Though retired now >12 years from my nearly 34 years with CDC, I on occasion review my final 2 years attempting to work within a small chunk of the CDC bureaucracy. Down on what within CDC amounted to the front lines, I was baffled at the bureaucratic layers above the program I helped manage. Those layers acted as if their business was not to assist, promote, or facilitate, rather to erect barriers. Among the few nearly encouraging lessons I'd tapped into were the words of a formerly retired colleague from a project overseas (actually Bolivia) who responded to my question: "Joel, you've had a fine career with CDC, do you ever think about retirement?" Joel: "When it stops being fun?" With all the fun squeezed out, I indeed retired--perhaps, an example of the "Gresham's Law of Bureaucracies?"
Though retired now >12 years from my nearly 34 years with CDC, I on occasion review my final 2 years attempting to work within a small chunk of the CDC bureaucracy. Down on what within CDC amounted to the front lines, I was baffled at the bureaucratic layers above the program I helped manage. Those layers acted as if their business was not to assist, promote, or facilitate, rather to erect barriers. Among the few nearly encouraging lessons I'd tapped into were the words of a formerly retired colleague from a project overseas (actually Bolivia) who responded to my question: "Joel, you've had a fine career with CDC, do you ever think about retirement?" Joel: "When it stops being fun?" With all the fun squeezed out, I indeed retired--perhaps, an example of the "Gresham's Law of Bureaucracies?"