The Foreign Service Journal, September 2018

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | SEPTEMBER 2018 29 lucci wrote in 2001: “Ambassadors lack the authority necessary to coordinate and oversee the resources and personnel deployed to their missions by other agencies and departments.” Six years later, a study of country teams by Ambassador Robert B. Oakley and Michael Casey Jr., reached the same conclusion: “Ambassa- dors do not have adequate explicit authorities to unify the efforts of the country team.” In its QDDRs, the department implored ambassadors to lead their missions “in a CEO-like manner”— without, however, acknowledging that CEOs, unlike chiefs of mission, control their budgets and personnel. Even within the department, the proliferation of bureaus, not to mention special envoys and other single-purpose entities, has diffused authority and made internal coordination slow and painful. State’s claim to responsibility for interagency coordination in foreign affairs is easy to assert, but hard to enforce. Having ceded policymaking to the White House and National Security Council, the Department of State sees the coordinating role as its central SOS for DOS: A Call for Action studies have identified the problems. We must act now to make the needed repairs. We must— • craft a clear plan of action to modernize and renew our organization, procedures and infrastructure. • transform our outdated culture and demonstrate a clear commitment to change. • embrace new technology and managerial techniques quickly. • integrate policy and resource management in ways that advance national interests and promote operational efficiency. • make a clear and compelling case for how we will use any new resources needed to underwrite and sustain a modernized and reinvigorated Department of State. We ask for the support, involvement and leadership needed to undertake a long-term, bipartisan effort to mod- ernize and strengthen the Department of State. The era of quill pen diplomacy is over. At the dawn of the 21st century, we call for bold and decisive steps now to deal effectively with the problems of today while preparing for the chal- lenges of the future—a future that is as close as tomorrow. —From “Are State Employees Ready for Reform?” by Shawn Dorman, FSJ , May 2001. I n an unusual “grassroots” reform initiative, a group of Foreign Service and Civil Service employees presented a detailed “call to action” to Secretary of State Colin Powell in February 2001. Having gathered under the ban- ner of “SOS for DOS,” they were convinced that leadership needed to urgently “undertake a long-term, bipartisan effort to modernize and strengthen the Department of State.” Here are excerpts from their call. United States leadership in a post- Cold War world requires a rigorous foreign policy and robust diplomacy attuned to the realities of the present, not the past. ... The Department of State is ill-equipped and ill-prepared to meet the foreign policy challenges of the 21st century. Outdated procedures and chronic resource shortages have taken their toll. The organizational structure is dysfunctional, its staff is overextended and many of its embassy buildings are crumbling. The State Department’s traditions and culture block needed change while its dedicated employees are distracted with trivia and drift without a common institutional vision. Multiple purpose. But its vision is not widely shared. Other agencies do not clamor for State, in Washington or overseas, to constrain their freedom of action or direct their energies away from their own priorities. When State adds value to the work of other agen- cies, it succeeds in leading whole-of-government operations. But despite years of studies, exhortations and occasional presidential directives, the department has yet to secure a broadly acknowl- edged, institutional position as interagency coordinator. Training and Education For 70 years, studies of the Foreign Service have identified a lack of specialized skills and the absence of systematic in-service training as serious institutional shortcomings. And for 70 years, the department has addressed these problems without much seriousness of purpose. State management may feel strongly about training and professional development, but not strongly enough to place them above other claims on its resources.