David Holland

One Space or Two: Memoirs of a Guv'mint Bur'crat David Holland

Should one space or two follow the period at the end of a sentence? Such issues can occupy a large portion of a government bureaucrat's time. In fact, for far too many bureaucrats, such issues are paramount. One Space Or Two is a work of fiction that portrays a government agency in which picayune issues of editing, organizational structure, status, turf protection, and one-upmanship dominate the agenda. As a result of the attention paid to these issues, the intellectual environment of the agency is stifling. Important, fundamental matters go unexamined. Preparing for the future, a major agency responsibility, receives little more than cursory attention. Unfortunately, the imaginary agency in this book is not atypical. ("Not atypical", now that's a double negative a government bureaucrat could spend half a day pondering.) Intellectually stifling environments were contributing factors to the failure of certain government agencies to foresee and prepare for the events of September 11, 2001. Can government agencies become more forward thinking and more employee-friendly? A major hurdle would have to be overcome: human nature.