Early warning system

How stupid is this?  

The other day Cicero was sitting at his desk minding his own business but of course obsessing how to meet the needs of customers as marketing folk are wont to do. Surprisingly and suddenly his phone rang-not a mobile one but one invented by Alexander Graham Bell. In other words the kind that don’t come with you to the toilet, let you shop on the go, tell you then time, let you take photos and even make the tea.

It was a co-worker.

Naturally Cicero was expecting to discuss important marketing matters or at least a review of the body politic and the state of the world. All he got was some chit chat about respective states of well-being.

But after a bit the talk moved onto the coup de grace of the discussion and the real purpose of the call and it was…..wait for it…..and Cicero kids you not…..to be informed that he was to be sent an e-mail later in the day to arrange for said the co-workers to meet and to swap war stories..

Yes, you heard it right. The purpose of the call was to warn Cicero that an e-mail was to wend its electronic way to his in-box. How absurd is that? Very, in Cicero's book.

Do we do act like this with any other form of communication?

It is no wonder that our in boxes are full to bursting each and every day. It is no surprise that server capacity is close to saturation with pointless e-mails like the one Cicero was to receive, with cheap promotions for dysfunctional penile remedies and off colour jokes.

E-mails were supposed to make our lives easier but you can only wonder at the high level of inefficiency in built to our communication processes if we are constantly making phone calls to warn of the impending arrival of an e-mail. Do we really need an early warning system for our e-mails?

It defies even Cicero’s logic that it was not possible to conclude arrangements there and then while telephone communing instead of waiting for the e-mail missive to arrive which will no doubt generate a flurry of e-mails as arrangements are made and unmade.

It is reckoned that on average it takes 8 e-mails today to make an appointment between two consenting adults. Previously it took one phone call. And they call this progress

And all the while attention is diverted away from the one person that really matters-the customer.

Sis felix. Et sis fortunatus.

Stone Age Medicine

I hope you had a great break over Easter. Now it’s time to get back to work and regain the momentum we lost over the Bank Holiday weekend.

And here’s a shocker for you-I have met a real life Health and Safety Gauleiter. You might see a softer tone from me on these hard pressed people doing an important job. Alternatively you might not.

Is it only me...who thinks that the NHS needs to join 21st century?

A very good friend has in recent weeks been subject to the wonders of our NHS. And when I share this story with you you no doubt will come to the same conclusion as me-the Two Caesars are right to seek to reform to this venerable institution and to drag it screaming and kicking into the 21st century, or at least into the latter half of the last century.

Now lest these fine words should be read by my own physician let me say at the outset that I have no and have never had any complaint about the treatment I have received at the hands of the NHS, my beef has always been with NHS Apparatchiks and their lack of efficiency.

But back to my friend.

For reasons of patient confidentiality, and because I don’t know it, I will not disclose the condition but needless to say it was beyond the competence and capability of the GP who needed to refer my friend to a higher authority and be seen by a consultant.

All well so far. But this is where it all began to unravel.

For to see a consultant the GP has to pen a letter of referral which needs to be sent by an Apparatchik at the GP surgery to another Apparatchik who looks after the consultant’s diary-seemingly the medical profession is far too important to have to write their own communications and manage their own diaries. If you want to see how this is done, boys, look at the private sector where PAs and secretaries are becoming as rare as final salary pension pots.

After a short wait my friend hadn’t yet heard anything so she called up to be told that the letter had not yet been faxed to the consultant because the person whose responsibility it was to work the fax machine was away on holiday.

Yes, you were right first time, your eyes are not deceiving you.

It was a good job that my friend’s condition was not life threatening.

Now maybe it’s only me but who in this day and age sends letters by fax. This is like medicine from the Stone Age. Someone ought to tell these people that today is an electronic age and most sensible business people send communications safely, securely and instantaneously via the wonders of the world wide web. Perhaps someone might be able to explain to me why the NHS still persists and insists on using mediaeval technology.

And while we are it, why would any right minded business or organisation think it right and acceptable that communications could only be sent by one person and when this person was ill or on holiday or having a tea break, nothing could be communicated. No one else would tolerate a single point of failure like this or find this acceptable.

And yet still the Apparatchiks claim the NHS doesn’t need reform. Ye gods, if these people were working in my business , we would not be in business by the end of the week if they behaved and thought in an Apparatchik way which they wouldn’t of course should they be seeking to create value to pay for the Apparatchik-ariat.

It’s time to reform this rotten edifice and put a stop to Stone Age medicine being practised by the NHS. At least our medicines and treatments have moved on.

And to think we fund the over generous pension pots of these people.

Have a great week.

Sis felix. Et sis fortunatus.