Big is beautiful is bust .....

The whole concept of "Big is Beautiful" or "Big is Cost Effective" is well and truly bust in my book. Look about you, the banks that have collapsed and had to be bailed out are almost all "Mega" Banks that have swallowed up smaller fry at an astonishing rate. When they couldn't swallow anyone smaller they went after "sub-prime" investments like the money supply was endless. And the management read the bottom line and saw that it was good, while those in the middle saw that things were going adrift and couldn't tell anyone above them. And those at the bottom? Well, why should they worry, as long as they got the salary at the end of the month.

Big does have some advantages, like the ability to shout louder or attract more notice than anyone else. It also allows you to bully your way into the position you want to occupy, but it isn't necessarily the best way to actually run a business. For one thing the "Management" and the "Board" seldom actually know what is happening on the "shop floor". They certainly think they do, but that is because they hear what they want to hear and the troops on the floor tell them what they believe the bosses want to be told and what they hope will get them noticed and promoted - or at least leave them in a protected position. The biggest disadvantage of "Big" is that it takes a long time for any faultlines to become apparent and for any message identifying failure to actually reach the top or anyone in fact that can actually deal with it. The Management seldom have any contact with the coalface and so are unable to identify things that are not going as they believe them to be.

The banks make a good example, the customer service end has become a "sales" service with the "customer support", until recently, trying hard to get you to borrow money or to sell you "services" which perhaps you would have been well advised to do without. Mortgage lending at 125% of value and on repayment calculations based on 4.5 times salary (Sometimes on a combined salary) may sound attractive to someone struggling to get on the property ladder, but is it good business risk? Probably not. The inability to communicate freely and quickly is strangled as soon as any organisation grows to a point in which the top management has no contact with the guy on the shopfloor. This can be demonstrated in any large organisation and both the Fire and Rescue Service and the Ambulance Service can demonstrate this. While the services were small (Say 500 employees) and run by uniformed Chiefs who knew their people and could identify a person in their service on the ground, the bottom rung felt that they could make themselves heard when they had a good idea or saw something going wrong. As the organisation around the Chief grows beyond a certain point the isolation begins to bite in both directions and more than just communication suffers, trust is also lost.

Big rarely produces the "savings" its supporters so often trumpet, the amalgamation of three Fire and Rescue Services into a single one in Wales ended up costing more than twice what it had cost to run the three independently, but this is, of course, concealed as it isn't in the public interest to allow it to be known. Again, the loss of direct communication has had its affect, but a more serious problem is that if there is a part of the organisation which is underperforming or failing to perform at all, it can be concealed by the sheer scale of the problem of trying to communicate. Once the organisation goes beyond a certain size it begins to attract passengers - people sidelined into posts and forgotten. But the astute in these positions can often take advantage and there are any number of examples of such people - who may have been sidelined for disciplinary reasons originally - using the opportunity to reinvent themselves and play the politics to advantage, emerging again in positions of power and on promotion well beyond their actual experience or ability. "Big" frequently actually encourages this. After all, the "management" only know what they are told and what they want to hear, with no contact below the "managers" below them, they have no counter checks they can run.

Look around you at the worst performing organisations in this present crisis and you soon notice that they are almost all "mega" corporations whose management have little contact with the customer other than through "marketing" reports. Look at the state of the Civil Service and you discover that there is a chasm between the Whitehall "management" and those who actually struggle to deliver the service they thought they were employed to deliver. The Civil Service subscribes to the vision that anyone with a "management" qualification can "manage" any function, no matter how technical, without any knowledge of what is being done or how it is done. This simply compounds the "big is beautiful" failures as communication becomes next to impossible between top, middle and bottom of the organisation and its branches. And the wastage of taxpayer money, the failure of projects and the frustration of the lower tier civil servants that manifests in sickleave, stress and absenteeism should tell you all you need to know.

I can identify no "large" organisation where the communication between top and bottom is filter free. I cannot identify a single mega corporation or organisation in which "savings" offset the wastage occassioned by communication failures, duplication of work or sheer wastage due to overly bureaucratic procedures. Big ain't beautiful and it certainly isn't efficient. In my view, big is bust.

Sales outlets for my books

I've been doing an online search to see if there are any other outlets selling my books and I have found a number. They are:

Blackwell's Books

Waterstones Online

W H Smith (Order at counter or online) Intriguingly Smith's have a different ISBN for the book to the one under which it is published ..... I have in front of me ISBN 978-1-906459-39-0 their version ends in a 77 which doesn't stack up ....

Amazon.co.uk - Although irritatingly again listed as "out of stock", though inviting you to "sign up to be notified when it becomes available.

Naturally Hallmark Press International continue to supply through their online bookstore(See the sidebar), and I intend to keep looking for other outlets so watch this space. Not unnaturally I'd be delighted to hear that Smith's or Waterstones had sold copies over the counter so if anyone does order through them please let me know!

The Brown economics exposed

Gordon Brown has been trumpetted by the left and the lefty media for the last umpteen years as "the best Chancellor" and the "Chancellor who broke boom and bust" but the truth is somewhat different - as it always is in matters political. The truth is that Gordon Brown's long reign at No.11 Downing Street was built on the hard work and the pain the last several Conservative Chancellors put into it. Gordo did what every Labour Chancellor has always done - he went on a spending spree and when he could no longer hide the tax increases he borrowed more and then borrowed again. And now we are back to boom and bust and the left wing media and the Labour Spin Doctors are trying to blame the banks, the "capitalists" and the "forces of conservatism" (to quote that other fraud, Tony Blair.).

All very well for our present government to blame everyone but themselves, but the truth is that it is they who changed the "rules" and allowed our banks and our local government treasurers to venture capital where it should not have gone. It is Labour who have driven through "Public/Private Funding Initiatives" against all advice and at vast cost to the taxpayer. It is there fore refreshing to see one of our MEP's, that body based in Strasbourg which costs an arm and a leg and which is window dressing for the most part to hide the fact that the EU is run by unelected Commissioners and Bureaucrats, has stood up and delivered what should have been a devastating critique. Pity not one newspaper and certainly not one TV Channel or News Bulletin in the UK even mentioned it. But then, why should they, every last one of them is a part of the Labour Party Propaganda machine.

Mr Daniel Hannan MEP deserves to be promoted by his Party, but my bet is that Mr David Cameron MP will mark him down as a "trouble-maker" and set the Goons from the Whips Office on him to make sure he doesn't threaten the Leadership in the run up to the elections. I find it astounding that I have to go to YouTube to find the speech - which is brilliant - and to hear it. I have to ask, why has the UK Media been so silent about it? Surely, if, as our Illustrious Leader Gordon Brown keeps telling us, Strasbourg is "vital to the UK and the UK's interests in Europe" the media should have picked this up and given us the full story? Or is that too much to ask a parochial and self interested media run by left wingers with their "Internationalist" agenda?

Brown's call to "spend our way out of the recession" rings hollow when his government is imposing taxes that are causing businesses to close, cancelling defence contracts which put literally thousands of jobs at risk and recruiting Civil Servants at a rate of thousands a month to consume more taxes and more tax money than ever before. Brown and Labour good at managing the economy? I don't think so - and nor do the IMF or anyone else with a modicum of economic knowledge. The only thing I will give them credit for is that it has taken them longer to destroy it this time round than in the past, but that may also be a measure of just how well the Conservatives left it when this shower of worthless PC parasites were elected.

I suppose we can only hope that we will now see them cast into the political wilderness where they and their left wing puppets in the media belong.

Voiceless in .....

Having survived all winter without a cold or even a sniffle, having travelled abroad and been exposed to a number of 'interesting' bugs everyone else seemed to get, I have succumbed to a vicious bug which is affecting my throat and chest - with a side excursion to my nose. Voice have I almost none so tomorrow could be interesting and next week's teaching commitment even more so.

Ah well, it has given me the excuse to stay home and attack the housework. The ironing in particular has got a bit behind so that is next, after I have finished filing the last of another set of bank statements and related paperwork. If only those who owe me payment for the work I have done were as prompt as I am expected to be each month.

Ah well, back to the cough lozenges and the filing!

Friday blues

Friday has finally arrived with an end to a week's teaching which has been made interesting by my developing what seems to be a heavy cold in the chest. Certainly my voice has gone from Bass/Baritone to Russian Bass as far as tone is concerned, and no, I don't intend to try singing even though I must shortly go and take Evening Prayer in the Abbey.

THis evening promises to be a "stay indoors" with a glass of the red wine, a book, some music, the cat and the woollies while I subside from a rather fraught week. I have some more work lined up for next week so the bank should be happy and I just hope the cold eases off with a little less running about and a lot more getting things sorted out here at home.

One good thing is that a course I was asked to pull together to be run in Ireland is now on the cards for May/June and I am looking forward to spending three weeks or more in the West of Ireland even though it will be work, its a lovely part and I'll be working with some lovely people. Lots to look forward too.

Looking back

Five years ago I went to South Africa for the 40th Reunion of my matriculation class. It was fun and a little sad to meet up with so many of my former classmates, the sad part was learning just how many of them were no longer with us in this life. The biggest surprise was how many of us now live in other parts of the world, hardly what any of us could have imagined, much less expected to have lain in our future.

Sadly it doesn't look as if I will be in a position to join the survivors this year. The reunion is always in October and coincides with the Schools Founder's Day celebrations. It would have been nice, but in the present financial climate I can't see it happening for me at any rate. So, to Merv, Des, Alistair, Bruce and all the others, I say, hope its a great year for you guys and perhaps I will make the 50th!

Gestures

I don't buy into gestures. If you are going to do something about a problem, do something, don't make gestures for the sake of scoring political or ideological points. Don't make pointless gestures which just allow the footsoldiers and the gullible to get that warm cuddly feeling that they have "done something" no matter how pointless. What got me going today?

Simple, a proposal that everyone in England should "turn off all electrical appliances for one hour" this coming Saturday. What will this achieve? According to the organisers, it will "send a message to the government that the people of Britain want an end to energy wastage." Really? So, will the one hour shutdown actually result in any power stations not running for an hour? No, it won't. What it will result in is a massive surge as everyone stupid enough to do this, turns everything back on at the end of the hour.

Climate change is a very complex issue, we are not even completely sure which way its going. Yes, glaciers and ice caps are melting, but parts of the oceans are cooling and the "Atlantic Conveyor" the return flow of cold water to the tropics which balances the Gulf Stream, is slowing. We have just had the coldest few months in 15 years in Britain and parts of Europe are still getting snow, again, the first time in many years it has stayed on the ground this late. In the Southern Hemisphere a heat wave has affected Southern Australia and Southern Africa, but selectively. In the atmosphere, the Ozone hole is closing and probably also contributing to the heat build up the Green lobby are so fond of screaming about.

So how will another little overage hippy "gesture" reverse this trend? Simple answer it won't, but it will give a lot of airheads a nice warm fluffy feeling as they all settle back into their electrically dependent lifestyles, gas heated of course and put on the kettle for another cup of something that has to be shipped to their local supermarket so that they don't have to waste time growing it, drying it and all their other foodstuffs themselves. This is why I am totally opposed to these gestures. They are usually made by people gullible enough to believe that they "make a difference" doing it, yet never actually consider what they really need to give up in order to really make a difference. My short list of things the "developed world" would have to give up completely to cancel the "carbon imbalance" includes -

• All electrical goods,
• Central heating,
• all manufacturing and revert to "cottage" and homemade goods,
• frozen foods, tinned foods
• pre-cooked foods
• clothing bought from stores as finished goods and revert to make your own after spinning and weaving to find the wherewithal,
• Clean drinking water,
• flush sanitation
• cars, trains and buses which use internal combustion engines,
• travel to anywhere you can't walk,
• All plastic goods and all synthetic goods,
• bathing regularly,
• Deodorant......

In short, we would have to revert to grow it yourself, make it yourself, no modern medicine, no modern conveniences. Fend for yourself. And even if we did, attractive as it might seem to the 1960's hippy generation and their equally stupid offspring, the climate would continue to change.

Gestures are stupid and pointless, what we really need is some positive and sensible ideas to adapt ourselves and make our technology less demanding and damaging. Even in the stone age we were changing the environment - look to Africa and South America and what you see is landscapes denuded of trees and shrubbery to provide fuel for heating and cooking, land for growing food or grazing that most damaging of all livestock - goats.

No I will not be joining in this stupid gesture!