This is why I wonder sometimes whether I’m suffering with Asperger’s Syndrome or sumik. I just don’t see the world as others do – and you know what – I like it like this!!! Leave me with whatever syndrome I suffer – untreated! It’s the rest of the world that is stupid or mad! Read on.
I’m invited to a professional breakfast seminar among some top brass in the next few days. The person who contacts me is the Director of Member Relations of the particular organisation (of which I’m one of about 15,000 members in the whole world). The venue of the meeting is 200 miles away in the north west. Keep that in mind!
I’m told that places are limited to 50, so I need to respond quickly. I do so. And the email conversation goes as follows over several exchanges over about a week with the PA to the Director of Member Relations (a female).
Here’s the sequence: [Anything in square brackets like this sentence are my comments or thoughts, or a timestamp]
Director: [11:14 AM] “The Xxxxx ternational Congress takes place in xxxxx from xxxx to xxxx , and you are cordially invited to a breakfast seminar at the Jury’s Inn hotel….Numbers are limited to 50 and you will need to pre-register….” [I exclude other irrelevant chatter for your ease of reading]
Me: [11:15 AM] “If it is free of charge count me in. I like free breakfasts. ;)” [It’s a breakfast seminar!! Note!!]
PA to Director: 14:47 PM] “Yes, it’s free but don’t get too excited = continental breakfast. Do you still want me to register you for the seminar?” [‘No – WTF, I just want the free breakfast..and I’ll be so disappointed if it’s merely a continental breakfast – you bledy jerk! – I thought to myself. Notice how the idiot is distracted by the word ‘breakfast’ – to the extent that I’m asked whether I want to register for the seminar. Like hellooooo!! What the hell does ‘If it’s free count me in’ mean?!! Oh you really want me to explain it. It means that I’m happy to be registered for the main object of the email, being the ‘breakfast seminar’ – but moron is distracted to think of breakfast as separate from ‘breakfast seminar’. So delicate is the cognitive process of.. morons! Or maybe the individual has a problem. Or may be – as a majority of you will claim, I’m to blame for joking about ‘liking breakfasts’ – yuh know – as a professional, and requiring to be totally PC, I should not be so light-hearted about things. Why? You mean I must submit to an world that is filled with political correctness, meat robots who cannot think figuratively or metaphorically, who are so bledy schizoid that if you distract them they lose the plot? Sorry – no – I’m not sorry – the day I concede to that crap, is the day I descend into the dust. So the ‘world’ will have to wait a bit longer.]
Me: [16:25] “Lol! Sure. Please confirm my place. :)” [Keeping it nice – but having impulses to travel 100 miles south to strangle someone]
PA: [16:28] “Will do.” [I sense this is going to go strange – the choice of words is wrong – and I already know I’m dealing with a moron]
Me: [Five days later – note well – 14:18] “And? Am I rubbing elbows at breakfast or what? :)”
PA: [14:21] “Oh I do apologise. I had registered your place and then forgot to tell you. See you on the xxth.” [And now you’re thinking, as I did, that that would be the end of that. Nope! read on.]
PA: [14:22] “Actually – I didn’t forget. Please see below:” [So I look below expecting to see an email with content that I had missed. What do I see? What’s she referring to? She’s referring to her email where she said “Will do”. So I scan diligently to see if I’ve missed something. Nope! Nothing missed. She is definitely referring to “Will do”.]
Well – now I expect a large percentage of persons reading this to go “What’s the problem?” – and when I do explain it, I will be psychoanalysed or diagnosed with OCD. Do I give a flying f* (fig)!!?
My point is simple – as I see it – if a person says “Will do” – I cannot know if they have done what they have said they will do, or whether some possibly unknown factor, interrupted them. In the scenario above, were I to turn up at a breakfast of international big wigs having, travelled 200 miles – assuming that ‘will do’ means I’m ‘in’ – I could well be faced with “sorry you’re not on the list”. Why? How? How embarrassing that would be – all because some moron went to the toilet perhaps and forgot to do what they said they “will do” and I was stupid enough to accept “Will do” as confirmed? Some still can’t get over the ‘breakfast’ thing – and if you’re a Rock-crawler, you won’t fathom that it’s not about ‘breakfast’ or even ‘breakfastses’!!
But for those of you in the minority who got my point early on, you’re probably wondering why I go on about something so simple. Yes – the situation is simple and yes in the normal scheme of things I shouldn’t be preoccupied by it. So why am I?
- This is a personal assistant to a reputable international organisation, I’m talking about.
- A system has selected such person who on one day, in an odd moment, has erred so grossly and tried to cover it up.
- This is a PA to the Director of Member Relations – so you would expect a bit more ‘brain’.
- If a system can select a person who – outside of the space of public scrutiny – can function like this, what do you leave for the average ‘man’ in the street. It is from that pool that systems select people.
- I don’t accept that a person could be so overworked, tired, or any excuses for the sequence above.
I conclude that the person and two tiers of management above should be sacked! Such persons would never enter any organisation that I was to lead. And if I found them on my watch, I’d sack them – I’d find a way to get rid of them, even if I have to make a pay out at an Employment Tribunal.
Organisations that say they are committed to ‘high quality’ service delivery need to select and pay if necessary, to deselect fools.
