Virtual Corners

Signs of recovery within the business community cannot come too soon for most people in the UK. We have seen lots of these signs in the marketplace but I wonder whether these are phantom signs rather than real ones. Some consultants are deciding to leave assignments as higher rates are available elsewhere and some are prepared to hold out for assignments closer to their base location. Some consultants are trying to re-negotiate terms at the end of projects and they are doing this with more conviction than hope. These are the signs of a booming economy rather than one that is still wheezing.

However, in reality, are there more assignments out there? Are there more projects getting the green light? Are there more new business initiatives being launched? I don’t think that this is the case. I was meeting with one of the CTOs of a major UK Bank and the story there was about reductions, cost cutting and removing consultants rather than expansion. I have also seen a client who is going to release all of their consultants at the end of the month to see if they could manage without them and then only invite the most essential back in later. Clients beware! Less scrupulous consultants may see this as an opportunity for profiteering or may feel that their market worth has increased with all the talk of growth.

The reality is that this is still a very difficult marketplace to trade in and whilst positive thinking is helpful, I want to see a genuine increase in opportunity before I claim that we have turned any corners, virtual or not.

Fiddling Whilst Rome Burns!

At any one time within an organisation there are a large number of things to fix or improve. When things are going well it is difficult to justify significant change in case the successes are diminished. Conversely, when things are going badly, or the business is under pressure due to economic conditions, change is the word on everyone’s lips. 

Addressing the fundamentals of the business, whether this be product quality, service levels, pricing or marketing should be at the forefront of decision makers minds. Why should it be the case then that shallow, ill-conceived re-organisations are so popular when more important issues need to be dealt with.

I think the answer is that humans are not logical creatures and often have trouble facing up to difficult challenges when there are easier but less important problems to solve.

Why look hard at the viability of your oldest product or service? Why question the new market sector initiative that you took last year? Why make difficult long term decisions on pricing? Why do any of these things when an easy option is to move some people around, rename departments and re-write job profiles. 

Re-organisations create a lot of noise, make people believe that their managers are taking strong decisions and distract people from the more significant impact of falling sales. It is a tried and tested method of pepping up a business but I think that they lack genuine dynamism.

The new saying might read that you don’t get fired for ordering re-organisations but these days maybe someone should.