The leader and the technician

In my last post, I shared the conversation that Mr Tosh and I had on Kenny Dalglish and his prospects at Liverpool. 

Liverpool responded well to the appointment of Dalglish and finished in a respectable 6th place.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Testament to the benefit of a motivational leader who recognises his own weakness.  Kenny’s love of golf probably meant he was not up to speed on modern football training techniques – so he appoints a great number two. 

A great motivator supported by a technical expert is always a winning combo – in business or football.

The role of a football manager

There has been a lot of talk in Tosh Towers about the appointment of Kenny Dalgish as the manager of Liverpool football club.  The first question discussed was around whether he has been playing too much golf to be up to speed on modern football management.

If this was a business scenario, all you would want is a leader with a vision who could inspire his team.  Knowledge of the market and the latest operational techniques can be acquired with a good team.  So I don’t think Kenny’s love of golf should be a deciding factor.

I believe the question should be can Dalgish inspire and motivate the Liverpool team.

I sadly suspect that the answer to the first question is yes and the answer to our second question is no.

I guess only time will tell

A focus on equality

Mr Tosh and I have spent a very enjoyable 30 minutes watching Jeff Randell’s Christmas Dinner (well worth watching).  But the talking point of the interview was the discussion between Carolyn McCall and Stuart Rose.

I was interested in Carolyn’s perspective re flexibility for women.  She highlighted the need for women to be allowed flexible working as mothers.

My personal experience of women in the workplace is that flexible working often lets mothers down.  They want flexible working but they expect it all to be on their terms.  Flexible working is a success when it is treated as a 2-way relationship.  If you agree with your boss to come in late/leave early then there may be times when you need to change that to reflect the needs of your office and this is when your other half comes into play.   Fathers of children also have responsibilities.  If both parents choose to work then deals need to be made that work for all parties concerned.  My big annoyance is the assumption that it is always the mother who will make the sacrifice and never the father.  I believe that this working assumption is the biggest cause of discrimination in the workplace.  It is this misplaced view that can end the career of an ambitious woman.

I always present a different perspective when I am told ‘aaahhh but men can’t manage like us women…’  WHAT??? It was this type of argument that denied women the vote and resulted in segregation in the US.  But women can now vote and we have a black President.  By denying men the opportunity to properly manage the combined demands of children and work because we don’t think they are able to cope is just another form of discrimination.  Therefore – being a believer in the capability of men, we need to challenge this and allow them the opportunity to succeed.

Finally, Bob Diamond shared that the last 2 appointments to Barclays board were female appointments.  Having spent time at Barclays, they are a successful organisation and one of the reasons that they are successful is that they judge on merit rather than on preconceived views.  Perhaps there is something other firms can learn from bankers!

What I have learnt from working in Financial Services

After poor and unreliable broadband, Mr Tosh and I have been looking into replacing our current service provider – BT.

I am embarrassed to say that we currently pay £25pm for a poor service with our broadband (capped at 2Mb).  So, we decide to move to Sky – as existing Sky tv customers we pay £7.50 pm against a comparable BT package of £28pm. 

To save our approx £250pa, we needed a code from BT – Mr Tosh grumbled that BT would try to sell him a new package, so I made the call.  I was amazed to hear that we were great customers as early adopters and good payers – therefore a bit disappointing that they knew we had old equipment which was unreliable, they capped our broadband and we were paying a premium for being loyal (aka lazy) customers. Mr T was correct and they did offer us a package - they matched the Sky deal and offered us some new equipment – all we needed to do was agree to the package for 12 months.

The BT chap said all I needed to do was to commit to a 12 month contract – ‘all broadband providers want you to sign up for a 12 month contract’.  This is true. 

So what have I learnt from working in financial services that I used today when talking to BT?

As I spend a lot of time looking at customers who have been ripped off because they don’t take the time to understand what they are buying, I like to discuss all of the small print of contracts that tie me in for a period of time. As I discussed the 12-month contract with BT – it transpired that the deal being offered me only lasted 12 months and after that period my monthly payment would more than double again back to £28pm.  This sharp practice only came to light after me asking a detailed question – I believe that BT would never have told me this and would have relied upon Tosh ‘loyalty’ to fleece us for more money in 12 months time.

I am disappointed that firms like BT treat customers in this way.  BT could learn so much from Sky on retaining customers.   

The joy of reading

Below is a photo of young James being presented with some books from Croydon’s Mayor, for being one of the youngest babies to join a Croydon library in June.  When James joined the library he was 5 days old and was beaten into third place by two younger babies!

James commitment is in part driven by his big brother’s love of books and visiting our local library.  Our local Liberians are wonderful and we know them by name as we attend a couple of reading and music sessions there.

Alan’s love of reading has been encouraged by a number of factors – parents that love reading, encouragement at the library and the good work of Book Start.  While we enjoy reading, it is helpful to get guidance from Book Start so that we know which books are likely to be winners. 

I consider the boys to be lucky to have two parents who are committed to encouraging them to read and I know that there are many children who are not as fortunate – hence the benefit of our local library.  We live in a relatively deprived part of London  and I see that our library offers more than just a place to borrow books.  Over the summer holidays, I have seen many children enjoying the summer’s reading challenges and during term time, I am aware of the children being supported during homework clubs.  My experience of using the library is evidenced on a national basis through the work of the Reading Agency. 

As a nation, we need more skilled knowledge workers and discouraging literacy by closing libraries would be detrimental to a generation of children who would miss out on the range of services that a library can offer.  So as a mother and as a professional who struggles to recruit enough skilled people into her workplace, I am committed to ensuring my library services remain accessible.

Shades of grey

I saw a re-tweet this morning which looked very binary in its perspective.  I am not sure our current financial crisis can be viewed in such a simplistic manner.

The tweet said ‘there’s prob no choice re cuts, but annoyed that history is being revised so that financial crisis is due to public spending, not the banks’ (for the sake of discretion, I have avoided naming the original poster of the tweet and the person who re-tweeted it).

Firstly, I am not really sure that history is being re-written but here are my thoughts on the current financial crisis and some of the reasons we are in the mess we are.

1.The last Government they are at fault for a number of reasons; ‘the end to boom and bust’ ethos peddled by its Chancellor; the growth of our public sector (having been at hospital today – the admin of a hospital does give the impression of large and inefficient); and the public praise of bankers who behaved in an irresponsible manner.

2. Consumers – they took their spending lead from the government and spent money they didn’t have with the expectation things would always get better.

3.The Banks – yes they are partly to blame – they were given the opportunity to make lots of money and they took it.

4. The regulators who allowed banks to behave like this.  As someone who works in the financial services community, I was and still am amazed at the culture that was allowed to exist in small sections of the banking community.

However, while it is easy to blame bankers for a set of circumstances they contributed to, we must also realise that a strong financial services sector will be one of our keys to financial recovery.  One of the reasons the UK Government borrowed less than initial forecasts was due to tax revenue from this sector.

It is now time for us to learn from our mistakes and sort out the economy – hopefully through public sector cuts and through increased tax revenue as successful business pay more  tax in line with their business growth.

It’s a disgrace

I am taking some time out of my day to use my blog as a means of therapy/anger management.  I would prefer to hit Gordon Brown around the head until he agrees that he needs to take some action but I am not sure that  would make any impact hence this post.

The Farepak story is a relatively old one, so let me remind you of what happened.  Farepak offered a Christmas club where you could save on a weekly basis and then at Christmas time you would have a pot of cash to spend – without getting into debt.  These customers were typically low paid workers acting in a responsible manner by saving rather than getting into debt at Christmas.  The now publicly bailed out HBOS failed to extend the parent company’s overdraft and the firm went bust.

It was announced today that a number of the directors of the firm have now been forced into making additional payments to Farepak savers and they will now get back 15p for every £1 they saved.  The average saver saved £400, so they will get back £60 rather than the previous estimate of £16.  Good news, I may hear some of you say.

So why am I so angry?

1. If you invested £100,000 into an offshore Icelandic bank -  then Gordon Brown was willing to take legal action on your behalf.  Why does a labour leader feel the need to protect the richest greediest part of society but not responsible working class savers?  He guarantees customers who send their many thousands of pounds off-shore but does nothing for those who save, on average, £4o0 for Christmas.

2. The Conservative manifesto says ‘A Conservative government will promote responsible consumer finance by creating a powerful Consumer Protection Agency (CPA) to take over the Financial Services Authority’s consumer protection role.  Why doesn’t the Tories speak out for these customers?  This type of Christmas club is likely to remain unprotected under their proposed consumer protection agency.  

3. Cannot comment on the Lib Dems and their view on Farepak as they don’t appear to have one…

4. Finally, none of the major news websites have anything on Farepak  as a front page story. their silence supports the leading parties into failing to care about genuinely responsible savers in the UK.

Perhaps our politicians feel that £400 is not a lot of money and therefore not worth bothering about.  Though when you consider that HBOS (who failed to extend the overdraft of Farepak) has been bailed out by £17 billion, it does make £400 per saver seem like very small cheese. 

Wearing a poppy with pride

While watching Sky News yesterday, I was saddened to see that Sky was giving a voice to the nasty Lindsey German from the Stop the War Coalition.  She was wearing a poppy – but not in respect of the solders who had been killed in Iraq and Afghanistan.  It was clear that the value of their lives and the impact to the dead solders mothers, wives and children were meaningless against her belief that the war is wrong. 

While I may not agree with our troops being in Iraq or Afghanistan, I believe Lindsey’s anger should lie at the door of the Government and not at the brave armed forces and their families.  Though with the number of Labour MPs in the Stop the War Coalition this honesty may not fit with the modern-day labour party. 

So when the London arm of the McIntosh family wear their poppies today – it is with the thanks to the armed forces – past, present and future.

Moral compass

There are some days where I think my moral compass must be off beam.  I read an article and just cannot believe it.

In today’s Guardian, there is a piece on the dream toys for Christmas this year.  I click on the piece for niece/nephew inspiration.  One of the toys is a lovely looking cat.  This cat is predicted to be one of the best sellers of the year.

What is strange about this is that the cat is promoted as having ‘real fur’.  If this is the case, I am questioning:

• why would a parent buy their child a product that has been made of dead animal – would they buy them a fur coat?
• why would the Guardian promote this product?  I wonder what their view is on fur coats
• Why would toy makers think a fur product would be such a big seller?

I am hoping that the ‘real fur’ product is in fact polyester.   Or maybe, I am just completely out of touch with modern culture and Guardian values.

quick update – it is fake fur – hurrah.  I think AJ would like his own cat, that he can stroke at will

Working fathers

Interesting piece in today’s Guardian following on from a report in Equality and Human Rights Commission.

As a working mum with a career, I am only able to manage the demands of the career with a husband who pulls his weight as a dad.

I do agree that firm’s now need to support fathers in managing their responsibilities rather than the focus on flexible working for mothers alone.