Still Stalled

Tuesday continued in a very similar vein to Monday* ...

... the crunched numbers were given further analysis so that we truly knew that we are in the shit rather than, more sensibly, working on a plan to get us out of the aforementioned excrement. At one point in the day I had a brief discussion with the Sales Exec and I candidly mentioned that I was at a loss to see where we were headed with this analysis. I was somewhat taken aback that he admitted that he wasn't clear either. I need to stress that my surprise was at the fact that he admitted this to me, as his actions and statements have been lacking direction and leadership for a good few weeks.

The lack of a plan has meant that I have refused to work stupid hours each day. I can see no point in doing crazily long days when, for the moment, we are stood around looking at a bloated corpse of a deal. As a result I have made sure that I have taken an hour out the day to walk T&M around the Three Miler. On that subject all I can say is "Christ, it is bloody cold out at the moment" with bitterly cold winds and snow flurries coming in from the Continent.

Towards the end of the day a conference call was held with some senior interested parties and, as usual, they all stood around and poked the corpse with a stick hoping to make it ooze. At an opportune moment I took to the stage and outlined an action that might get the numbers in to better shape. Basically we need to remove cost and there is only one way that this can be done. The SMIs will get nowhere taking resources out of their solutions because they don't have the on the ground knowledge to know whether they are removing fat or cutting out critical organs. We need to have the Delivery Executive involved to sanction each and every head that we remove from the solution. As a result it looks like I will be having a long day in London on Thursday.

It was an early dinner this evening as 30% and TP headed out with the ukulele to see Doctor Dave. I filled this time crunching further numbers and chatting the the Sales Exec. At about half past eight the two returned with smiles on their faces ...

... apparently the volume control had failed and Dr Dave had simply bypassed the control making the ukulele reliant on the amplifier for adjustments. This is great news as the deadline for submitting this project is rapidly approaching and short of getting a new control box I was at a loss to help him.

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*Apart from not having a trip to the Artrix in Bromsgrove to see Marcus Brigstocke's Brig Society tour. It was basically Brigstocke telling us that he was a posh bloke, but not as posh as David Cameron or Gideon George Osborne and how the Big Society concept hadn't really worked. I have to say that it was "OK" and raised a few laughs but, as a set, it didn't really hang together particularly well and I saw similarities to Mark Thomas' Peoples Manifesto concept so question the originality. The biggest laugh of the night was given to a member of the audience who told Brigstocke he was a Fudge Packer in response to an enquiry about his occupation. Sorry Marcus, it was funny but only 6/10 funny.