19 June 2009

Changing the guard at DET and TAMS

| johnboy
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The Chiefly Jon Stanhope has announced new CEO’s for key departments in the ACT Government.

Mr Gary Byles takes over as Chief Executive of the Department of Territory and Municipal Services, and Dr Jim Watterston is the new Chief Executive of the Department of Education and Training.

    Mr Byles has had a long and distinguished career in the Federal and New South Wales governments. He has held senior positions in the Department of Defence oversighting Army training and development, including policy formulations and implementation of strategic initiatives, and he managed and trained the operational development of Australian Defence Force personnel in support of the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games.

    Dr Watterston joins DET from his role as Regional Director of the Eastern Region of the Victorian Department of Education and Early Childhood Development. He also served with distinction in the Western Australian Department of Education and Training as district director, high school principal, superintendent and principal of the state’s largest primary school.

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It will be interesting to see what happens at TAMS now that Mr Byles has gone from caretaker to head honcho. wonder how much will change to de-Zissler the Department.

Unfortunately “oversight” is the noun form of both both “oversee” and “overlook”, which are almost antonyms.

However, there are very few instances where you need the noun form.

Using “oversight” as a verb is wrong, and “oversighting” is just made up: “overseeing” is correct.

It’s part of an American disease. Rather than saying “Jane oversees parking” they feel compelled to say “Jane has oversight of parking”; and then “Jane has been oversighting parking” rather than “Jane has been overseeing parking”; and “Jane oversighted parking” rather than “Jane oversaw parking”.

Eg, Douglas MacArthur oversaw the occupation of Japan. I’m pretty sure he didn’t oversight it, and at no stage was he oversighting. He was overseeing; and perhaps failing to make it the 52nd US state was perhaps an oversight.

Eschew obfuscation, I say.

Mr Byles has pssibly been overseeing Army training & dev? seems strange to say oversighting, makes me think he was ignoring them.

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