From a slow start to an extremely rushed process

There was a break for lunch. The PA personnel gathered at a table, and sighed openly that the only thing they could do now was to start looking for another job. All agreed, and the atmosphere was very depressed. A PA auditor said, in the survey April 2003, regarding to the assignment of the 3AG and the issue of relative influence, that:

On top of all this come three Auditors-General with close relationships to RRV. Matthew employed there, Sophie member of the Council, Luke with contacts via the Auditors’ Committee. We can only give up, unfortunately!

Among RRV personnel, reactions were more mixed. Rachel explained at the seminar that she was “extremely happy” with the choice of Auditor-Generals, and emphasized that they were “very competent people”.

As the names of the 3AG were announced, responsibility for merger preparations was formally transferred from the previous NAC constellation to them. According to the Committee on the Constitution, the NAC would remain; it would merely take on a new form. Formally, the three primary NAC members (apart from Luke) became experts instead, as they were replaced by the 3AG. In reality, the concept of the NAC was rarely used in this sense at RRV and PA during phase II, and former NAC members explained how it more or less ceased to exist.⁴¹

4.3.2 From a slow start to an extremely rushed process

the 3AG probably just needed time to co-ordinate and get to know each other. According to the staff magazine (RRK-nytt, 1/2003), the 3AG met every week to discuss issues. Toward February, 2003 frustration among personnel was extensive, and they referred to the limited time remaining before the merger.

Alison (one of the former three primary NAC members) explained that preparations had come to a rather sudden halt after phase I. She explained that they had been moving fast during the autumn of 2002.

Alison explained that she understood that the 3AG needed time to get an overview, but that this took about 2½ months of very important time, “when the work came to a complete halt for us leading the projects”. (Alison here referred especially to the Personnel Project and the Organization Project.) During the spring of 2003, she had even considered leaving the new NAC constellation altogether, since “in reality” they were not part of the process anyway, she argued. However, she still wanted to be “at their disposal”, in case they should need her assistance. Other NAC members reasoned the same way, she claimed.

Luke admitted, regarding to previous NAC members, that “the operational work came to be run increasingly by ourselves. […] We ourselves took command.”

A NAC member said:

We were very surprised, all of us, I must say. And we actually did meet some time informally, to kind of ask each other what was happening, because it just died all of this work. It came to a total stop, everything.

In interviews with the 3AG, they later explained that a problem during this period had been that they were not able to carry out their duties on full-time until March/April 2003, due to commitments in their previous positions. According to Luke, Matthew started working full-time on 1 March, Sophie about a week later, and he himself on 1 April, but occasionally they met before this as well. Luke and Sophie said afterwards that they regretted that they had not had more time for preparations at this early stage.

Sophie explained (20 November, 2003) that she thought Alison had found the change of the NAC somewhat sad, because she had a way of bringing people together (Swedish: en sammanhållande kraft) - but

“now we had entered the scene to make decisions”. Meetings had had a tendency to aim at informing the former NAC members, rather than requesting their advice, after the 3AG had been appointed, Sophie confirmed. She added that she still thought that it was good that the group was still “formally” intact.

From 1 April, 2003, all 3AG were in place full-time, to lead merger preparations (RRK-nytt, 5/2003). These now became extremely rushed.

Personnel described the period that followed as characterized by a kind of state of emergency decision making. “Preparation work enters a new phase”, was the top headline in the internal newsletter, issued on 11 April, 2003 (RRK-nytt, 5/2003, p.1). It continued:

It is now less than three months to the start of RiR. An intensive period remains for the Auditor-Generals and everyone else who is involved in the preparation work. Recruitment of managers to the new organization is proceeding at full speed. The detail organization is being shaped and the rebuilding of the office at Nybrogatan is running according to plan.

In March, 2003, a project organization was set up, to prepare the details of the RiR organization, to elaborate an audit plan valid during the autumn of 2003 and to suggest how RiR should work with this plan in the future. Seven projects were drawn up under the 3AG.⁴² Employees with experience from each of the areas were included in the groups. (RRK-nytt 2003/04.) The projects covered:

• Financial audit

• Performance audit

• International assignments

• Companies (limited) and special audits

• Quality assurance and development of methods

• Administration

• Audit plan

42These projects were called assignments (Swedish: uppdrag) by the 3AG, but the informal wording was project and they also functioned as such.

Often, leaders of these projects did not discuss issues much with personnel prior to forming their suggestions to the 3AG. Nor did they always inform personnel about their conclusions. This was a problem, Bonnie explained, because it allowed them a great deal of power. They had not been elected by personnel, so they really did not represent the organization - the project leaders of the 3AG projects had been appointed by the 3AG. (As described in Section 4.2, the situation was similar in the NAC projects.) Still, personnel expected them to act as representatives for them, and therefore waited for these project leaders (or project members) to provide them with information and ask for their feedback.

The 3AG projects often became a forum for conflict between RRV and PA, just like the NAC projects. Partly due to the lack of time, conflict from the 3AG projects were not communicated much in the organization. The growing frustration with the 3AG leadership and the lack of personnel influence in general, tended to evoke stronger reactions than any former antagonism between the two merging organizations did.

During the late spring of 2003, an increasing number of auditors complained that they had noticed that the 3AG did not care much what the 3AG project groups had suggested, just as they had not cared about suggestions from the NAC projects. Bonnie confirmed that frustration and distrust grew rapidly during this period. An auditor from RRV (Daniel) explained that the project organization was:

more of a pacifying measure than an attempt at democracy. […] Rachel too has played a democracy game every now and then, created development teams and then ignored their conclusions - she has her own ideas anyway.

He added that those involved in the projects, however, probably thought that it would be good for their career.

From May, 2003, there was a period of state of emergency decision-making. Unions complained that they were not being involved in these, due to the lack of time. Afterwards, there were many decisions that needed to be revised, and the first year with RiR was described by a

manager as characterized by “constant extinction of small fires everywhere”, as issues became acute.

4.3.3 Limited personnel influence and increasing