A public servant could compose a perfect game plan for a minister and it wouldn't be enough to impress Scott Morrison.
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The Prime Minister wants advice that will make winners of his team, not beautiful ideas that don't survive first contact with reality.
He made this and many other things clear to public servants on Monday. They can be in no doubt what side they're on, and for whom they're working, after Mr Morrison enlisted them for his mission to focus on middle Australia.
In this spirit, his Institute of Public Administration Australia speech at Parliament House was crowded with the sport metaphors that would come to mind for an NRL devotee like Mr Morrison.
He spoke of the "locker room" of politicians and asked bureaucrats to emulate the work rate and on-field presence of Parramatta Eels great Ray Price.
His speech might bear one more rugby league analogy. Mr Morrison's answer to calls for more public service resources appears to be "live within the salary cap".
"Mathias will say no," he said to those wanting larger budgets. Everyone will have to work with what they have, and Senator Cormann will see to it in his finance portfolio.
It was a humorous touch in a speech that struck a respectful and sympathetic tone towards public servants.
His point about spending restraint also left an important question unanswered.
Only in rough terms did he explain how the public service is to meet the growing expectations of Australians he outlined, and to make government simpler to deal with.
Two mysteries hung over Mr Morrison's address, and muddled his message.
First was the final findings and recommendations of the Thodey review into the public service, due to reach the government in coming weeks.
The second was the future of staffing caps, efficiency dividends and other constraints on the public service many argue have hobbled its service delivery.
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Mr Morrison has for now left it a live debate whether the Coalition can make the public service more responsive to the needs of mainstream Australians without lifting the bureaucracy's spending and headcount.
He appears to believe it's a matter of allocating resources better, ignoring bureaucratic hierarchies at times, and making the public service more porous to the talent and ideas of outsiders.
Like a coach, the Prime Minister gave public servants a set of tools to keep them on the path to success. He told them he wanted a results-focused bureaucracy that solved problems. Public servants may have to look to the Thodey report to fill in the details later.
It's an independent review, but the final product will likely be shaped by what is politically realistic. Speaking ahead of its release, Mr Morrison has flagged what parts of that game plan have a better chance of surviving.