Have you ever struggled through a bureaucratic process? Did you learn anything f
Have you ever struggled through a bureaucratic process? Did you learn anything from the experience?
Have you ever struggled through a bureaucratic process? What, if anything, did you learn from the experience?- Lisa Marie Warrenposted 11 years ago
0I have, and what I've learned was that it is vital to avoid all bureaucratic processes if at all possible, and at all costs.
I had problems getting a grant each year for a project that I was running.
I learnt that the people you have to deal with leave their humanity out in the bike shed. That such people are obviously very unhappy in their jobs and probably their lives, and they want to pass on that misery to the rest of us.We're living today in an increasingly regulated, authoritarian, bureaucratized society. Every one of us has to deal with bureaucratic processes and their effects all the time. You can't do business with a bank or a grocery store, drive a car, or use electricity without it.
The first experience usually teaches one to despise officious bureaucrats and the horse they rode in on. Virtually all of us now do. The second lesson, that a regulatory state fleshed out and enforced by bureaucracy is no way to run a country, is a harder one. I'd like to think most of us through sad experience are learning that one too, but given the continuing expansion of that regulatory state and the elections that time after time fail to restrict it I'm skeptical we are.- Larry Wallposted 11 years ago0
I have encountered many bureaucratic processes, some successfully and others with less than success. The secret is to learn their rules--they may not be logical, but there are rules that they have to follow and while the person you talking to is sympathetic, he or she has their limitations.
Some situations defy common sense. I wrote in a hub about insurance. There is a program designed to insure people who have pre-existing conditions. There are two requirements yo had to be without insurance for six months or without credible insurance for six months. The insurance industry has a definition of what is credible and non-credible. Non-credible does not provide major medical or catastrophic coverage.
However the government rules say the policy is credible if they pay for an event and not for time. Thus a doctor's visit is an event. An X-ray is an event, and so on. Because these procedures are charged as events and not on a time basis, the policy is considered to be credible, making me ineligible to get the government program that is suppose to help people like me. I got my two Senators and my Congressman involved and no success. So I am stuck with a limited medical indemnity plan, which help pays for meds and some mediclal procedures. However, I hope I do not have any $100,000 hospital visits like I had in the year 2000. I may have to buy a copy of "Surgery for Dummies" and do the job myself. My husband is a totally disabled veteran and it took numerous applications, lots of frustration and 17 years for him to get his disability. We learned that they do not care if you ever get your disability and are hoping that the veterans die before getting it. Then they will not have to pay him. We learned that they will throw your application in the trash right in front of you and taunt you with the fact that they are in control. We learned that when they throw it in the trash in front of you, it negates that you ever turned that app.in and you will not get back pay to that app. turn-in date. We learned that they just want to screw with you, not help you. They really suck.
That is an outrageous story! What a horrible way to treat people who sacrificed so much for their country. I sincerely hope that your husband has received some reparation, and that his example is highlighted as proof that 'the system' is not working.
This is unfortunately the norm, although it is getting slightly better over the years. You would not believe some of the horror stories I have been told by people. I wrote a three part story of this fight and it is on my profile page.
Spending my childhood and early adulthood years in the Eastern Europe I have learnt that the communist system I used to live in, was not only totally bureaucratic, but also unjust and unfair and totally corrupted...anything after that is a piece of cake:)
Bureaucracy is a way of life in Latin America, and Chile is no exception, allthough everybody is making a big effort to streamline legislation, civic processes, form-filling and etc. I guess the main lesson is to multiply patience, patience and then patience. I find that daily experience does help to cut through to the central issues and solutions. And when standing in line waiting to get attended to, I practice a modified form of "standing like a tree" meditation (Qigong). This last is my invention, I think!
