Thursday, September 24, 2009

Government Success Strategies

I was sent this by my brother in New Zealand who still does not what I do for a living so I thought it worth repeating here

Tribal wisdom of the Dakota Indians (so legend has it), passed on from generation to generation, says that,
"When you discover that you are riding a dead horse, the best strategy is to dismount."

However, in government, education and the corporate world, more advanced strategies are often employed, such as:

  1. Buying a stronger whip.
  2. Changing riders.
  3. Giving horse and rider a good bollocking.
  4. Re-structuring the dead horse's reward scale to contain a performance-related element.
  5. Suspending the horse's access to the executive grassy meadow until performance targets are met.
  6. Making the horse work late shifts and weekends.
  7. Scrutinising and clawing back a percentage of the horse's past 12 months expenses payments.
  8. Appointing a committee to study the horse.
  9. Arranging to visit other countries to see how other cultures ride horses.
  10. Convening a dead horse productivity improvement workshop.
  11. Lowering the standards so that dead horses can be included.
  12. Reclassifying the dead horse as living-impaired.
  13. Hiring outside contractors to ride the dead horse.
  14. Outsourcing the management of the dead horse.
  15. Harnessing several dead horses together to increase speed.
  16. Providing additional funding and/or training to increase dead horse's performance.
  17. Doing a productivity study to see if lighter riders would improve the dead horse's performance.
  18. Declaring that as the dead horse does not have to be fed, it is less costly, carries lower overhead and therefore contributes substantially more to the bottom line of the economy than do some other horses.
  19. Rewriting the expected performance requirements for all horses. And, finally, the highly effective...
  20. Promoting the dead horse to a supervisory position.

Take a look at your options on hiding the inevitable under the hay!

Friday, September 4, 2009

Refreshing or what?

Leaving the house this morning I felt a refreshing chill in the air, first time this autumn. I love this time of year it signals the restarting of a longish work period before Christmas. It's time to get busy again. Forget the doom and gloom merchants the OECD, BBC and the daily mail. Its really good out here whatever is going on and if we have to wait a bit longer to come out of this media created "recession" than france or germany so what! It's no coincidence that still desperately need the UK to join the euro so get up and face the fresh calming air.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Tuesday, September 1, 2009

A new month and a new season.

Where do we go from here petrol up a few pence and winter almost back again?

But in reality its just a day past yesterday and nothing is really that different just your state of mind. So get a grip and focus on the great unknown just around the corner. Your greatest contract is just round the corner trust me. But if you are to scared to look then I'll take it and thanks. No really a big thanks to the meek they make life so much easier for the rest of us.

Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device