2004 Speeches
Opening Remarks by Ambassador Lavin at the GSO Regional Conference
February 10, 2004
I am delighted to be here this morning and welcome you to Singapore. I am grateful to An Le and the Admin staff here at the embassy for doing all the work to host the conference. Like the great admin officer that he is – he and his team do the work, and I just get to walk on stage.
Singapore is an ideal country for a conference on “Information, Innovation, People, and Processes.” This small country has made incredible strides with limited resources by applying, people, technology, materials, and logistics. The result is a remarkable success.
As you begin to explore this city-state, let me give you an update on our bilateral relationship. President Bush said it best when he visited here in October: “Our two countries have a proud history of friendship and cooperation…(Singapore) has also been a vital and steadfast friend in the fight against global terrorism.”
During the Afghanistan and Iraq wars, Singapore proved a strong partner, providing unparalleled access to its facilities for the transit of American military equipment and personnel. Singapore military units are in Iraq today, helping to rebuild that country.
And we are doing even more on economic and commercial issues. The Free Trade Agreement between the United States and Singapore went into effect last month. The first FTA with an Asian country, it will be the benchmark for FTAs to come. It breaks new ground in intellectual property protection, financial liberalization, and e-commerce.
Underpinning all of these vital successes is the General Services Office. From my perspective of Ambassador – there are two kinds of people in an embassy: people who put problems on your desk and people who take problems off your desk. You should be proud that GSOs are almost without exception in that second category. Your job is to make other people’s jobs easier. (I am sure there are others in the building who view their job to make other people’s job more difficult.)
Here in Singapore we have 15 agencies working together at the Mission. GSO touches the lives of all of them, helping them register their cars and clear their household effects through customs, finding them suitable housing, and getting them to meetings. They maintain the building and buy our supplies. We all depend on the men and women of GSO to take care of the details so that we can get on with the business of diplomacy.
I mentioned up front that An was a great admin officer. To my mind, here are the characteristics of a great GSO.
- You understand overall mission priorities so you can adjust your operations to them and you can understand the context in which you are operating. You are a full member of the country team. Our most effective public diplomacy initiatives – our 9/11 memorial ceremonies – were successful because GSO was in on the front end as part of the creative planning.
- You have a culture of service and a view of the embassy community as worthy customers. You look for a way to say, “Yes.” Rather than reject a request because it was not submitted in the proper way, you work with the customer to make sure it gets submitted properly. Interruptions and requests from embassy staff are not a distraction from your business – they are your business.
- You are goal oriented rather than merely task oriented. You improve the process under which you operate. And whey you do have to say, “No,” you do it with such style and explanatory strength that you cause no ill will.
- Finally, all of this works so well that the Ambassador hears nothing but complements about GSO in his corridor chats.
We are happy to have this opportunity to host the GSO conference. You honor us with your presence, because we take as a testament to the strong GSO team we have here. We welcome attendees from 59 countries; and the many presenters from the Department and other agencies. I hope you have a productive stay in Singapore. And if you have any problems at all, please let me know. I’ll just turn it over to GSO.