12 April 2007

Wednesday - The Seat of Power

Suddenly I'm motivated. I came into work with a spring in my step anticipating all of the tasks I can complete today.

Anne's off and although I'm loathe to say it, I'm in charge.

Perhaps I really am the company man that Dave the cheeky cockney geezer claimed I was.

I started off the day playing down my elevated status. I was determined not to be corrupted by power.

"Are you in charge then?" Gareth asked sarcastically.

"No. No. No. I'm just a glorified milk monitor. Just making sure that any urgent emails sent to Anne are dealt with,"

I made a point of sitting at my own desk and not in Anne's office just to emphasise this. My resistance lasted twenty minutes.

Ted walked by as I switched on her PC.

"Making yourself at home?" he asked.

That sort of insolence will be noted on his file.

11 April 2007

Tuesday - Coma or no Coma?

'Life on Mars'. The last ever episode. Discuss.

05 April 2007

Thursday - The Last Resort

There is good news and even better news.

It's the Easter Bank Holiday so I'm not back at work until Tuesday.

And Anne is off on holiday for the week I return - hooray!

She beckoned me into her cave and broke the news.

"I'll forward my emails to you while I'm off," she said instantly inflating my own sense of self-importance, before pricking it with the comment "Jez is also on holiday and I don't want to add to Tracey's stress levels at the moment, so it'll have to be you."

Wednesday - Paranoia

I'm getting more and more paranoid. I have the sneaking suspicion that I'm either being blamed for something or someone is saying something behind my back and I can't quite put my finger on it. It's almost got to the stage where I've started to say 'It wasn't me!' whenever anyone asks who was responsible for something.

It all seemed to have started from a couple emails that I've already blogged about. I just wish Anne would give me the chance to defend myself and repudiate any accusations. But they won't.

I know what you're thinking...

But just because I'm paranoid doesn't mean that no-one is talking about me.

02 April 2007

Monday - Tea, Ern?

When I joined the company all those years ago, part of the induction training focused on the impact of bad service on the reputation of the company. If you provide a good service, the recipient will tell 1 other person. If you provide a bad service, then statistics indicate that they'll tell 1o people about their experience and possibly even write to 'Watchdog'.

Now if the board understand this, do they understand what sort of impact redundancy has upon the company's reputation amongst its customer base?

It was announced that another office was to close today with the loss of 57 jobs. I'm sure that the board would have issued a press release to the stock exchange about 'reducing costs and improving efficiency' blah-de-blah-de-blah! But aren't those 57 staff potential customers as well?

Do you think that they are going to buy the company's products in the future? Do you think they are going to recommend the company's products to their friends and families? I think not.

'Its only 57 people,' the board might say, however if you remember the induction training statistics the negative impact of this decision will not just swing their purchase decisions but those of their families and friends. So how many customers has the business lost? And if you count up all of the redundancies over the past 10 years - it numbers thousands not hundreds - have the board really improved our operating ratio? No. I think you'll find that in reality they've merely alienated a great number of potential customers.

No matter how many stock market announcements you make, it means nothing if no-one is buying from you.

Its bad enough that our present crop of customers have to endure long waiting times, advisers that cannot understand them and numerous cock-ups due to the constant movement of work from continent to continent without creating a lifetime of disgruntled customers from within.

Anyway my rant is over now. Please accept my apologies. Sometimes I wish my biggest problem could be the same as Dan's or Jo's - how to persuade Ted to get a round of drinks in from the machine.