By Mark J. Ohringer–Executive Vice President, Global General Counsel and Corporate Secretary, Jones Lang LaSalle Incorporated

Why does the government do such a bad job? Whether you are a liberal or a conservative, or for that matter a communist or a libertarian, I will bet you don’t think the government does a GREAT job of anything. Indeed, one thing everyone will probably agree on is that government often does a pretty bad job of whatever it seeks to do.

If you have been living by yourself in the North Woods for the past few years without any newspapers, TV or, God-forbid, the Internet, then you may need some recent reminders of what a bad job the government has been doing, not necessarily in order of magnitude:

• There was the failure of the Securities and Exchange Commission to detect the huge Madoff Ponzi scheme, which took place right under their noses and even while there were skeptics who had vocally warned about it much earlier on. The SEC was so incompetent that even Bernie was shocked. Perhaps it was all the porn they were watching on their computers that got in their way.
• There was the Minerals Management Service, whose people were spending too much time partying with the oil companies to notice there wasn’t an adequate plan to cap a deep-well gusher, or at least to clean up after one.
• There was the Federal Reserve, which somehow didn’t notice that banks were making mortgage loans en masse to people who had no prayer of ever paying them back, and broke the world economy as a result.
• After multiple intelligence failures and miss-communications, there was the Christmas underwear bomber who actually got to the point that he was able to light a fuse aboard a jumbo jet, and the only thing that avoided disaster was a few alert passengers.
• And, oh yes, there was the SEC again, which was literally in the Lehman Brothers offices but didn’t notice that Lehman was doing three-day repo transactions at the end of each quarter so they could make it look like they were a lot less leveraged than they really were.

We all know I could go on and on (remember the response to Katrina and the absolute confidence in the existence of WMD?), but then you’d all be too depressed.

Now the reason most liberals are liberal is likely not because they think government will do a great job at anything, but because they don’t trust the private sector or faith-based organizations to do certain important jobs, so for them the government is the only remaining choice regardless of how ineffectual it is. If liberals could be convinced that organizations other than the government could somehow be trusted to effectively help the impoverished, feed the hungry, educate everyone, provide healthcare to all and assistance for the elderly, among other social needs, then I suspect they would be just as happy taking that alternative rather than continuing to argue for an activist government that they know is mediocre on a good day. That would also have the side benefit for them of keeping government small where they actually want it small—when it comes to legislating against civil liberties issues like abortion and gay marriage.

Conversely, if government were consistently better at doing the jobs it takes on, then probably more conservatives could be persuaded to be more expansive in their thinking about what government should be permitted to do. And no longer would the nine most terrifying words in the English language be, to quote Ronald Reagan, “I’m from the government and I’m here to help.”

Overall, if everyone had greater faith in the government’s abilities, maybe conservatives and liberals could actually start meeting in the middle more often, with a concurrent reduction in the vitriol between them that we would likely all welcome.

So, back to the central question: Why does the government have to be so bad at what it does?

It can’t be for lack of money. Unlike in Greece, Americans mostly pay their taxes, which are quite high. I don’t know about you, but after I get done paying my income taxes, property taxes, FICA, Medicare and sales taxes, not to mention stiff taxes on hotels, cell phone bills, airport surcharges, gasoline taxes and so forth (fortunately, I am too cheap to smoke), the government is charging me a lot for the poor job they are doing for me. And it’s not like they get any better at it while they continue to raise our taxes. Can you think of anything else for which you pay so much and get so little in return? Would you stand for it in any other context?

Nor do I think that people who go into government want to do a bad job, at least when they start. Indeed, the people I know who have wanted to serve the people have at least begun with good intentions.

Therefore, what’s the problem and how can we ever hope to fix it? It is presumptuous and simplistic to think we can list all the answers in a short article, but on the other hand you have to start someplace. While their relative weights will differ from government to government, agency to agency, there are probably some core reasons for the problem:

• Power corrupts, even the good ones to some degree, so the tone at the top often turns out to be lacking, and in some cases there is a lot of evident hypocrisy that the staff sees before anyone else, all of which is a de-motivator to doing a great job.
• Appointments to lead government positions are by definition political—designed to pay back donors and maintain authority—rather than used to find great leaders.
• Government employees, including those at the top, are paid salaries with none of the long-term equity incentives or bonuses-based-on-performance that corporations use as a matter of course, so the financial interests of those who work in government are not aligned with those of the people they serve.
• Politics has become so raw, and political campaigns so expensive and so taxing, that probably most people who would do the best job of governing aren’t willing to make the personal sacrifices it takes.
• Many government jobs are viewed as short-term, just long enough to last until the next election, or as a way-station to something in the private sector where the government contacts and experience will be valued, so there is little motivation for long-term strategic thinking.

With all this going against them, the one thing that all government employees should be much more strongly encouraged to maintain is their integrity. There obviously needs to be a much stronger ethical compass to keep them on track than there has been historically. One way to do this is to make sure that the codes of ethics that apply to government workers—at all levels—are as robust as they have become for publicly traded U.S. companies. While the latter are still far from perfect, many of them have also gotten much better at being intolerant of the shenanigans that openly went on in the Mad Men days.

Given the different dynamics that exist in government as compared to the private sector, the concepts that need to be infused in government ethics codes also would have to differ in some significant ways. But there are some standard ethics concepts which, if taken seriously and enforced, would universally improve the work of government:

• Your primary obligation is to serve the citizens. Think of them like the stockholders in a corporation to whom you owe a fiduciary duty. This means you must use your best judgment to do what is good for them without regard to your own personal interests. Guard against being bought (or looking like you are being bought), whether for a little or a lot.
• Treat the government’s money and property with the same care as you would your own: remember it is theirs and not yours, so use it wisely and don’t waste it. And just because the government has a lot of money (and can print more if necessary) does not mean that you can throw it around carelessly.
• Give an honest day’s service to your position, whatever it is.
• Understand your role and what is expected of you, and also think about the bigger picture so you can carry it out with perspective and intelligence; the goal is to achieve the spirit of what you are supposed to be doing, not just blindly ticking the boxes.
• Beware of “regulatory capture.” If you are supposed to be regulating certain businesses, you must always retain your independent judgment and not become beholden to, or improperly influenced by, the people you are regulating. You should treat them in a professional and respectful manner, but remember that you work for the citizens and not them, and that your job is to make sure they are operating legally and intelligently. Your duty as a regulator is NOT to be looking for your next job within the industry you are regulating, and there must be no overt or tacit understandings or communications in this regard.
• Listen to whistleblowers—some of them are likely crazy, but some of them are sane and right. Earnestly and promptly follow up on every complaint that is filed, or every suspicion that someone from the public calls in about miss-deeds.
• Don’t let politics get the best of you. Most of what government employees do has nothing to do with being a Republican or a Democrat, and for most people, who the boss of the agency is should be irrelevant. For most things the government is supposed to do, a political agenda does not mean that common sense and good judgment jump out the window.
• Just as bad as poorly regulating is over-zealously regulating the wrong people, in which case you are not spending your time where you should be.
• Cooperate with your government colleagues and with other government agencies. Be transparent and readily share the information you have. Winning a turf battle may make you feel better but it does not mean you are serving the people well.

Once these concepts were added to the code of ethics of a government agency, there needs to be “tone at the top” that mandates and supports them, plus an enforcement mechanism to identify violations and impose consequences. Think about how much better our government services would be if everyone followed these principles. And then who knows, maybe the Ethisphere list of the World’s Most Ethical Governments?

__________________________________
Mark J. Ohringer is Executive Vice President, Global General Counsel and Corporate Secretary of Jones Lang LaSalle Incorporated, the leading global professional services firm specializing in commercial real estate services and investment management. I have written this article in my personal capacity and my views do not necessarily reflect those of my employer.