When I worked for government office, I had experiences that I would sum up as a law of work: “Time taken to make decision varies inversely with importance of work.”

For example: it took about 5 minutes to discuss and decide on a national project with the budget of 50+ million dollars; but over 30 minutes to discuss and decide on the color theme for curtains, blinds and partitions in the office. The main underlining factor is ‘personal conflicts’. ;-)