Wednesday, 30 November 2011

Striking

All this striking bugs me somewhat. There are too many public sector workers as it is. The previous government artificially created lots of jobs to keep unemployment figures low, and introduced a mass of expensive regulation that cost both the private sector and the taxpayer a huge amount of money. They borrowed billions every year to fund these jobs, and now the people who have them are going on strike to protest at pension reforms.
At least they have pensions.
What I find amusing is that (admittedly only a few hours into my working day) everything is running smoothly. My drive to work was traffic-free, probably because nobody is meddling with the traffic light system. Reports on the radio suggest things are going more smoothly at airports with passengers being greeted with friendly smiles instead of the usual suspicion, and to top it all off, the weather forecasters must be on strike because it’s sunny! Smile with tongue out
It will be interesting to see how badly services are affected with all these people not working. If everything runs smoothly, all they prove is that they aren’t needed and can be made redundant. And who will pay their unemployment benefit if they are made redundant? Well, the same people who pay their salaries now; the taxpayer.
Of course nobody reads this blog so my opinion is out there waiting to be quoted or linked or tweeted, but it’s unlikely it will ever see the light of day! D’oh Smile

Monday, 28 November 2011

Social Butterfly

It would appear that fate has dealt me some interesting cards and I now find myself turning into a social networking and online communities expert. I am quite surprised by how much I already know about this, and very pleased to hear feedback from the various vendors in my selection process, that my comments on the client requirements document are spot on.
What does this mean for me?

Well for a start, as a social media expert I’d better get blogging and tweeting more! Whether I will actually manage this remains to be seen, and I am finding it difficult to post everywhere so it’s either a blog post if I’ve got something long to write (that I think nobody other than the odd recruitment consultant will read anyway), a tweet if it’s a photo, because my iPhone can do that easily since iOS5, or a facebook status update if I want answers to my questions from people who know about such things.
I had a great meeting with Telligent on Friday, who showed me a couple of videos that got me all excited: This one about APAN really moved me, and this one from Socialnomics author Erik Qualman filled me with a feeling of excitement and ‘I told you so’ as it relates to almost everything I’ve been working on in my field anyway.
Something that unites all the vendors I’ve been speaking to is a sense that the community has to sustain itself and it’s unwise to attempt to prescribe to people what they can and can’t do. One of the appeals of social community driven sites is the freedom to be able to use the site in almost any way the user wants, and this is what I will be aiming for in the solution I deploy over the next few months.
With any luck, I won’t be too busy to update this blog with my progress Smile

Wednesday, 16 November 2011

everything everywhere

Well, they aren’t really everything and they aren’t really everywhere, but that’s their plan. And as of today I’ve just saved the company I’m working for £80000 by migrating our mobile phones to them and away from Vodafone. They assisted us with some interesting financial structuring that plugged a hole in our finances for this year.
Along with the saving we’re also planning on moving our remote and home staff to mi-fi mobile data devices, so they can access the Internet from wherever they are instead of (in some cases) having to sit under the stairs to use the computer where their current staff ADSL goes in.
During the bidding process I dealt with people from Vodafone, O2 and Orange, and Orange were by far the most professional. They were also fastest at responding to requests, and had answers for every question we fired at them.
I look forward to working with them in future, and am even considering moving over my personal lines to them as they currently have a great £7 SIM only offer Smile

Sunday, 13 November 2011

Apple Service

Next time you complain that apple products are very expensive, remember they are backed up by a network of retail stores where you can take your device for free support. Compare this with other manufacturers who usually expect you to contact your local warranty centre and arrange to post it back to them.
On a similar note, apple are replacing the original iPod Nano I bought in 2005. Apparently they have batteries that explode or something. I always wondered why the battery in mine deteriorated so quickly! :)

Tuesday, 8 November 2011

Money Saving Expert

I am about to save the company I work for about £150000. More details in a future post!

:)

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