I tend to admire anyone who says that they don’t have a computer and that they’ve never engaged with email or the endless proliferation of pointless, mind-numbing content that the internet provides. 

You can almost hear the nation’s collective sharp intake of breath, as thousands of people return to work, fire up their computers and then gasp at the quantity of emails in their inbox, ignored while they’ve enjoyed the peace and solitude of the festive season. 

Sir Brain Roche is the Public Service Commissioner. He’s been in the job just 73 days, but already he’s making a great deal of sense. 

He’s been a fix-it man for all Governments in the past 40 years, and that clearly would have been a full-time occupation for anyone. A job that most of us would run away from at high speed. 

Many chief executives have asked him what he thinks isn’t working – and so he’s told them. He’s not only told them, but he’s setting up a select group of these inquisitive chief executives to address the problems. 

Essentially, there are too many meetings in the public service, too many layers of management, too much duplication, not enough clarity about its role and not enough focus on outcomes. Wow. There you have it, straight from the mouth of Sir Brian Roche; a man qualified to make that call and confident enough in his leadership to instigate positive change. 

One of the key aspects that Sir Brian Roche wants to focus on is the need to improve the quality and timeliness of decision-making. 

How much of what you do at work is determined by endless meetings, or you sending and receiving emails? 

The advent of email was thought to be the great new way to communicate, but in my lifetime, I’ve seen email used as a form of belligerent belittling, complete time wasting with no obvious purpose, and of course: arse covering. It’s effectively, rightly or wrongly, used as the modern form of a paper trail and ergo - arse covering. 

When you’re getting to work for the first day of 2025, are you tempted to delete your entire inbox? Have you considered having an out of office message that simply says: I’m away – when I return, I will delete the contents of my inbox. If your email is important, send it again upon my return? 

My advice to anyone right now who may be in the throes of writing an email, is to get off your bottom, walk down the hall and knock on the door of the person you were about to email. 

Sometimes, the old ways of communication are still the best.