I have been busy tweaking my trail-blazing interview for the British Diplomatic Oral History Programme.

This is an exercise in getting senior diplomats to talk for some hours about their life and work and then publish the transcripts for the edification of future generations.

Lots of famous names already there, so my own quixotic entry full of sparkling witticisms and profound insights haha will be in company better than it deserves, as and when it appears.

Meanwhile, back in the present tense, long after former giants of British diplomacy have moved on, the FCO is making a ‘tragic descent into mediocrity’ according to this Times account of an HR consultants’ report which the FCO itself commissioned:

“We have never come across an organisation so stuffed full of talent. How can it continue to get so many obvious ‘common sense’ issues wrong?”

The lame excuse seems to be that the findings were based on a relatively small sample, which by the way included a mere 20 SMS (ie senior) officers who might be thought to be able to give a pretty clear view. And, apparently, did. Plus who decided what sample to go for?

Here is the magnificent report by the Couraud HR consultancy. A trenchant piece of work, describing all sorts of failures which are all the more poignant after the countless man-years spent on New Labour ‘management since 1997. Full of tough love:

From the minute one walks into either King Charles Street or Old Admiralty Buildings, the Office feels second rate. This sends a clear, if unconscious, message to employees: second-rate is acceptable. Indeed, we believe that the physical state of the Office is perhaps the most outwardly obvious manifestation of the absence of a culture of ‘ownership’. No one seems to own this extremely important issue, and therefore no one is accountable. We recommend strongly that the Office turn its attention to this topic and restore some pride in organisational appearance.

I wrote in April last year about my own efforts to tackle this presentational issue: A Clean Ministry is a Happy Ministry. This philosophy drove my relaunch of the British Embassy in Belgrade after we reopened diplomatic relations in 2001 – as I describe in the Oral History interview.

Or this cracker:

… there are too few people operating at board, or even director, level who have operational experience of having run things.

See here for what I tried to do to change that.

The late Robin Cook who had many strengths alas has something to answer for in all this decay. He made it clear that when the FCO had successes he personally would be taking the credit, whereas when things went wrong he would be blaming the system for underperforming.

With that attitude of profoundly cynical irresponsibility arriving at the top, the descent towards mediocrity was bound to be fairly steep and straight. As indeed has taken place.