... and now for something completely different!

I’m not a big fan of schadenfreude; bitter is something I prefer in a pint glass or (if at the golf club) in a pink gin. Today however, ‘Bigotgate’ has led to much mirth and hilarity in my cell and I cannot wait for the election debate tonight. Brown has a perfect opportunity to cover himself in even more sh*t and I want to watch. To amuse myself until the next political cage fight, I have reproduced the New Labour Party dictionary definition of bigoted below.

Bigot, n. one who asks awkward questions, a proletariat with incisive inquisitorial skills, an honest citizen who voices the question on 80% of the country’s lips, a semi sentient impediment to trite PR answers with ‘a zero factuality content’ (q.v. ‘American Political Language In The Nixon Years’). - adj. bigoted, having the qualities of a bigot. – n. bigotry, blind or excessive zeal in matters of truth which concern society as a whole.

Bring it on!

Anne

Never mind golden, silence is priceless!

As I stood staring disconsolately at my weeping flange (it is an elegant tap, but simple, single taps are so much easier to maintain) my world went quiet and was quite suddenly a very different place. I know you will recognise that disconcerting feeling you get when something is different - not necessarily wrong but definitely changed? (we chaps have a strategy - check for new hair do s, outfits, perfume, accessories that require positive comment). But you can’t quite crystallise that knowledge, and you know that the uneasy feeling won’t go away until you have solved the puzzle.

As the pool of water around the tap base grew larger, so my realisation grew that there was no sound infiltrating my head. The boiler was not firing, the central heating was not pumping, the fridge had achieved its pre-programmed froidure and even the birds in the garden were silent. The toddler next door was not chattering, the wind-borne noise from road and rail was being blown elsewhere and no dogs barked nor burglar alarms wailed. Even the scrap-mans trumpet and the call of ‘Any old iron?’ was conspicuous by its absence.

Watson Towers was silent.

And I suppose I had a glimpse of what a sensory deprivation tank might sound like, and how meditation could allow stillness and peace.

The beauty and profound appreciation of the lack of noise was over in an instant, but the appreciation of the freedom that the absence of distraction offered, of the clarity of my thoughts during the quiet (I won’t reveal them lest you recognise the shallow nature of my existence), the appreciation of the simplicity that mono-focus allows has endured. I realised that this short space in my life merely emphasises the nature of our multitasking lives.

At the risk of sounding neo-Luddite, I am not impressed that the i-phone can help me do yet more with the fag ends of my life; as I am on hold enduring Vivaldi excerpts again I may book dinner, have a game of snooker and check my walls for vertical variance. Fan-freaking-tastic! What’s wrong with one thought at a time, with a single strong strand of logic and clarity, with a story that has a beginning, a middle and an end without a having an obscure back-story and more twists and turns than your colon? I’m all for simple, for quiet exactitude, for clean and uncluttered, for Bauhaus rather than Baroque.

I have survived thus far in a world where complication increases exponentially with time passed, and I will continue to, but there is a sadness; now I cannot mend my car, cannot understand the person talking to me about my insurance claim, cannot understand 80% of the functionality of my mobile phone. For every multiplication of the convenience factor, effective and efficient seem to diminish. And it’s not just me; the evil of advertising persuades us we all need HDTV, but apparently 80% of HDTV owners do not have the required signal, or are still using RF connections and therefore actually getting reduced picture quality!

I’m going to make a space each day to calm down, slow down, turn off my e-mail auto alerts, put my mobile on silent, slip on the noise cancelling headphones, enjoy nothingness, listen to my thoughts, think about what they mean, regain my sanity.

With or without a bar of Galaxy.

Peace and love followers.

Anne

Critical analysis or just plain cynicism?

Happy St Georges Day followers! What does it all mean? How do we define our Englishness? Why is it special? Is it special? (of course it is peeps, before you all send me hate mail). Should nationalist pride be avoided in our aspirationally multicultural, multiracial society? How risk averse must mainstream sentiment be so as to avoid to unsettling the ethnic minorities who co-inhabit these islands? (I refer of course to the banning of St Georges day parades by Sandwell Council and some schools actively not celebrating our patron saint for reasons of political correctness etc. etc.).

I am surprised to see the lack of coverage of this great national day of celebration in the red tops, and can only assume that the lack of column inches (I make no apology for harbouring a love of imperial measure) was due to the fabulous opportunity to feast on headline grabbing news about the beasting of Nick Clagg, Jordan and Pete’s PR affairs and the ‘gobfather’s’ burial in Highgate cemetery.

The real facts about our patron saint make thought provoking reading; there is uncertainty about St George’s nationality (and indeed whether he visited these shores at all); he ‘put it about a bit’ in so far as he is celebrated in many countries; his dragon slaying persona is it seems, a myth added to spice up his image - although he is popular with the girls for saving damsels in distress (I’m more of a ‘fallen woman’ man myself, but I’m sure the gratitude of a scared maiden has it’s benefits).

So, this paragon of virtue whose name is attached to the best (naval ensign) and worst (BNP supporters) of British-ness was a Johnny foreigner, with no particular love of the English race and a big spear air-brushed into his likeness to impress the gullible. Now, you can take this as a metaphor for lots of aspects of the human condition as expressed in contemporary life, perhaps drawing parallels with Nick Clagg’s parentage, his Brussels based political apprenticeship and his bad-boy enhancing (alleged) torching of the greenhouse full of cacti.

No, that’s too easy. I prefer to use St George to observe the intricacies of communication. How do you give context to situations, paint a compelling picture for change, engage your stakeholders and yet still ensure that the truth is told and understood? Often there is just too much information to understand, the concepts are too complex and the need for supporting information too vital for full cognition of all the nuances and ramifications of a course of action. So we précis (btw how come the acute accent appears in précis but the circumflex is woefully absent in raison d’etre?) the information for the sake of brevity, we offer similes and metaphor to colour the context, we simplify the irrevocably complex to give access to a broader audience.

When the moment of truth arrives, whether we believe what we hear or read depends on the trust we have in the speaker or author. For a relatively small audience, trust is won directly, by the observation of actions which underpin integrity; for a wider audience though, that trust must be nurtured and fed in order to grow. You might apply fertiliser to a plant to accelerate it’s rate of growth and that fertiliser could be inorganic or organic, a product of scientific manufacture or a lot of bullshit. Both science and bullshit can help grow trust, and although one may be deemed more efficient and than the other it is arguable which is the healthier.

Churchill’s inspirational leadership in WWII garnered the nation’s trust and allowed us to keep ‘buggering on’ (you in the back row... yes you, STOP SNIGGERING!); this trust was based on Winnie’s character and statesmanship but was significantly enhanced by liberal amounts of BS in the form of propaganda.

And that is what we have in St. George’s day; propaganda, a need to believe in legend, in a communication process started long ago and unquestioningly accepted by a large proportion of the globe. That is what we have in the election debate – opinion and propaganda (and stage management). That is what we have in our work environment. What is a burning priority for your boss may seem like just another KPI to you, or an opinion to a co-worker, perhaps a mysterious irrelevance to another colleague, and management spin-doctoring to the guy in the post room, whilst the cleaner doesn’t even register it as background noise.

Makes you think, doesn’t it?

Have a great weekend, look after your skin.

Anne

Every cloud has a silver lining

Yes, even ash clouds with turbine blade wrecking silica.

It's difficult not to be trite when so much inconvenience has been caused by the airspace closedown, and there is no schadenfreude in my observations of disadvantage to airline passengers, carriers and businesses affected by zero cargo space. And I'm not going to say to all the whingers 'come on, 'man'- up' like the indomitable travellers we have seen biking, hiking and generally pushing on using initiative and viagra-esque stiff upper lip.

I'm not going to say that because for every stir fry denied mange tout and baby sweetcorn there will be someone still undergoing dialysis because their promised organ transplant could not be flown to them. For every Ryanair executive moaning that he is losing revenue from his grounded pay-per-pee lavatories there will be a business struggling because their transportation network has a disconnect.

I'm not even going to say that my life has been enhanced because the purity of the recent blue sky is devoid of the silver snail-trails which usually sully it.

There is however a quickening which comes with challenge and imperative that demands intellectual activity above and beyond trying to work out which lying politician is currently fooling most of the people most of the time. I know from experience how stimulating it is to have to think on your feet, create a 'best fit' situation with disparate components, and how when you go to bed after a day of stimulation, you may be knackered, you may be half worrying what the next day brings but you will have a glow that only problem solving offers.

One of my heroes, the late, great Ian Dury sang of 'Reasons to be cheerful .... one, two, three', so here is my trinity of reasons to be grateful;

1 The opportunity to flex the 'leetle grey cells' (apologies to all of my Belgian readers, that was an appalling accent!) and show that we can adapt and survive; we must thank our gods that the mobile phone signal was not disrupted ....

2 I don't have empirical proof, but it seems to me that a more significant reduction to the alleged global warming issue will have been provided by the absence of aviation fuel guzzling leviathans for a week than for the whole stock of 4x4 s roaming the UK - can we have our tax back please mister? Add to this the reflective nature of the dust reducing the warming effect of the sun which makes it past our depleted ozone layer and we may be entitled to ask for a reduction of punitive excise duty on other larger engined cars too!

3 As the paperazzi cannot jet off to stalk 'slebs' on holiday / shopping in their track suits and slippers / stumbling out of toilet cubicles, we might have a temporary respite from Jordan's exploding breast implants, Leonardo Di Crapio's receding hairline and Kate Moss's little white moustache - really guys, am I the only person to retch when I see paper wasted on this schizzle?

That's it for today. If you like it, comment. If you don't like it, comment. If you don't care, sod off!


Anne

PS Day off tomorrow, but I'll talk to you soon God willing

By way of explanation ....

In this tale, a HR Manager of indeterminate age is exposed to the vicissitudes of job hunting in a trying environment and an economy which could have been organised better by Mugabe ....

Oops. Due to the aforementioned lack of a technology gene I cannot get the cartoon to show on my third-born utterings. This is a shame, as it kind of explains this blog's raison d'etre ( how do you get accents above letters in a Microsoft programme please?)

Instead you will have to follow the link http://stripgenerator.com/strip/372444/blinded-by-the-light/#id=372444;view=undefined;accordion=0; which is also on my Facebook page if you are a true believer. Awfully sorry about the inconvenience.

Anyways, stuff to do today, but as Arnie said with such menace .... I'll be back.

Anne

Victory for common sense

As I woke this morning the world seemed full of hope and promise.

Waking to sunshine always helps of course, as does having a (rare) peaceful nights sleep, but as I followed my morning routines I reflected on the vagaries of my moods and quite why that shrivelled, clinker-like virtual organ I call my soul was quite so uplifted.

Time is a flawed concept in my brain, but I know absolutely that within a yoctosecond I had the answer – common sense seems to be infiltrating the world of Law. The scrapping of the Omari Roberts trial has struck a blow for natural justice – the self-evidence that a 14 year old knife wielding accomplice burglar would lie to seek revenge / obfuscate / because he wouldn’t know the truth if it bit him in the ass (delete as required).

In addition, Lance Corporal Tilern DeBique (known as sexy T to those without the necessary visual acuity) would only be awarded £17,000 of our money for hurt feelings rather than the £1.2M she was hoping for. Not only should we be grateful that the ludicrous Tribunal findings have been overturned, but further that the debacle has given oxygen to the fire that I sincerely hope will consume Harmen and Phillips and the rest of the liberal lunatics who’s intention is enforced homogeneity.

As a HR practitioner we have quite enough to do oiling the wheels of commerce, without fighting rearguard actions to prevent the equality terrorists; think of a world where the HR community could focus 100% on supporting and moving the business forward through fair and intelligent use of the people plan instead of imposing a net of policy with mesh fine enough to strain soup which by definition strangles initiative and enterprise and moxie.

Th-th-th-th-th-thats all folks!

Anne

Are we nearly there yet?

OMG - it is me, or do most people of 'my generation' (that's m-m-m-myyyyyyyy gggeneration of course) find that they are missing a technology gene?

Still, now I can actually see some product on the page it is a relief - I blog, therefore I am.

Sometimes it is as if there is a Matrix-like universe happening around me; a dimension where all people who want it have meaningful work and a focus for their life other than family, friends and the miasma of news the media emits. It seems that at some stage I must have chosen red instead of blue (hmmm, there was no yellow pill on offer then) and now I sit here, a reasonably qualified, very experienced, energetic 40 something (OK, 52 if you must know) uploading my reflections to share with the world rather than improving the business or supporting colleagues in their aims or indeed any of the useful stuff I used to be paid to do.

.....and all the time surrounded by world events from Fox, CNN, BBC - a kind of 'news-lite' folk tale for those with IBS (irritable brain syndrome) who cannot take the full fat reality of life.

Still, that's enough ranting for today - tune in soon for more ( or maybe less) soon, and see if this therapy is as effective as I want it to be.

anne