The Notebook: A British DOGE? It’s more likely than you think
Will Britain follow Musk’s example and set up its own DOGE? It wouldn’t be the first try, writes Richard Morgan Evans, CEO of Sapience Communications, in today’s Notebook
A British ‘DOGE’? It wouldn’t be the first try
As President-elect Trump’s administration takes shape, two of his more colourful appointments have been Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy – who are set to head up a new DOGE, or, ‘Department of Government Efficiency’.
The Doge will be given an expansive brief to save taxpayer money by finding fraud, waste and abuse in the federal government – which is supposedly endemic. Reactions from Washington insiders have been mixed. Is this just a ceremonial post to appease a new Trump ally? It’s sometimes hard to escape the impression that the whole thing is a sort of joyride: even the name is a cadge from an internet meme.
Don’t be so sure. Britain – for its part – has had its share of Doges. It wasn’t so long ago that the businessman Sir Philip Green was commissioned to cut civil service bloat. Dominic Cummings has been calling for public procurement reform for over a decade. We can also see shades of the Doge in Wes Streeting’s promise to name and shame underperforming NHS managers, or in Rachel Reeves’ planned ‘Office for Value for Money’.
Indeed, the problem of administrative waste is much more pressing here in Britain, where we lack the ‘fiscal headroom’ of a country like the United States. Last month’s Budget should force the question anew: how much state spending is simply waste that could be safely sloughed off? According to Sir Philip Green’s report, cutting the cost of public procurement by five per cent would save around £10bn a year to the taxpayer. That’s getting on for half of Rachel Reeves’ ‘black hole’.
Of course, bureaucrats have always been something of an easy target for governments looking to economise – easier than pensioners, anyway. For public sector organisations, which do not operate by the profit motive, it will always likely be a challenge for them to have the same standards of efficiency as private companies. But I wonder. In an era where we’re asked to choose between low taxes and high-quality public services, could an assertive British Doge help us square the circle?
Going for gold…
Reports last week that an India/UK free trade agreement could resume can only be good news. Indeed, businessmen seeking inspiration need look no further than BBC iPlayer’s Mumbai Gold. Focused on the entrepreneurs that are causing the Indian economy to boom, their sheer determination and exuberance is a marvel almost on a par with the Taj Mahal. Last month we had the privilege of managing the UK launch of Dubai-based Danube Properties. It’s founded and run by one of Dubai’s wealthiest Indian entrepreneurs, Rizwan Sajan, who is known as ‘Mr 1%’ because of the innovative financing offer to potential buyers of the luxury apartments the firm builds, where they pay just one per cent per month of the cost of the apartment they are building. Perhaps someone for Angela Rayner to speak to as she tries to sort out the UK’s housing woes.
The practical benefits of a diverse team
Despite the last quarter’s economic figures out last week suggesting otherwise, Sir Kier Starmer’s Labour Government is set on its objective of ensuring the UK has the highest growth in the G7. But just in case, we are hedging our bets and have just opened an office in Dubai. We have also started to cover India, and have been working with DLF, one of the country’s largest property groups.
For a business looking to expand abroad, a diverse team is indispensable. We often hear about the value of diverse viewpoints and the new ideas and perspectives that they can bring to a business: all true. Less discussed, however, are the practical, on-the-ground benefits of this, from the cultural perspectives to doing business overseas they can bring to the simpler benefit of having a team that can speak a range of languages.
Having colleagues from India, Nigeria, South Korea, Malaysia and Iraq has helped us open up overseas markets. For my own part, I’m originally from Wales, and we have a saying: ‘os ydych am fod yn arweinyedd byddwch yn bont’, ‘if you want to be a leader, be a bridge’. Any successful organisation should be building bridges to diversify talent.
From shoegaze to stargaze
David Ogilvy was one of the legends of modern advertising. He always emphasised the need to take long holidays and seek alternative sources of relaxation. This was to help ease the mind – stress is no friend of inspiration – and feed creativity.
Fortunately, London has a bountiful range of such opportunities to switch off and with a friend over to stay last week I indulged. First up was an O2 concert to see Cigarettes after Sex, the paragons of shoegaze rock, followed by Cabaret – I confess it was the second time for me, having seen Cara Delevingne’s excellent performance as Sally Bowles earlier this year.
We ended the week at the Albert Hall to see Bob Dylan. No doubt a star and lyrical genius, but capable of lines as inane as ‘he wasn’t too small and he wasn’t too big, ah, think I’ll call it a pig,’ and as sublime as ‘in the fury of the moment I can see the master’s hand in every leaf that trembles, in every grain of sand.’
All in all, though, I think I’m set for some very creative campaigns this week.
What I’ve been reading
News of the Doge has put me in the mind of another irreverent reformer of the state – David Lloyd George, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1916-22, and a titan of his age, with a new book out on his career: Rivals in the Storm.
He’s now mostly remembered for his personal peccadillos, which eventually caught up with him – but this shouldn’t obscure his almost Musk-esque levels of zeal and inventiveness, which should chime well with the current government’s emphasis on reform of our public services. During the Great War, Lloyd George created a new Ministry of Munitions virtually from scratch, which managed to resolve the ‘shell crisis’ afflicting the army in a matter of months.
He also established a so-called garden suburb of advisers to give him some independence from conventional civil service advice – the name came from the fact that they were all housed in temporary wooden structures in the gardens of No 10 and No 11 Downing Street. Certainly, a better use of those gardens than the lockdown-busting parties of the previous government.