Thursday - Shhhhhh!

Some days I feel like I'm trapped in a cage with a sleeping bear. No matter how much I tip toe, I know that bear isn't going to stay asleep forever and soon it'll wake, notice me and it a fit of pique rip me to shreds just because didn't nod my head on cue.

Today was one of those days. Anne had imprinted the strategy for today at 8:30 when just Tracey, Jez and I were in.

"ITS VERY DIFFICULT FOR ME TO CONCENTRATE IN HERE WITH ALL THIS NOISE OUT HERE. I'VE A LOT TO DO AND I DON'T EXPECT TO HAVE TO COME OUT HERE AGAIN!" She snarled at us before disappearing back into her dark and strangely smelling corner.

A damage limitation exercise followed. As the teams drifted in, I casually and quietly requested that they keep things down for today. Everyone was compliant apart from Gareth.

"What? Why? Does that mean we can't answer the phone?" He boomed in that deep Valleys accent of his.

"No," I mouthed in the vain hope that he might take a hint. "but no idle chit-chat about Eastenders or the six nations,"

"We need to be able to make small talk between calls. It helps morale,"

"She's always singling us out," added Jo, now following Gareth's lead and standing up for her rights. "Jez's team spent all yesterday afternoon talking about Steve's ingrowing toenail but Anne didn't say anything to them,"

"It doesn't matter what they do," I said. "We mustn't do anything to annoy Anne today,"

"I'm sorry but I can't be quiet all day. It's not practical," said Gareth, his voice getting louder and louder.

Jo and Dan joined in. They all started talking at once, creating the very row that I'd been so determined to avoid.

"Dan. Jo. Gareth. Please let me explain, " I said through gritted teeth but it was too late.

"Luke!" Bellowed Anne from the shadow of her nest. "I expect you to lead by example and all I can hear is your yapping. I don't want to have to say it again!"

Still. At least it shut the team up.

Wednesday - Trapped in 1973

I have a boss who is a female misogynist. She doesn't believe in any "touchy-feely" stuff and thinks that staff development is a plotline from Lord of the Rings. To her, people should do as she says because "She is the boss" and it doesn't matter how insane or petty the order, that is all that matters. To her, all staff are moronic imbeciles who cannot do anything right and do not deserve anything other than abuse.

My boss lies, cheats and bullies and has no understanding of the concept of leading by example.

I've a sneaking suspicion - or it may even be a vague hope - that I've been transported back to the year 1973 just like John Simm in "Life on Mars".

Except in my case the boss in question is fatter, uglier and hairier than Gene Hunt.

Tuesday - The Bitches of East Wing

Tension is building up between my team and Jez's. It's now almost a daily occurance for Anne to pull me to one side because - someone somewhere has said that someone in my team has done something that they shouldn't have. Not that I'm one to apportion fault but this blame-throwing has a distinct Jez aroma to it.

Today it was the high volume of calls.

"Handled rates were particularly low yesterday," said Anne. "Tell me what happened."

So I told her that I'd offered overtime. I told her how I pulled staff back from breaks and that I'd taken ringbacks but volumes were high and staffing levels were low.

"I heard that you allowed Jo to have an hour long break in the afternoon," She said cocking the gun that said all it needed to say. Her source was now obvious but somehow the time scale concerned had been through some sort of clerical black hole in the journey from Argumentative Man to Jez to Anne, and had been distorted from its actual 2 minute reality.

I told her the truth, although whether she believed it or not was uncertain.

Later I discovered just how perceptive the rest of the team were in our weekly team meeting. With a lot of sabre rattling, they moaned how Jez's team were quick to pass work back to you if it was yours but would not take it off you if it was theirs and you'd been unfortunate enough to receive the call.

They picked up on the fact that even though Jez has more staff, their output is far less per head than mine.

"Just what does Jez's team do exactly? Apart from slagging off everyone else in the department,"

I wallowed in the shared moment for minute before doing the professional thing and reasoning the issue into its rightful state of indifference.

With any luck, Jez's gameplay will see him promoted out of the department before long.

Monday - The Most Argumentative Man in the World

I had a run in today with the most argumentative man in the world. Of course, he works in Jez's team and for that reason alone, is seen as one of the rising stars in the department.

I don't know what hold Jez has over Anne, but it can only involve Polaroids or a plain brown envelope. But I digress. TMAMITW who will from this point on be named Argumentative Man accosted me on the stairs and started bemoaning the high volume of calls that the department is currently struggling to cope with.

"We need more people on the phone," he said, argumentatively.

I agreed with him but this only seemed to annoy him even more. I got the distinct impression that if it would have stood up in court, he would have disembowelled me with with his company issue biro there and then. To Argumentative Man, even agreement is not enough, agreement is merely asking for trouble.

"Jo in your team has been on a break for over half an hour!" he cried. This I knew was a lie. She'd been away for two minutes at the most.

"I'll go and ask her to return if we're inundated," I said Chamberlain-like.

"That's far too long," Argumentative Man continued as if he hadn't heard what I just said. "The phones are far too busy. We need more people taking calls," He shouted, raising his voice even more.

"Everyone who can be on is on. We'll start taking ring backs to ease congestion." I told Argumentative Man.

"Ringbacks are no good. We need more staff," Continued Argumentative Man as if he expected me to pull some fully trained temps out of my pocket.

I left him on the stairs to continue his argument alone. I imagine that the fire extinguisher would have been a more suitable opponent for him.

Tuesday - six hours, thirty-one minutes and counting

Kate's boyfriend has organised a romantic Valentine's Day break in a Lake District Cottage tomorrow for the two of them. As a result Kate's been counting the minutes until the end of the day when she leaves and doesn't return to the office until next Monday.

"Of course I might not get there at all if the Sap Nav has anything to do with it," She told the team.

"Surely you mean Sat Nav," smirked Dan desperate to correct her.

"No. When the only form of in-car navigation is my boyfriend and the 2002 AA Gazzeteer, its exactly what I mean," said Kate.

Tuesday - Man Flu

It's that time of year again. We have casualties across the office, lost to the latest bug to hit the building.

I look forward reading the self-certification notices when the staff return. It's always a viral infection or flu, never a cold. A cold just sounds as if you need to put on another layer of clothing, but the fact is, unless you're immobile for a week, it's a cold.

Of course I've been struggling in work with my own 'flu' this week, but I'm a team leader and I have to set an example and so I have to face down the calls from the team for me to go home because 'I'm spreading my germs,'

"I'm past the infectious stage," I told the team, knowingly quoting from my HR absence management course and then spluttering into my coffee.

Wednesday - Rats in a maze

I've spent the last two days working as some sort of Human Berlin Wall, making sure that Kate and Gareth's bullets don't hit each other. In the end, despite various degrees of negotiation and reasoning with each of them individually - with Gareth explaining that Kate is the senior member of the team and with Kate coaching her in getting team members to perform there still didn't seem to be any kind of breakthrough. It had gone beyond a simple disagreement now, petty as it was, to quote the movie trailer's (adopt big gruff American trailer voice) 'This time it's personal!'

Unlike the time when I was first asked to deputise for my team leader - when I was told that I was in charge of the team, but I couldn't actually let any of the team know, I had explained Kate's position and seniority in my absence. But this wasn't enough for Gareth.

In the end I had no alternative but to browse the internet for trust exercises and finding one, put one into action in my team meeting. One at a time, each team member was blindfolded and then directed around an obstacle course of chairs and tables by spoken instructions from their exercise partner. In this case I placed Gareth and Kate together and I think it might have worked. I'll just have to see how things pan out. I mean a bond has to develop between someone when you're trusting them to guide you around a room without impaling yourself on a haphazard chairleg and they do it without any harm to your person.

And I'm sure Jo didn't really mean to let me walk into the corner of that table.

Friday - Man in the Middle

Two hours. That's all it takes for the team to fall apart in my absence. This may sound a little arrogant on my part, assuming that the team could not function in a responsible and rational way without my presence to oversee things, but sometimes this is one of the joys of teamleadership.

Kate intercepted me on my return and requested an audience in one of the empty meeting rooms.

"Gareth's out of control," She told me. "He won't listen to me. He won't do what I ask of him,"

Kate had demonstrated the first mistake that newly promoted staff make. She'd presumed that the team would blindly follow her requests like a group of squaddies that had just stepped from their passing out parade.

"Tell me exactly what happened," I asked Kate calmly.

"I gave him some of the file allocations to complete but he said that he had an urgent complaint case to clear. I told him that the file allocations were more urgent and should be his priority for the morning. But he still refused,"

"What did he say?"

"He said that you'd expected him to close off the complaint case today. When I asked him to drop the complaint he said I was overly sensitive,"

"He said you were 'overly sensitive'?" I questioned.

"I'm not though!" shrilled Kate in a way that I should not at all describe as 'sensitive'.

"I'll have a word with him," I told Kate.

When I got to my desk there already was an email from Gareth, blinking politely in my inbox.

"Luke. Can I have a minute." He'd written. "It's about Kate..."

Thursday - Diamond Des Enters the Building

Anne was in a good mood this morning. A very good mood. And she was wearing her best black smock and had even spent a few minutes in the Ladies applying some make-up.

The reason was clearer at 11AM, when her boss, Diamond Des Diamond entered the building.

He was challenged by a new starter, who, having only been at work in the company a few days, didn't have a clue as to who he was. When Des finally got through reception his ego had been bruised like a peach.

We were called into a meeting about Customer Service with him but the timing of the meeting was cause for concern. The phones wouldn't be covered by any of the team but when I broached the issue with Anne. Her response was merely that he is on a tight schedule and we have to all fit around him. He is the boss and we all have to do as he says. Of course if he hadn't been slumming it on a expenses paid train trip in first class and then didn't have a return journey a few hours later maybe he could have been more accommodating.

More and more in my dealings with Directors I'm starting to realise that they seem to exhibit the temperament and behaviour of a spoilt 2-year old. Flatter their ego's and let them have whatever toys they want to play with and they're fine. But if you don't know who they are or question a decision then they'll throw themselves to the floor and beat their hands and feet in a corporate version of a temper tantrum.

Of course it could be that 'Yes-Women' like Anne who'll flirt around and tug at their forlock the instance she sees someone a payscale above her merely pander to this perception.

I think that is why I'll never get anywhere in this company. I'm not a militant but I just cannot bring myself to bow my head and wring a flat-cap between my hands. It doesn't matter if it's your boss or not. An idiot is still an idiot.

Wednesday - Crumbs

Ted was most disappointed. His wife, Mrs Ted hadn't prepared his usual sandwiches this morning as she had to leave home early to visit their son in Luton.

Ted slummed it with the rest of us at the baguette shop opposite the office. He sat at his desk trying to navigate his teeth around a peninsula sized french stick, dripping lettuce and red onion shavings like a ticker-tape parade around his chair. Most of these he plucked up off the carpet when he'd finished.

Shortly afterwards, Jez meandered over.

"I hope Ted is going to vacuum all of that up," he said referring to some barely visible bread crumbs left on the floor.

"There's only a few crumbs. You can hardly notice them. We do still have office cleaners don't we?" I told Jez.

"He's got to complete the file allocations." I added when I realised that he might just be serious. Ever since Jo had been placed under the magnifying glass of management scrutiny everyone else had to cover her workload while she proved that she was up to the job.

Jez wandered away. Later that afternoon I returned to my desk from tracking down a couple of files. Ted had the office Dyson out and was running the nozzle around his chair.

"Ted. What are you doing?"

"Just what I'm told," grumbled Ted. "Anne said I had to clear up the mess,"

I glanced over at Jez but before I could say anything Ane emerged from out of her cave.

"Jez was quite right. We can't have the place looking a disgusting mess, People need to clear up after themselves,"

You know. Sometimes words fail me.

Tuesday - Jo in the Firing Line

I consider that there is a role for everyone in my team.

Each executive has their own very individual strengths and I focus (listen to me getting all management speak on you) on magnifying those positives whilst at the same time developing the areas in which they are weakest.

Jo for instance, gives great phone. She is polite, professional, charming and positive to the person on the other end of the line. It doesn't matter that she's reading the latest issue of Heat when she's talking because the customer doesn't know, and will have melted like butter at the end of the call, no matter what their grievance, thinking they have just been hand-delivered exceptional customer service.

Which, they have. But Jo was reading about Jordan and Peter Andre when she provided it.

It's all about perception at the end of the day.

Likewise if I know I need a monotonous but high volume task completed. Then I know Jo's your (wo)man. She doesn't do detail, but she clears a backlog like it's a bar lined with vodka jellies.

But it was perception that called me into Anne's hole this morning. The perception that because Jo is loud, flirty and bubbly that she is vacuous, lazy and a waste of space. Anne had Jo's timesheet in hand as evidence to support her theory.

"What are your impressions of Jo?" Anne asked.

I almost told her how productive Jo was but knew how many bullets the timesheet Anne held had loaded. There were no categories on the sheets for the work that Jo output. Anne had had issues with her since she'd joined the team. It was probably these reservations that had placed her in my reporting line as opposed to Jez's.

"She cleared the November backlog pretty much single-handedly. She's kept the file allocation to a minimum. She's not working for a career but she'll process what's put in front of her," I told Anne.

Anne was blunt and to the point. "She's not processing anywhere near as much work as she should be with the amount of experience she has. She needs to improve or I'll have to manage her out,"

"But she's processing more of the backlog than anyone else, and file allocation has been kept up to date since she took it over."

"But she's not closing as many complaints as Gareth, Dan or even Ted for that matter."

"She's doing more than Kate,"

"Kate has other duties,"

At this point I knew that putting forward Jo's case was a pointless exercise.

"I'll get Jo up to speed," I told Anne.

So now Jo's working day is set on solely closing complaints. The backlog isn't being processed, the files are not getting allocated and the customers are missing out on Jo's great phone service. But if it can get Jo out of the firing line it'll be worth it.

There is a strapline that can be found throughout the company on numerous walls and posters. It is a quote from the CEO and it reads:

"Without the Customer, we are not a business. Without the Customer, we have no business. Our Business are our Customers. Remember this every day."

I did remember this, as I tasked Jo with ignoring the customers, just so she could appease Anne and avoid being fired.

Monday - 23 and a half

The new series of "24" began last night and as much as I have a rule about not blogging on anything unrelated to the daily grind, I can't resist making a few observations.

Jack Bauer has spent 20 months in a Chinese jail, presumably being starved, deprived of sleep and tortured.

Within two hours of being freed, he has showered, shaved, been driven to a storm drain, handcuffed to a grate, abducted, driven to a secret hideout, tortured again, chewed out a terrorist's throat, hotwired a car, driven to a another secret hideout - through traffic - faster than a pair of helicopters could fly there, persuaded some terrorists he's on their side, rescued them from the secret hideout, followed another terrorist, got onto a subway train, had a fight and then pushed the said terrorist out of the car through a very flimsy door just as he set off his suicide bomb.

Phew.

In two hours this morning, I've showered, shaved and waited for a delayed train. Sat at my desk, booted up my PC, waited for it to warm up, got a coffee, read some emails and have been called into a meeting.

If think I need to boost my productivity.

Also, how come anyone in the series can log onto any PC and in a tense 15 seconds, take control of a spy satellite and home its camera's on any given point on Earth or, delete an entire database just in the time that it takes someone else to wiggle their mouse to disable their screen's powersave.

Just hovering my pointer over an Access database causes my whole PC's system to grind to a complete and utter standstill.

I don't think CTU have been shopping at Dell for their IT equipment.

Monday - 101 Ways to Brighten your Day

The topics of conversation from the team today were Leo Sayer's pants, Jade's mum and David Beckham's forthcoming transfer to America where he will play 'soccerball' in front of thousands of adoring Mexican immigrants.

I was called into an impromptu meeting in Anne's cave with the other team leaders. There was good news and bad news.

The bad news was that an auditor was going to visit the department this week. The good news was that he wasn't arriving until Wednesday, so we had two days in which to prepare for his visit.

We were all given the strictest of instructions to ensure that no-one in our teams' were to so much as break wind in a non-company way when he arrived.

When I sat back at my desk Dan was in the middle of explaining how he brightened his day.

"Sometimes, I lower my chair as far as it will go and look around the office. Its incredible how something as simple as a change of perspective can make a view more interesting," he told the team.

I've found a cupboard in which to lock Dan for the duration of the auditors visit.

Friday - Now That's What I call Neuro Linguisitic Programming

This is probably one of those posts where I get a little too philosophical for my own good. For those of you that don't know, NLP is the scientific of the individual interpretation of language and even those who are not aware of its principles often find themselves using its techniques.

For instance, Anne couches her language in these ways - she refers to herself, in very positive powerful ways such as "I have solved this problem," "I understand what he really means," "I will give you the benefit of the doubt,".

When referring to others it is always the opposite. For example, "You cannot see the big picture," "People are incapable of following simple procedures," "You've got this completely wrong you absolute imbecile!" and so on.

None of this means that she is actually capable or any good at running a department efficiently but it certainly can help her to pull the wool over her superior's eyes. I can imagine the post interview review amongst the board.

"Wow, she is very positive,"

"Yes. She certainly knows her stuff,"

"You're right she was the loudest and brashest person we've interviewed. And she is a woman. She must be good. We'd better hire her!"

Another interesting fact about NLP is that Derren Brown uses it in his mind control performances. Those of you that saw the Special this Christmas would probably have been as astounded as I was when he got random members of an audience to pick a random word from a random cutting of a randomly selected newspaper. Of course it all became clear when he explained that he did it by suggesting rather obviously through his performance that they "Choose 'Daily Mail' a number from the board,".

I will try these techniques this year.

"Anne, I'll just bring that (promote Luke) report over right now,"

It just might work!

Wednesday - Eastenders for beginners

As overheard in the team today when they were discussing the latest plotlines in the 'enders:

Jo: "So Martin thinks Joe killed Pauline?"

Kate: "No, Martin said I know who killed Pauline"

Jo: "I thought he said 'I know you killed Pauline,'"

Ted: "He said I know who killed Pauline because Rebecca saw Sonia hit Pauline,"

Kate: "And Sonia thinks that she killed Pauline,"

Jo: "I'm sure he said that 'I know you killed Pauline,"

Kate: " No it was 'I know who killed Pauline,'"

Jo: "So he doesn't think that Joe killed Pauline?"

Kate and Ted: "No. He thinks that Sonia killed Pauline,"



Dan: "Does anyone know how to get the sludgey stuff from chicken soup out of the end of a bic biro after they've stirred it?"

Tuesday - One Resolution Too Many

My New Year's Resolution is to maintain the blog on a more regular basis.

I will do this.

I will not be distracted by video's of thirteen year olds philosophising on YouTube or MySpace.

I will not play Java games that involve catapulting penguins into snowploughs.

I will blog. It will be on a regular basis and I will not be on too much of a downer.



Now if only I could persuade my audience to read this, instead of being distracted by home made webcam videos of thirteen years olds philosophising on Youtube and Myspace or playing java games that catapult penguins into snowploughs then I'll be really happy!

Thursday - Our Staff Are Our Most Valuable Asset

We've been under the kosh this week due to a sickness bug that has decimated the customer complaints team. Both Jo and Gareth have been off since Monday. Kate and Ted, as expected have battled on but Dan has hinted that he too, is starting to suffer. I expect he's planning a long weekend.

We had our weekly team leader meeting in Anne's hole in the morning. Anne berated the staff for their absence levels, ulimately worried about how this looks with head office. Its all reported back to them monthly.

"We've got to tighten up on sickness related absence," said Anne. "Its always the same names letting everyone else down and increasing workloads for the whole department."

"You've got to look at the underlying cause," I commented. "If staff are happy in their work then they will make the extra effort to come in if they're feeling a bit run down. But at the moment morale is low and backlogs are excessive. They feel unappreciated and no-one is listening to them."

Anne thought over this. Jez appeared a little shocked but Tracey was nodding.

"Well," said Anne sternly. "If they don't like it they can just go and get another job." She said, proving my point.

Friday - Ol' Beardy Face

Gareth and Dan are going to have a beard growing competition. They've asked Ted and me to join in but I've had to turn them down citing earlier gf statements that she wouldn't kiss me when I had a bit of stubbley growth on my chin. Ted doesn't want to look like Santa Claus's anorexic younger brother so he's also turned them down.

"I can feel it itching already, " said Dan stoking his cheeks. "I don't know if I can keep this up."

Kate, eager to please, chased up her system enhancements document, that was currently buried beneath a mountain of invoices on Anne's desk. I glanced towards Anne's cave, where she prowled like a hungry bear with a hangover. The dark clouds above her alcove did not bode well and I didn't want to be the person to be prodding her with a short stick.

Kate looked at me expectantly.
"I'll go and see if Anne's reviewed it yet," I said bravely

I peered over the partition and asked Anne in my most inoffensive tone, whether she'd looked at Kate's document.

At first she appeared to be taken aback and didn't remember the document I was referring to.

"I know. Yes. There's some detail missing from it," She said.

"What's that?"

"I need a cost/savings analysis."

"That's already in the report."

Anne blinked in surprise before regaining her composure.

"No." She said firmly as if I was the one who wasn't listening. "I need more detail." She said.

"Sorry, what detail?"

"I've got some telephone conferences to attend. Can we discuss this Monday?" She answered.

Thursday - Kid Gloves

Jo's appraisal. I tracked her down in the rest room and overheard her talking to Dan before I dragged her along to the interview room.

"I'm really nervous," Jo told Dan.

"You'll be all right. You'll just flutter those eyelashes and he'll forgive you anything."

"I'm not like that. He had to have a word with me about lateness and sickness this year,"

"Oh sorry Luke. I promise I'll be a good girl from now on," Dan said bending backwards and fluttering his eyelashes at Jo.

I cleared my throat to give them warning and entered the room. Dan almost spilt his coffee over himself.

"Ready Jo?" I said, pretending that I hadn't heard any of the earlier conversation.

She cast Dan a look as we left for the interview room, like that of the condemned (wo)man walking the green mile.

Jo was right in that the main issue with her work output was her loose grasp of the concept of punctuality and the number of hangovers she'd had to face under the guise of food poisonings, migraines and viral infections. Jo wasn't as dispassionate as she appeared. She had been known on rare occassions to burst into a flood of tears, usually after one of Anne's barbed comments. I had to raise this subject with her and after overhearing her earlier concerns, very, very, carefully and with a immense amount of compassion.

Fifteen minutes later and I'd run out of tissues.

"It's ok," I said. "You just need to be careful of your sickness levels,"

"But you said I'd be sacked," Jo cried, he face burried within a crumpled mass of kleenex.

"No. I said that if you take too many days then as you know your performance will be reviewed under second level sickness procedures which can lead to a dismissal for ineffective performance,"

"You're saying I'm ineffective," wailed Jo.

I was fed up of this. "It's ok," I said, for once thanking Anne. "You've got a 3 anyway,"

DO THIS NOW!

For the second time in a week I find myself blogging on stuff unrelated to my job but I make no excuses for this. More importantly this will affect you, whoever you are and wherever you are.

We only have one planet to live on and like it or not, climate change is real and it's happening. If you live in the UK you can register with I Count who are petitioning the public to email their local MP's and to put in place legislation to reduce carbon emissions.

The I Count website states:

"Together we can help stop climate chaos by cutting carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions.

We want to see a Climate Change Bill passed by Parliament which will make year-on-year cuts in CO2 a law. This has never happened before.

The idea of a Bill is backed by thousands and thousands of people across the UK, and by over half our MPs. After much campaigning the Government has responded by saying it will introduce a Bill at some point – although we don’t yet know what the wording will be.

Speed is of the essence. We want the government to include a truly effective Bill in the Queen's Speech on 15th November. And this will only happen if the government feels the heat from all 646 MPs.

That's why we're asking you to send an email to your MP. It's their job to represent you - help make sure they do."

I urge everyone of you from the UK to do this. The site will even work out who your local MP is and generate the email for you.

If you're not from the UK then please contact your local Government Representatives and start a similar campaign. We have to make a difference because no-one else is going to save our world.

We've all heard the excuses - that its no good doing it if China/America/Russia (Add the large national CO2 cuplrit of choice) doesn't, but this has to start somewhere and doing something is a million times better than doing nothing at all.

There. I've had my say. Please now have yours.