2026
What the System Cannot See
Every meeting begins with an agenda. What is not on it rarely gets discussed. Our work within government is organised around what has been defined in advance. Assignments. Programmes. Functions. Budgets. That is not accidental. A system that must account for itself learns to organise around what is countable.
But in doing so, it also builds in a blind spot. Because the system only recognises what already has a name. What is still searching for language — a connection not yet made, a question that shifts a conversation, a direction that cannot yet be planned — simply does not exist for the system. Not because no one sees it. But because it cannot be accounted for.
What is still searching for language simply does not exist for the system. Not because no one sees it. But because it cannot be accounted for.
This is not a plea for less structure. It is a question about what we lose when structure is the only thing we see. Because government faces questions that cannot be solved with what we already know.
Those questions need people who move where things are still open. Are we set up to recognise those people? Or do we quietly filter them out?