An imaginary tale… Picture a high pressure environment. Resources are stretched and the work keeps on coming. Jobs are routinely prioritised so that staff can focus on what is important. That isn’t an uncommon scenario, maybe it is ringing bells, so let me make it a little more dramatic by upping the stakes. Imagine it was […]
The “A” Team
The escalation What do you do when things get out of hand? When your staff are bombarded with queries that they can’t handle? There are two lines of thought… Management Model 1: First split your staff into two pools, the experienced people who know what they are doing and the less so (who presumably don’t) […]
How I Lost My Job
A while back I worked in a call centre. It was a big call centre, thousands of people worked there, talking to customers. But not any more… First we mitigated the work, we removed all the rework and mistakes and backlogs, we got rid of all the things that went wrong Second we automated the […]
How to Have an Easy Life: 3 Lessons from a Fireman
I am not fond of working, I want an easy life. I’d far rather lie on a beach than be sitting in an office. My mate Dave has an easy life. He is a fireman. They have an easy life, all they do is sit about, waiting for a phone call, reading the paper and […]
How to Deal with Customer Complaints
The Highways Agency (the people responsible for the state of the UK’s roads) have announced a plan to save money. You can read about it here. Currently if a member of the public complains about a pot hole on a major road the Highways Agency are duty bound to repair it (throw on a couple […]