In a message to Paul about Comment from Dieter, Alan said:

AW> As for improving productivity, well that's simple. All legal
AW> officers should have to learn to type their own letters rather
AW> than writing them longhand, or dictating them, getting a draft
AW> back, changing that and going through the rigmarole a few times.
AW> That would save about 50 jobs and whilst taking longer at first,
AW> would improve their efficiency in the long run. Only the very
AW> highest in the hierarchy at IBM had their own assistants. The rest
AW> made do quite happily without. All companies should be the same.

Agreed, and it works too.

AW> I find your ideas not totally ridiculous. I think I stuffed up a job
AW> interview after IBM with this attitude. The interviewer asked me what
AW> I would do if I were a supervisor and someone came in 10 minutes late
AW> for the second time, with the same excuse of major domestic trouble at
AW> home. I said she should be sacked and no one should be a minute late,
AW> even if she was the best worker. Stiff shit about the marriage break-up
AW> she was going through.

So are you a 'supervisor' where you are now?  God help those that work
under you if you are!

Where I work, a small company with half a dozen employees (ignoring
our parent company next door) ranging from a production assistant,
production manager, salesman, and three engineers, no one gives a fuck
if someone is half an hour late even.  If so and so feels sick and wants
to take the rest of the afternoon off, then they take the rest of the
afternoon off.  The other day, I needed to go to the optometrist - I
make an appointment for 10:00am, and was gone a total of fourty-five
minutes or so.  The other weekend, I had to traipse into the city to
remove some equipment from an office that we'd installed some time
ago.  No thanks or remuneration for that annoying episode.

The price we pay, in contrast to the monkeys in the factory next door,
is that us three engineers can be found at work at 6:00pm most nights,
if not later, especially if there's any imminent urgency for something
to be done.  The six o'clock news?  What's that?!?  Life goes on,
despite the fact that I might have slept in twenty minutes later that
morning.  The company gets its pound of flesh none the less.  At least
I can be thankful they aren't idiotically unreasonable in making us
conform to 'standard hours' and having someone standing at the door
ready to dock my pay because I dropped some groceries into my
grandmothers place on the way to work...  IOW, our management know
not to rock the boat when they're already on a good thing!

'tnt, Amfony.


--- Maximus/2 2.01wb