Meaningless management drivel
Join Date: Apr 2006
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"Remember, there's no 'I' in TEAM"
There's no I in team, but there are four in "Platitude Quoting Idiot"
...now I'm desperately trying to remember a line about Scunthorpe...
" ...we shall have to interface in a more direct manner..." said a previous boss. To which I replied -
"I'll try talking to them then."
" ...we shall have to interface in a more direct manner..." said a previous boss. To which I replied -
"I'll try talking to them then."
Join Date: Feb 2005
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Heard an MP on radio 4 today dismissing a dropped manifesto pledge as an "elision," as if that explained it all. To save you looking it up it's "an omission of a part or parts." Accurate I suppose but used to obfuscate.
I've been looking for this amusing thread ever since I received an e-mail earlier today containing 'enablers', 'facilitating influence', 'multifaceted approach', 'holistic', 'common vision' and 'keep you copied in'.....
Typed it into the The Wankometer and it scored an off-the-scale figure of 11.0!
Why do people write this clichéd garbage - it just makes them sound daft!
Typed it into the The Wankometer and it scored an off-the-scale figure of 11.0!
Why do people write this clichéd garbage - it just makes them sound daft!
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Don't the wanquerres realise that writing such bolleaux makes them sound not just daft, but pretentious? It's obvious they mean "bollocks", so why not just say that?
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Drivel is not nouveaux, of course.
Here's a pretty little one, RAF Guetersloh SROs c. 1970:
"......... The persons to whom this instruction applies are to ............."
We searched high and low for definition of "the persons to whom".
Here's a pretty little one, RAF Guetersloh SROs c. 1970:
"......... The persons to whom this instruction applies are to ............."
We searched high and low for definition of "the persons to whom".
Roadster280, 'tis indeed to defeat nanny filters - the sort of things which change "Don't snigger at the people of Scunthorpe" into something rather meaningless.....
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Well, as a confirmed civilian, I think you guys have been fairly lucky compared to the civilian world or have you too had work done by the likes of Mc@@@@@sey and Company Consultants where a load of MBAs with little real experience report to your upper management how you could do things better than the current team. Highly regarded by other MBAs or people just out of touch with reality they have been responsible for numerous disasters and idiotic sackings and if you see that they have been caled in to Compnay X whose shares are sliding expect their demise to accelerate-they are very good however at making money for themselves.
I experienced this in one life where the division I ran and another were accused of the heinous charge of overlap and duplication on no more solid grounds because we both had the word Network in our division titles. Luckily I had a friend on the senior management 'oversight team and he reduced the Consultant responsible to a terrified jelly by snarling in his best native Maryhill Glaswegian-that 'you sonny would nae have a clue what a network is unless it hit ya on the f----g heid'
MBAs of course do not teach you how to deal with Glaswegians appearing to be on the verge of explosion into physical violence, so we heard no more of that.
Of course , and having done one myself and sponsored others , no MBA that I have seen has issues like
Upside-We kill a lot of people
Downside -We get killed.
I feel very sorry for you if you have to deal with this idiocy while trying to hold together what seems the very bare bones of defence forces, which as an earlier poster pointed out is not a profit making public company . It also cannot really use marketing and sales functions to any great degree and drafting the SLAs to cover outsourcing of combat missions (using best practice of course) would be an interesting exercise.
I experienced this in one life where the division I ran and another were accused of the heinous charge of overlap and duplication on no more solid grounds because we both had the word Network in our division titles. Luckily I had a friend on the senior management 'oversight team and he reduced the Consultant responsible to a terrified jelly by snarling in his best native Maryhill Glaswegian-that 'you sonny would nae have a clue what a network is unless it hit ya on the f----g heid'
MBAs of course do not teach you how to deal with Glaswegians appearing to be on the verge of explosion into physical violence, so we heard no more of that.
Of course , and having done one myself and sponsored others , no MBA that I have seen has issues like
Upside-We kill a lot of people
Downside -We get killed.
I feel very sorry for you if you have to deal with this idiocy while trying to hold together what seems the very bare bones of defence forces, which as an earlier poster pointed out is not a profit making public company . It also cannot really use marketing and sales functions to any great degree and drafting the SLAs to cover outsourcing of combat missions (using best practice of course) would be an interesting exercise.
Gentleman Aviator
Here's a pretty little one, RAF Guetersloh SROs c. 1970:
"......... The persons to whom this instruction applies are to ............."
We searched high and low for definition of "the persons to whom".
"......... The persons to whom this instruction applies are to ............."
We searched high and low for definition of "the persons to whom".
All eyes turned to Sir Humphrey from the FO... [my comments/stage directions in square brackets]
Sir H: Clearly [always a bad sign] ....... [long pause] ...the FO retains responsibility .......... [long pause] ..... in those areas .... [shorter pause] ... for which it is responsible. [answer ends!]
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I can almost cope with the buzzword nonsense but it is the brazen lying that gets me.
I've recently been involved in our company bidding for a piece of work. For argument's sake, lets assume that the task needs a capability of 10 crews and associated aircraft/equipment. So, our proposals team asks me along for some specialist advice. I point-out that we only have the capability to generate, at very best, 4 crews etc and it will take some time to increase to about 6 crews (I must admit, I fell into the trap and used the phrase "ramp up"
). Getting any more capability will take significant time, i.e. years. "Not a problem," says the team leader, "we'll just lie in the bid and sort it out after we get the contract".
The bit that is really bizarre? We'll probably get the contract, the customer will not complete any form of sensible due-diligence and in about a year's time we'll be sat around the table arguing over who did what and the customer will ultimately pay!
Welcome to the civilian world.
I've recently been involved in our company bidding for a piece of work. For argument's sake, lets assume that the task needs a capability of 10 crews and associated aircraft/equipment. So, our proposals team asks me along for some specialist advice. I point-out that we only have the capability to generate, at very best, 4 crews etc and it will take some time to increase to about 6 crews (I must admit, I fell into the trap and used the phrase "ramp up"
). Getting any more capability will take significant time, i.e. years. "Not a problem," says the team leader, "we'll just lie in the bid and sort it out after we get the contract".The bit that is really bizarre? We'll probably get the contract, the customer will not complete any form of sensible due-diligence and in about a year's time we'll be sat around the table arguing over who did what and the customer will ultimately pay!
Welcome to the civilian world.
..and the lying is the major objection. The MBA I met who banged on continually about "deliverables" failed to deliver a d@mn thing, including several things he promised and set a deadline for.
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Current policians seem to forget that the sort of "delivery" the RAF is supposed to do, is to deliver something that makes a big bang and leaves a large smoking hole.
Fox.
The MBA brigade ( now increasingly being tumbled) , plus HR "practitioners' ( tumbled years ago ) , plus lap dog Accountants ( 6 months ahead only in vision , with eyes to the City) , plus a "Business Model" fable (good for the GMD in his annual report to blow smoke over the share holders ) seem still to constitute a mutually supporting and non-productive, clique of dominance in some quarters of industry.
Plus of course the employment, at great cost, of teams of "management consultants" ( also infected as above ) as part and parcel of the abrogation of responsibility and accountability to the responsibilities incumbent upon competent management
And all of the above constructs are usually peopled by individuals apparently considering themselves far too important to bother with , or to be qualified in or know anything about the real market requirements , technical personnel skills , design or manufacturing implications and applications for the products involved:other perceived qualifications seeming to be more important.
One certain GMD of a quite large blue chip company group I worked for was either the youngest RN Captain ( of a Corvette) on D-day, or the youngest RAF pilot Captain on the Berlin Airlift -- depending on the ( captive) audience in his presence. It transpired that he was also the only Member of the IEEE who had never heard of him. That Group,not surprisingly, collapsed in due course.
" If you have nine women, you can make a baby in a month".
The MBA brigade ( now increasingly being tumbled) , plus HR "practitioners' ( tumbled years ago ) , plus lap dog Accountants ( 6 months ahead only in vision , with eyes to the City) , plus a "Business Model" fable (good for the GMD in his annual report to blow smoke over the share holders ) seem still to constitute a mutually supporting and non-productive, clique of dominance in some quarters of industry.
Plus of course the employment, at great cost, of teams of "management consultants" ( also infected as above ) as part and parcel of the abrogation of responsibility and accountability to the responsibilities incumbent upon competent management
And all of the above constructs are usually peopled by individuals apparently considering themselves far too important to bother with , or to be qualified in or know anything about the real market requirements , technical personnel skills , design or manufacturing implications and applications for the products involved:other perceived qualifications seeming to be more important.
One certain GMD of a quite large blue chip company group I worked for was either the youngest RN Captain ( of a Corvette) on D-day, or the youngest RAF pilot Captain on the Berlin Airlift -- depending on the ( captive) audience in his presence. It transpired that he was also the only Member of the IEEE who had never heard of him. That Group,not surprisingly, collapsed in due course.
" If you have nine women, you can make a baby in a month".
You see the problem with MBAs, HR, Accountants etc is that there are a few who actually know what they are doing. My BIL is an accountant. As FD, he didn't try to tell his Animal Feed employer how to sell Animal Feed. He did, however, sort the boring routine stuff like insurance. The plant and warehouse burnt down on Boxing Day one year. This is peak time for animal feed. The conversation with the CEO at 6 am went something like.
CEO "I'm ruined!"
BIL "No you aren't, we are insured"
CEO "But I'm only insured for £xxmillion"
BIL "I reviewed that in June. You are insured for £yymillion plus cover to buy in feed from elsewhere to keep your contracts going. We will in fact profit from this fire, but I didn't start it, honest!"
CEO "I'm saved. I want to have your babies!"
..and the insurance company tried to duck the payments and appointed an independent assessor....except the independent assessor was the guy who'd been appointed by BIL to do the review in June, because my BIL had checked that he was on the insurance company's list first.
Mind you, he doesn't like many other accountants.
CEO "I'm ruined!"
BIL "No you aren't, we are insured"
CEO "But I'm only insured for £xxmillion"
BIL "I reviewed that in June. You are insured for £yymillion plus cover to buy in feed from elsewhere to keep your contracts going. We will in fact profit from this fire, but I didn't start it, honest!"
CEO "I'm saved. I want to have your babies!"
..and the insurance company tried to duck the payments and appointed an independent assessor....except the independent assessor was the guy who'd been appointed by BIL to do the review in June, because my BIL had checked that he was on the insurance company's list first.
Mind you, he doesn't like many other accountants.
I once received a letter from a sqn ldr containing the phrase 'sine qua non' followed by, in brackets, an explanation of the Latin phrase. Such arrogance I found common among HQ thrusters. Similarly, a wg cdr once 'praised' me for the correct use of the semicolon. I was not surprised at the sqn ldr, but I thought the wg cdr was better than that.
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I once received a letter from a sqn ldr containing the phrase 'sine qua non' followed by, in brackets, an explanation of the Latin phrase. Such arrogance I found common among HQ thrusters. Similarly, a wg cdr once 'praised' me for the correct use of the semicolon. I was not surprised at the sqn ldr, but I thought the wg cdr was better than that.
Result=one interview ohne tea & biccies with the CI.