I worked in the Energy and Climate Change Directorate and all the cons that follow are in this context.
This is a very high profile area with ministers, particularly given COP26 and the more recent cost of living crisis with energy bills so you would think this would be a well oiled machine but it's not.
The senior management (grades above C1 team leaders) are woefully inadequate. Lack of communication, leadership and effective programme/project management resulting in more junior staff being unable to do their jobs properly. Don't get me wrong, most of the staff above C1 are nice people but - with a couple of exceptions - their management and leadership is awful. The worst type of senior staff (and this includes quite a few C1s) are the ambitious empire builders who will stop at nothing to climb the ladder of success at the expense of others. Anyone in the directorate reading this will know who I am talking about.
Thinking about the Scottish Government more generally then I do get annoyed about the comments civil servants make about their pay. Trust me, despite what they say, they are EXTREMELY WELL paid for what they do and comments made on Glassdoor and other places about the Scottish Government being 'not as good as the private sector' in terms of pay are without merit. With the exception of professional roles such as lawyers and accountants, I doubt very much those in the private sector do earn any more. This is a myth that's been used for so many years that it's now become an established fact. The only thing I would say is that unlike the private sector civil servants don't get bonuses.
As mentioned earlier the pension is amazing but sadly it means many civil servants are reluctant to leave, particularly when they no longer enjoy the job. Naturally this leads to stagnation and can cause great inefficiencies as some people are just counting down the clock to retirement which is really not healthy.
One other thing. Human Resources are universally loathed by pretty much everyone I've come across so clearly the government has a huge problem with this. Recruitment is a key problem area with major issues relating to form filling, permissions and the hugely cumbersome interview process resulting in the wrong people getting jobs and some great talent having to leave the directorate/government. Put simply it defies common sense!
