Feel free to ask..

Today.. this afternoon at the office..

One of the local government employee came in, introduced himself to us as a data user. He needed Human Development Index data to accomplish his mission from his boss. We gave him the only book we have (we used to have lots of copy but they apparently to be disappeared since those data users borrowed from us). He insisted to borrow that only book. We pursued him to copy them rather than borrowed. He didn't want to know, he told us that he is a trustworthy guy and would return it as soon as he can. We told him that most of Bappeda guy used the same reason and they never returned it back..

I told him that if he really needed I can gave him the soft copy.. all he had to do was just submit his USB to us. He agreed.. and wondered why he couldn't borrow that only one book but he can get the soft copy.. I told him it is part of our service.. all he have to do is just ASK..

Lelang.. lelang...

Entah aku harus merasa senang atau tidak dengan meeting tadi pagi.. Bunda membuka meeting dengan mengatakan betapa senangnya dia mengikuti saran kami untuk mengadakan lelang dan segera membuat pengumuman di koran tanggal 3 April lalu. Karena itu merupakan keputusan yang tepat setelah dirapatkan di tingkat yang lebih tinggi yang hasilnya memang harus lelang.

Masih jelas teringat pagi itu tanggal 2 April, beliau kelabakan ketika menerima pemberitahuan mengenai matrik anggaran untuk pelatihan pemetaan. Walaupun angka itu masih perkiraan kasar alias belum fixed, tapi dia ragu-ragu apa yang harus dilakukannya. Dan aku.. tidak bisa lepas dari kalkulator untuk menghitung prediksi-prediksi yang mungkin terjadi dengan beberapa besaran rupiah yang akan digelontorkan.

Sejak awal aku sudah mengukuhkan diri untuk mengadakan lelang karena sesuai dengan ketentuan Keppres 80, kegiatan pengadaan barang dan jasa di atas 50 juta harus lelang, dan aku sudah segera memberitahu beliau untuk memasang pengumuman pada hari itu juga atau paling telat esok hari jika ingin mengadakan kegiatan paling lambat akhir bulan ini. (Itu kalau mau mensinkronkan antara aturan hukum dengan aturan dari pimpinan yang menginginkan agar pelatihan tidak dilaksanakan di bulan Mei). Tapi yah.. begitulah... aku kan paling junior disini, jadi pendapat dan saranku perlu justifikasi dari banyak pihak untuk segera disetujui. Setelah klarifikasi sana sini, telpon sana telpon sini beliau agak terpaksa untuk memasang iklan. Itupun setelah kami (yang lulus keppres 80 : Pak Muktar, Pak Ade dan aku) menyarankan untuk rembugan dengan kantor tetangga alias Kabupaten Bekasi.

Pendapatku sederhana, kita punya juklak, punya pedoman, punya ketentuan yang harus dan merupakan syarat cukup dan perlu dalam sebuah kegiatan pengadaan barang dan jasa yaitu keppres 80, maka ikutilah alurnya.. dan vuala.. pada rapat tadi pagi bunda bilang ternyata hanya 3 kab kota yang mengadakan lelang (karena nilainya di atas 50jt), yaitu kota bekasi, kab bekasi dan kab bogor. Tiga serangkai itu memang saling terkoneksi dengan baik. Sampai-sampai Kab. Bandung minta difax bagaimana sih bentuk pengumuman yang harus disubmit ke koran.. Padahal preparasi di kita sudah sampai menyiapkan semua kelengkapan dokumennya.. Hmm.. cuma sekedar menunjukkan bahwa kita bekerja tidak setengah-setengah...

I don't know.. somehow I feel like I'm on the edge of mountain.. feels like winning something.. what I think, what I feel, what I ever predict is just happen.. and it feels really good..

The bottom line is.. be carefull on what you do.. although the assignment came from the chief.. if it didn't suit the law.. don't do that.. it is your life you're gambling with...

Never ending story

The overload work is now become my never ending story.. Because of it, I forgot about my kid's schedule on his taekwondo examination. Gee.. what kind of mother I am! I become more permissive about his school.

I have a lot of job pending lately.. and sure it start to drive me crazy. I should have delegate it to my staff but all I know it never works! What should I do? I can not keep complaining about my never ending story on my job, yet I love my job.

I thought I have bad time management. I don't have to bring my work to home while I can finish it at office.

Does it really matter..?

A friend of mine told me that there is no coordination in our office. Bad data management, bad connection, bad everything.. I see it in another point of view. Okay if we have bad coordination, bad management even bad working condition. But I love my job. I take it very seriously.. as serious as I consider my life. I grew up in this community, learned with this community, earned my money from it and so much more.

Statistics Indonesia, that's what I used to call my office. Everything about data macro or micro can be found or forced to be found. I had bad and good moments. Sometimes it feels like you're on the edge of the mountain but somehow you'll find yourself in the bottom of the sea. Things are changed.. the institution changed, I changed, everybody's change.. but my love remain the same.

I have higher expectation for my institution to raise it to higher level. I write this to let everybody knows that I never do my work as if it was nothing. I am a government employee and I take it very seriously..

It's Alan Greenspan

I just found out the book of Alan Greenspan yesterday at Gramedia Bookstore. The title is Abad Prahara. The book price is a hundred thousand rupiahs discount 20 % at the bazaar. I'm kind of interested to read it, but somehow I have made a little research on internet about Alan Greendspan.. and it's dissapointing...

He was blamed for the financial crisis for policies that he drawn when he was chairman of the Fed. Stiglitz and Krugman also blamed him for the same reason. Wow.. if two nobelist blamed for the same thing, it must be very wrong.

Government Spending.. Can we rely on this engine?

According to Keynesian, the GDP from expenditure side is explained as Y = C + I + G + (X-M), where C stands for Consumption, I = investment, G for Government Spending and (X-M) as net export.

Many economist said that Indonesia’s economic growth is led by consumption showed by its share on GDP (61% of GDP, 2008). But it will disturbed along the crisis since the investment (the share on GDP is 8%) is declining and so is net export. Indonesia is the second country in the fall down net export after Rusia.

In this global crisis situation, according to Keynesian, the government spending could be another way out as engine of growth. As we know, the government had given stimulus for about 73,3 billion to make the economy work, 12,1 billion of it is for the infrastructure development.

The rumor said that government will give stimulus package for government employee like remuneration package. They might be hope that this stimulus will run the economy as the whole. But can we rely on this?

When data speaks for itself, that's when you say nothing at all..

After reading and analyzing how top level decision maker in this country spoke up with figures held by central bureau statistic Indonesia, I begin to see the red line. They treated data in their own way not how it is generated. It makes the translation on data become multi translations. Sure, as a quotation said that statistics is the only science that enables different experts using the same figures to draw different conclusions. (Evan Esar; 1899 - 1995).. but that can not be used as justification on what they did to data. They should treat data very carefully.

First thing first they have to be sure knowing what is the purpose of data collection, after that the methodology. Because, even they have the same purpose if the methodology is not the same, it could draw different conclusions. Say, the collection of Indonesia's population data. The CBS always take every 10 year population census and mid population survey between the census. They collected data by visiting every household, door to door. Meanwhile Dinas Kependudukan collected data based on report. They waited household to report to them about coming and incoming household, about death and birth. Those two kinds of how data collected are not comparable, not apple to apple. Unfortunately, there is still many decision makers, politicians, even researcher and college students blame the difference of the figures. Well, it looks like blaming is a habit of our society, but it won't solve the problem.

Let’s take a look on how they treat or use data. Nowadays, people start to respond on data. They begin to have self awareness on how figures presented. Many advertisements give fact findings by showing the survey result. Politicians also use it to make them look good or to let their vows look bad. And the data itself have nothing to loose but to be used.

It became a common model to have surveys that held by surveyor agencies. Like I said before, even the purpose is the same, if the methodology is different, it would draw different conclusions. The methodology includes the time reference, sampling, estimation method, and a lot of more. When these things happen, people get confused. People seem to loose confidence on data.

Now, what if the purpose is remain the same, the methodology is the same, including the sampling frame, time reference, etc and even the surveyor is the same person. The only thing that is not exactly the same is the institutions that held the survey. What will happen? Do the result the same or not?

The answer is yes the result is the same but the survey is useless..
Why those institutions held the survey with everything the same just to know the same thing and spent a lot of money. Just to prove that statisticians is a man who believes figures don't lie, but admits that under analysis some of them won't stand up either, Evan Esar said. In economics we call it inefficient.

That’s why we need a strong, dependable, trusty, independent institution to hold the survey and census. Especially the result of the survey will be used to draw policies. That will be the CBS role. Still, from statistic’s quotation “there are three kind of lies ; lies, damned lies, and statistics”. But data will speaks for itself, that is when you say nothing at all..