Opinion: Stakeholder chafes at ‘change agent’ inflation
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Q: When has a management-speak cliche jumped the proverbial (and cliched) shark?
A: When it appears in two front-page stories about bureaucrats.
That’s what happened in today’s paper. First, in a profile of proposed Rumsfeld-replacement Robert Gates:
And it is Gates whom President Bush has selected to lead the Pentagon, offering the onetime CIA director up as ‘an agent of change.’
Second, in the story on new LAFD Chief Douglas Barry:
‘The mayor wanted to find a person for the interim who is a change agent and ready to create momentum and action for the department, who knows it well, who has served it well, and also who has the leadership skills and shared vision for excellence,’ said Robin Kramer, the mayor’s chief of staff.
The mayor has been particularly promiscuous with the Change Agent card of late, saying last week that ‘I’m looking for one thing: a change agent,’ and also, ‘I want a change agent. Whether that chief is white, black, a woman, gay, lesbian.’ Then, in a meeting between the mayor and new LAUSD chief David Brewer,
Villaraigosa urged Brewer to bring in a ‘cadre of change agents’ to reform the district
According to our archives, the phrase ‘change agent’ hadn’t been published more than eight times in a single year since at least 1999. Yet it’s been used eight times in the last nine weeks!
And the cruelest blow of all? We may have had a C.A. in the firehouse all along. According to outgoing LAFD chief William Bamattre, ‘I believe I have a record as a change agent, and I’d like to move forward aggressively with these changes.’ At least he learned what jargon he was supposed to mouth....