40 JULY AUGUST 2024 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL was about 5,000 people strong. We’ve grown significantly over time, not just in terms of numbers but especially in terms of the wide variety and diversity of skills and experiences that we have brought in. So, I’m not only pleased with where we are today in terms of the talent we possess but also very optimistic about the future. AFSA: What are some of the biggest changes the Service has seen, in your experience? MB: I’m a fan of our being every place we can be—the universalist approach—but if you consider the history of the Foreign Service, you were really on your own. You had your letters of instruction, but any correspondence, any guidance was oftentimes far enough away in time and distance that you had to be able to think on your feet. One of the common threads we have throughout all this time is that we still require that our Foreign Service personnel are able to think, act, and make good decisions without necessarily being able to call home. And it’s true that we still face expeditionary challenges, most recently in opening our Pacific Island posts. But as the last five or six years have taught us, we also have to develop a means by which we can track issues that have not traditionally been part of diplomacy. I’m thinking in terms of emerging technology. Five years ago, no one in this building was talking about AI. Now we’re about to have our own custombuilt ChatGPT inside the State Department. Similarly, our work on multilateral diplomacy. How we build coalitions in what has become in many ways a more multipolar world will require a much greater expertise there. And health—who would have thought that a pandemic would have presented [challenges] to our national security and to our economic security the way COVID-19 did? So we now have two new bureaus, one for emerging technology and one for health, that look at the diplomatic aspects of those issues. AFSA: As we reflect on the past, what lessons have we learned over the last 100 years? MB: We have learned over time to be far more agile. People see those pictures of our predecessors, before and during World War II, sitting around in stately rooms having discussions. That still happens, of course, but we are so much more field-forward than we used to be, and the responses to crises are demanding that we find ways to be even more agile. We are not just simply diplomats out there on our own. We are supported by our families, families who are with us at post and sometimes families who are back here in Washington, who we are learning to employ more creatively and more flexibly to augment what is a constant staffing gap. We’ve learned to value what our family members bring to the job that we’re doing. AFSA: The Foreign Service Officer Test is no longer the pass/ fail test it used to be, and the Foreign Service Officer Assessment is going virtual. Those are big changes. Can you please comment on that? MB: We still have a written exam, but we came to realize that like every standardized test, there are some inherent biases that we worked hard to get rid of. We finally asked the right question: “Are we really looking for people who can take tests well?” We haven’t done away with the test; it’s still a very important component. But rather than making it the first hurdle to overDG Bernicat with AFSA President Tom Yazdgerdi at AFSA’s Centennial Gala on May 21, 2024. AFSA/SHAWN DORMAN
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