getting the same answer for each.) These "ghost" courses were created around an individual who rotated in to teach. Adapting an existing inactive course was apparently frowned upon, so they just made a new entry in the catalog. Hopefully that has change and the catelog trimmed of its ghost courses. My information is, admitedly, very dated. Related, FSI won't get elevated – or fixed – until State accepts that continuing education is essential to career advancement. This isn't a chicken and egg discussion: Main State needs demand change and hold people accountable for that change. Good luck with the fight, it's a worthy, necessary, and overdue.
I would add living/studying abroad while not in a position of bureaucratic expectation, authority, or status-seeking (admittedly hard once someone is already hired). A lack of on-the-ground experience with a culture, people, and language - in addition to the usual suspects of humans being human in a bureaucratic construct - leads to policy formulation and decisionmaking completely divorced from reality. Deep learning of historical outcomes from books & seminars and meta thinking on sound decisionmaking is wonderful but wildly insufficient.
With respect to number two, I think learning how to write memoranda quickly and succinctly is critical. Part of meeting deadlines is anticipating when your bosses have gaps in their schedules to clear your work so your principals have time to really consider it.
Great point. Often, unfortunately, the timeliness and rhetorical punch of a memo seem far more predictive of policy impact than the quality of one's ideas. It helps explain why speechwriters gain immense influence in national security.
Check your stats on FSI. Are "800" courses really offered, or are there 800 courses in the catalog? The two aren't the same. My experience trying to take courses at FSI (way back when I was in a position to do so) was *every single course I tried to take* was not offered nor was it likely to be offered in the foreseeable future despite being on the list of "available" courses. I had a relationship with FSI and I had spoke at FSI several times, so it wasn't entirely a foreign place to me. (I gave up trying to find a course after 10-12 picks and getting the same answer for each.) These "ghost" courses were created around an individual who rotated in to teach. Adapting an existing inactive course was apparently frowned upon, so they just made a new entry in the catalog. Hopefully that has change and the catelog trimmed of its ghost courses. My information is, admitedly, very dated. Related, FSI won't get elevated – or fixed – until State accepts that continuing education is essential to career advancement. This isn't a chicken and egg discussion: Main State needs demand change and hold people accountable for that change. Good luck with the fight, it's a worthy, necessary, and overdue.
I would add living/studying abroad while not in a position of bureaucratic expectation, authority, or status-seeking (admittedly hard once someone is already hired). A lack of on-the-ground experience with a culture, people, and language - in addition to the usual suspects of humans being human in a bureaucratic construct - leads to policy formulation and decisionmaking completely divorced from reality. Deep learning of historical outcomes from books & seminars and meta thinking on sound decisionmaking is wonderful but wildly insufficient.