The SF 171 gets
Short-Sheeted
It's easy to understand why the process of applying for the position of Director of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) turned James King into an enemy of the Standard Form (SF) 171. After all, it took a full three days for King to enter all of his extensive work experience onto the imposing Federal job application form. When the 6-foot, 4-inch King unveiled his SF 171 at a public event in April, 1994, the form "...stretched from above his head to his feet, with a few pages to spare," according to The Washington Post.
Not all successful applicants had to (literally) go to such lengths to prove their worth. Nevertheless, applicants needed an average of eight hours to complete the archaic SF 171, which became a requirement for Federal employment in 1938. Moreover, the intimidating form scared off many qualified potential candidates from even applying for Federal jobs. As Vice President Gore observed, "It was almost like saying to somebody who wanted to come and work for the Federal government, 'Welcome to the fun house.' "
Now, OPM accepts from applicants the same types of resumes long accepted by private industry. (Of course, OPM still accepts SF 171's from folks who have invested time and energy in keeping them current.)
Tea Leaves
In 1897, Congress passed the Import Tea Act creating the Board of Tea Experts and the position of official Federal tea-taster. You can picture the scene: New York Harbor, the tall clipper ships at anchor, the riggings on their graceful wooden masts slapping in the breeze, and the Federal tea-taster prowling the docks on the lookout for poor-quality tea. We are, after all, a people who overthrew our previous government over a certain tea matter.
Now, fast-forward to 1995. We still had a Federal tea-taster and an official tea-tasting room in Brooklyn, New York. No one questioned the extraordinary skill of the tea-taster. The question was, why was the Federal government was still spending $120,000 a year to support an activity that the tea industry was already supporting itself? After all, it's not like the tea-taster was America's foot soldier in the battle to fight back wave upon wave of shabby tea; only one percent of all tea tested in 1995 was rejected.
Still, the tea-taster tasted on until 1996, when the Clinton Administration ousted this outdated institution from the bureaucracy.
