An excellent idea
But it would have been even better if I was not eating a biscuit when he stretched out his hand and smiled: “Klaus Welle”. Me, mouth full: “Baffabella Be Mabte”.
For those who don’t know Klaus: he is the Secretary General of the European Parliament. Basically the Boss of the bosses of all of us, the “Administration”. He organised a meeting on 25 March to welcome the “new officials”, those who recently passed the notorious 9 months probation period.
It happened that he sat just next to me, and he was often turning at me to look for approval. And I, of course, punctually nodded.
This meeting was a “première” established by him. He wished that our career will be ”long and satisfying”, and gave to each of us us a book, “Memoires” de Jean Monnet. Something written “more than 30 years ago but very actual”. Because – he said – our job is not a common one, and we have the responsibility to try to make “things move forward”, and “hopefully in the right direction”.
Web Communication Unit well represented in the meeting with Klaus Welle, Secretary General of the European Parliament, on Thursday 24 March
Three things to remember
1) This Parliament is an anarchic place: there is space for individual creativity and spirit of initiative. Hierarchy exists, but you will always find ways and space to make things move on. And it’s not like national parliaments, where decisions are pre-determined by the executive: this Parliament is free to say no.
2) We should ‘push the limits’ to make the Parliament gain power and weight in the institutional architecture. Help MEPs to use ‘the grey zones’, even of the Lisbon Treaty, to extend the sphere of influence of our institution.
3) It’s the politics, stupid! Administration and politics are interlaced. Our existence is legitimated by the existence of the MEPs, and our duty is to help them, consult and be at their service. It’s necessary to understand political points of view to do a good work as an administrator in the EP. Making an experience in a political group can be helpful to understand the political perspective.
A great boost of energy
A part from the basic instinct of nodding, I couldn’t agree more. I was thinking of my experience of an assistant, but also to my months here in DG COMM. There is a lot of unexplored, open space in this Parliament, and this spirit of “exploring”, and pushing the limits” to “make things move” is what makes me alive, awake and über-motivated.
[...] lines (the ones I see in the partial feed) that didn’t attract my attention (Update: like this wonderful article on Klaus Welle that I had almost missed hadn’t I written this [...]
Thank you for the post! the SG of the Parliament is indeed a great and frank speaker!
It was a very interesting meeting indeed, with a very smart Secretary general, listening to all our comments and questions and trying to give us his point of view. Klaus Welle seemed to have a real vision of the role of the Parliament and the power it will get in the near future. And he made us feel part of this project.
Asked about his role in the institution, he told us that he was the interface between the administration and the political level (=MEPs). That means he has to “translate” the political will into an administrative request, and has to explain MEPs our constraints as officials.
Do I now see my job differently? Not really since we’re very far from the Secretary general, and thus much more far away from the political arena. In addition, the Secretary general has still – in my opinion – a much more political role than he said. He’s not only the interface between politics and administration, but he’s part of a party-political game.