## Notes from 16 June 2025 [[2025-06-15|← Previous note]] ┃ [[2025-06-17|Next note →]] Yesterday I posted about the [The People's Lab study on fellowships and government's youth crisis](https://peoplelab.hks.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/Getting-your-foot-in-the-door-Policy-Brief.pdf). It reminded me of someone who became globally known for a different kind of truth-telling: [Rutger Bregman](https://rutgerbregman.com/), the Dutch journalist and historian who told the Davos elite to stop dodging taxes. Bregman has a new book out called "[Moral Ambition](https://www.moralambition.org/book)" and a whole project around redirecting talent toward meaningful work. From the [reviews](https://www.theguardian.com/books/2025/apr/23/moral-ambition-by-rutger-bregman-review-why-you-quit-your-job-to-make-the-world-a-better-place) and [interviews](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=djKBIET9kMw) I've seen, his argument is that our brightest minds are being systematically funneled into finance, law, and consulting - what he calls a massive waste of human potential. I haven't read the book yet, but this connects somehow to something I believe: working in government is one of the most scalable ways to create impact. Not the only way, but one of the most important - and the one that struggles most to attract talent because our public HR systems are fundamentally broken (what is worst: few people recognize that as an emergency; we would rather speak about fancy digital gadgetry). Think about it: governments have terrible competency-based selection processes. They have no strategic employer branding. Compensation is completely distorted - some highly complex roles pay far below market while others with less complexity pay above it. Selection systems favor memorized knowledge over actual competencies and fit. And that's when excessive politicization isn't making things worse, which happens in many places. Even in wealthy countries like Germany, public HR is built around procedural equality rather than equipping the state with the best people. There's minimal innovation in attracting talent, so of course the most capable go to the Bermuda Triangle of law/finance/consulting. But here's what's even more problematic: many people with genuine public service motivation end up in the philantropic and multilateral organizations instead. These organizations often drain talent from the very territories they're supposed to help, hiring the best people who could be working directly in government. They choose NGOs, foundations, and international organizations because they offer better career management, more personal development opportunities, and competitive compensation. So we have this massive elephant in the room. The very institutions that need the most talent to tackle our biggest challenges - climate change, inequality, democratic governance - are the worst at attracting and retaining it. Meanwhile, the talent pipeline gets diverted either to private sector wealth accumulation or to well-meaning but often indirect third-sector work. Bregman's call for "moral ambition" is spot on, but we need to acknowledge that government work represents one of the highest-leverage forms of that ambition - if we can fix how we recruit, develop, and retain people in public service. **P.S.** Speaking of fellowship programs, earlier this year the Trump Administration eliminated the [Presidential Management Fellows (PMF) Program](https://www.pmf.gov/), one of the longest-running in-house talent pipelines of the US federal government, which had successfully channeled talent into public service. It's like trying to solve the talent pipeline problem by closing more doors. Senators Andy Kim and Jeff Merkley have introduced the [Talents Act](https://www.kim.senate.gov/senators-kim-and-merkley-lead-effort-to-revive-invaluable-federal-pipeline-program-of-top-talent-into-public-service/) to restore it.