From the virtual to the real

Strava is a great site for tracking my cycling and running exploits (if that is not too grand a term) and I was delighted to have a group of new virtual friends, even if they all seemed to ride quicker than I did. However to have found some of my real life friends (with whom I have broken bread and drunk Guinness in various European capital cities) on Garmin Connect has made me even happier (check out ajdobrien at http://connect.garmin.com/). After the last ride of 2012 today up the Col de St. Ignace, I start 2013 with some real life sporting friends even if many thousands of kilometers separates us and our training rides. Now to get my cousin and brothers all Garmin'd up! 

New Year's Resolution #1

...Remove all bits of titanium from my body in 2013...lucky then that earlier today I planned the operation to remove the plate from my left forearm for Friday 18th January. I had the plate put in a couple of years ago after a fall with Quolchique Saint Aubin which resulted in a triple fracture. The operation to remove it will require an overnight stay, although it will be performed using only a local anesthetic. I actually had a similar fall and break about 6 years ago. At that time the operation required a general anesthetic and the recovery was much more difficult. Two years ago I remember being struck by how medicine had moved on in only 4 years as I watched the anesthetist put my arm to sleep one nerve at a time over a period of 30 minutes or so. In a weird sort of way, I'm intrigued to see what happens in a couple of weeks.

Management guff but they found my Achilles heel

I received this motivational link from a colleague...I was naturally going to ask for the sick bowl, until I found out that over-achievers like lists....ah, lists, my precious lists...http://www.forbes.com/sites/tjmccue/2012/12/28/13-things-overachievers-do/ and http://blog.penelopetrunk.com/2012/12/25/15-things-overachievers-do/

Toto the click

I’ve been riding the same horse Pich de Toulven for the last couple of years. Despite his undoubted qualities he’s a complex beast, and he himself has also evolved and matured quite significantly since we first struck up our partnership. As with many things in life one can always justify the mediocre results one might achieve; in the case of Pich things such as the double change of jobs, the arrival of twins, and the lack of sleep are all too easy to call out. However about a month ago, shortly after my last inauspicious show, it seemed like something clicked, I had what I like to call an epiphany moment (my coach Michel prefers to say, “oih, l’irlandais, have you finally understood what I’ve been telling you for two years, or was that just a stroke of luck?”). 

As much as every horse has a different morphology, there seem to be a set of basic principles that have to be applied (in different doses) to all horses; rebound in the canter, a horse balanced on both shoulders coming out of the corner, a little check as you start the final run into the jump, lifting up the horse’s head to lower his hindquarters, the application of a bit of leg pressure in the last few slides, soft hands over the jump, and for me, making sure my legs stay in place as I come down on the other side.  The last month has seen me manage to put all these different elements together on Pich with some pleasing results. However it was only when I rode Toto the trotter earlier today did things really start to sink in. From an equine morphology point of view, Toto is the polar opposite of Pich. However Michel insisted that the same principles applied to both horses, all I had to do was to find the different mix of doses for this new mount. It took me a few minutes but afterwards the lesson was learnt, and indeed this afternoon’s session will undoubtedly help me cement the progress of the last month. Is 2013 the finally going to be the year of Pich de Toulven and Aidan d’Aquitaine? 

Mid life retirement

I remember a few years ago asking a recently retired mother in law what the week ahead held in store for her. She started her response by pausing, and then saying, “well Monday, I need to go to the Post Office, Tuesday...” I’ve made fun of her ever since suggesting that when going to the Post Office becomes the main activity of your day, then you really know you’re on the downward slide. However when I look at my activity report for this morning it runs something like, “got up, dressed three small children and had a shave”. And the worst thing is that I was actually quite proud of myself to have been able to get everyone in a state of dress with freshly cleaned teeth! Maybe I should put those stones back in a box now that I’ve discovered that the house I live in is made of glass (http://www.goenglish.com/PeopleWhoLiveInGlassHousesShouldNotThrowStones.asp). On the bright side, at least Frodo managed to save the world last night so it's not all bad...

Spanish Sharks and the Return of Kings

Today was meant to be an afternoon of physical exertion up the col d’Ibardin. Instead it turned into a day out in San Sebastian with Sandie, Maxime and Gaston. Eating a chocolate brownie and drinking a vanilla milkshake after a visit of the aquarium took a lot less effort than slogging up a Basque mountain on a bike. The day was made even easier by the fact that Capucine spent the day with her paternal grandparents in Biarritz. San Sebastian is a wonderful place. We saw the old town, the aquarium complete with seahorses, star fish and sharks, and some parts of the modern town. I was really taken by it. It’s only 50km from Biarritz so definitely within striking distance on a bike, although I suspect I’d need some tapas and pincho (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pincho) style re-fuelling on arrival before contemplating a round trip. After getting back to Biarritz the evening was dominated by the third part of the Lord of the Rings triology. I have amazed myself as much as anyone by being able to watch all three films this week. I decided I wanted to see it after the last au pair, Jessica, waxed lyrical about it. I really didn’t think it would be my type of thing, but I have to admit I’ve really been quite taken by it. I have definitely preferred some of the other films I’ve seen recently e.g. Argo (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1024648/) or the intouchables (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1675434/?ref_=sr_1), but I’m very happy to have invested the time watching the Tolkien classics over the Christmas period. Right back to the end of Sam saving Mr. Frodo…hopefully!

Christmas Precision

I took Maxime to mass on Christmas Day. He still struggles to sit quietly for an hour (or any period of time longer than about 90 seconds). I was however very appreciative of his precision when he told me he had decided to go for a wee..."outside" (the church). Both Father Christmas and Baby Jesus heaved a bit sigh of relief.

Santa's French

This Santa thing is brilliant. It's not just the fact that it is the best child behaviour management technique ever invented, it's the level of sophistication in that technique that has been developed over the years. Maxime has been wonderfully behaved for the whole of the month of December, well ever since we started opening the doors on the advent calendar to reveal little chocolates. Chocolate at breakfast?... On the 1st December he thought all his Christmas' had come at once (they almost did - this is only his fifth). Needless to say Capucine and Gaston also cottoned on quickly. And just when you think the "Santa only brings presents to good little boys" must wear out after the first two weeks, it doesn't. And even better, from the middle of December onwards introducing the phrase, "you have to be in your bed because Santa comes round to count the little boys in their beds to understand how many toys he has to bring", merely serves to add extra authenticity to it all; I have never seen Maxime run to his bed like he did tonight. Tremendous. It's just a shame that we can't do this all year round, but that's when I realised that full time work in the months of November and December roughly equate to fourty-one 35 hour working weeks...clearly there's a significant chance that work-shy Santa is French.

A hangover worth having

It was more difficult to get to Madrid yesterday than expected. A passport mix up with Sandie meant I missed my original flight after having driven 90 minutes to get to the airport in San Sebastian. Thankfully I managed to get to Spain a bit later in the afternoon after the au pair had transformed herself into a motorway passport delivery service. It was worth it. 2012 isn’t finishing in Spain the way I wanted, but I was adamant I wanted to see the team again before the end of the year. It was the right decision. I went to the office party and it was good to relax with the team and have a few drinks after a few draining months. The headache I had when I got up at 6.30AM to fly back to France this morning was well worth it. I’m now in Biarritz after a round trip to Pau during the day to pick up the family. We’ll be here for the next two weeks and I’m looking forward to the break. We’ll see what 2013 brings, but for the minute I’m more interested in seeing what Father Christmas will bring.

Strava and my imaginary friends

What’s all this about Big data? Everyone seems to be talking about social media, open, machine to machine and now personal data lockers http://www.economist.com/news/business/21568438-data-lockers-promise-help-people-profit-their-personal-information-know-thyself. Could this really be true? As the end of the year approaches I am managing to find a bit of time to play around with some of the gadgets I’ve bought over the last couple of months. I received a personal GPS and heart monitor for my birthday and which I now use religiously whenever I take my bike out or go running. I just worked out how to upload all this information onto the web. Apparently I can start to link to my friends to compare our respective workouts, speeds and power ratios. What’s even better is that whilst I try and find some real friends, the website www.strava.com gives me some imaginary friends to compare myself against, because “Frederic Tonera” and “Mark Telfer” are obviously real people…

BMI Book Cover

I read the following Economist article recently http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21568389-state-can-do-some-things-encourage-people-eat-less-not-lot-fat-chance. When I first read the initial article, it fell into the “mildly interesting and thought provoking” category and no more. That was until I sat on very small plane with an extremely large chap. That particular flight was a most unpleasant experience – having the window seat whilst the man on your left literally overflowed into your own personal space wasn’t great. The fact that he drank Coke and ate Air France cookies the whole time just rubbed salt (or sugar) into the wound. That hour long flight got me thinking about the time when I lived in Denmark working on a project for a pharmaceutical company with a load of diabetes statisticians. Oh how a BMI tax sounds so seductive and easy…except for the fact that I recall endless debates about how exactly one measures BMI – it doesn’t seem to be that simple http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_mass_index. However, this theoretical debate, which would indeed limit one’s ability to implement a BMI tax, was not as compelling as the following letter from Dave Powell in Bristol who said, “muscle is a lot denser than fat, so BMI doesn’t necessarily indicate fitness. To give an example, Mo Farah, one of Britain’s outstanding Olympic champions, has a BMI of around 21 (based on height and weight figures I found) which puts him in the BMI’s healthy category. But another great Olympic champion, Steve Redgrave, at a towering six-foot five, would have had a BMI of around 26 at his peak, which would indicate that he is overweight. Taking things a step further Mike Tyson would have a BMI over 33, which was off the scale on the BMI calculator I used. Now I don’t know about you, but I’m not going to be first in the queue to inform Mr. Tyson that he is morbidly obese”… But the real moral of the story? As I got off the plane, the fat chap passed me my jacket and was the most charming of gentlemen. I suppose one really shouldn’t judge a person by his BMI score.

As good as it gets?

The kids have been sent off to Pau with their mother. I am now sitting on the couch in Biarritz waiting for the finals of my favourite UK TV programmes “Strictly Come Dancing” and “X-Factor” after also having managed to get the bike out for almost two hours this afternoon during their siesta. I’ve just tidied the house and there are bananas, fresh milk and vanilla ice-cream in the fridge. For a cleanliness obsessed 35 year father of a young family, does life get any better than this?

Dance, and bike, before the music starts

I often think that my initial spells in Oxford and Paris might have been more enjoyable if I had been readier to embrace the particularities and inherent character of each place. It’s not just a case of not dancing faster than the music it’s also a case of singing in tune with it. That said, every now and again it is beneficial to stand out from the crowd. Although I personally am, France is definitely not a country of early risers. Hence my delight to be able to get up at the crack of dawn and get a not insignificant part of my Christmas shopping done by 10.30AM this morning without having to fight with a flood of furious festive shoppers. Two hours in the mountains on my new bike in the afternoon added a feeling of virtue to the smug spring in my step. The upshot was that I felt at ease easting copious amounts of chocolate cake at Maxime’s second birthday party today in Biarritz. Round that all off with a healthy dose of X-Factor fun and it’s safe to say that it’s been a good day all round.

Getting back in the saddle

The problem with being passionate about the job that you do and the people in your team is that you leave yourself open to the risk that sometimes it makes you sad. Over the last couple of months the ideas have been coming as ever but the blog postings have not. I’ve been embroiled in a few rather complicated topics which have taken up a lot of mental and emotional energy. The sadness comes from the fact that despite my being personally committed and completely convinced of a plan that I had developed, another route has been chosen by senior management and it is one that is likely to have a human cost. I suppose it’s somewhat ironic then that when I started to write this particular posting, I found an earlier half-finished posting which started by saying, “there are so many different lines of reporting and management that decision making power is all over the place and that people who sit together on a daily basis have much more ability to influence things than people who are travelling remotely, regardless of level of seniority in a company.” As I sit here in my new role as influencer rather than one of the two owners or decision makers who are finalizing their top down 2013 plan, I must make a mental note to be careful for what I wish for.

So that somewhat cryptic explanation aside, what else has been going on since Gaston and Capucine’s second birthday…

I find that we as adult humans tend to try and create generalizations to serve as short cuts in this time starved world. Despite getting better at trying to avoid living life at one million miles an hour, I unfortunately do the same – I’ve recently managed to refine and express my classification of French people into two categories. I believe that all French people are either râleur-moteur, or râleur-casseur. Basically this means all French people like to complain, although half of them complain and then try to make things better (“moteur” or a motor for change) , whereas the other half complain and then do nothing positive (from the verb “casser” which means “to break”). The trick in France is to surround oneself with the first type of person. A real life example is after a French team complained that there were never any social activities for them, I then arranged a series of nights out. Hardly anyone turned up. They only came after I pointed out to them that this was something they had asked for. Vive la France.

At work, I have had a number of key new people join the team in France, the Netherlands and Switzerland. It’s been nice to see the building out of a team in line with the initial analysis and definition of a strategy that was done. Only six weeks after their arrival things are really starting to pan out nicely, and this quarter’s financial results should back that up. I’ve got a couple of new strong operational leads which means I can start thinking about what we need to do a few months down the line. I personally have spent an inordinate amount of time in various internal meetings most notably “quarterly business reviews”. A section of these meetings have always been dedicated to people’s views on 2013. This has been most surreal (and largely a waste of time) because this year’s annual planning process is massively top down (very different to last year’s consensus based approach). Sitting in internal meetings is bad enough, even worse when they talk about topics that you know that you, or they, can’t actually influence. Apart from that I’ve been travelling pretty much as normal taking in the sights of Madrid, Zurich, Paris, Amsterdam and Brussels. I’ve also been down to Lisbon, or Estoril to be more exact. I took it as an opportunity to stay with a friend and meet the latest addition to his little family.

At home we had a change of au pair – we swapped an outgoing Nebraskan for a more reserved Californian. Lauren has been with us for a few weeks now and is getting used to the noise, disorder and general hustle bustle of life in a wet and chilly French town.  I’ve also had a few more horse jumping competitions with some very average results, but I think I might have made a breakthrough (how many times have I found myself writing that over the last two years with this animal?!). We’ve addressed challenges associated with his back legs, when he turns left, when he turns right and now, most recently, with his head…Surely there can’t be much else I need to think about before he’ll jump a clear round for me? Anyway I persevere because Michel is convinced that the end is in sight…

So it’s been a busy two months although there is one thing that stands out for me. After significant personal investment in one particular topic a decision was made contrary to my recommendation. Both of the options being discussed revolved around a significant degree of change. I am now ok with the fact they chose a different option – that can always happen. The irony is that last week we sold a new medium sized contract to a new client, and as an immediate result they threw two months of discussion out of the window and opted to retain the status quo. What I take from it all, is that if you are genuine about wanting to do transformational change, then you need to do something different. Lots of people talk about transformation as a good thing, but there is a much smaller number of people are prepared to embrace a different daily life as a result. This power of inertia has made me more cautious about choosing which problems to try and fix – are people really ready for big solutions?!

Two today!

That's the number of new wrinkles I have on my face in the nose and mouth area today. It is also how old the twins are. Maybe their youthfulness is linked to my ageing. A good day (and indeed birthday weekend) was had by all. They may not completely understand the whole thing, but they are certainly very good at blowing out candles and eating cake. Normal service resumes tomorrow with a 6.40AM flight to Paris. Now there's something that definitely isn't helping the wrinkles!

It's about productivity, stupid

I am enjoying my new role at work. On those days when I am feeling positive, I really like the fact that I'm trying to create new, sustainable jobs. However on some days in some countries the focus is simply trying to get the whole of the existing team busy. This contrast across countries really got me thinking that if we want to be successful over the long term, we've got to do more than just keep people loaded with any type of work we can find. We really need each of them to be more productive. This can be either doing more with less e.g. more of the same type of output in a shorter time period, or, doing different more valuable work in the time available. However this does mean that if everybody is doing more (quantity or quality), then we really need to sell either more of the same, or sell more complex work, to keep these increasingly productive people occupied. That type of reflection was why I found the following article so interesting and worrying at the same time...http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/78e883fa-0bef-11e2-8032-00144feabdc0.html#axzz28S9d2U5m

Effective Salesmen

I received these links from a colleague on Friday and I thought it made for interesting reading...

http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2011/06/the_seven_personality_traits_o.html and http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2012/09/top_reasons_salespeople_lose_b.html

Sunny Saturday, clouds on the horizon

The sun is shining this afternoon in Pau. I’m enjoying it streaming through my office window. After this week’s edition of the Economist dropped through the letter box this morning I read the following article and it initially served to lift my spirits… http://www.economist.com/node/21562915. The beginning of the end of the Euro crisis…wouldn’t that be nice?!... However this quickly made me think about another article which I read earlier in the week; http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/danielhannan/100180151/the-euro-crisis-stand-by-for-years-of-slow-wretched-decline/. This second article muses over what a recession actually looks like. It suggested that the Euro crisis would never manifest itself as, “lines of men in cloth caps queuing at soup kitchens – and somehow doing so in grainy black-and-white footage”. The article went to say on that, “because journalists deal in drama, they like to frame the euro crisis as a choice between ‘a solution’ and a catastrophic breakdown. But surely there is a third option, namely that people carry on getting gradually poorer. Imagine that you lost your main source of income tomorrow. At first, not much would change. You’d still be driving the same car, sleeping in the same bed. Only as things broke, and went unreplaced, would your poverty become visible. Dilapidation would steal upon you progressively.”

So the question I asked myself was whether or not if we have indeed turned a corner, will people notice, will people recognize how close we came to the edge of economic meltdown, or will people just carry on expecting the government to subsidize bread and petrol (as in France)? Will people actually change their behaviour as a result of recent events, or did things just not get bad enough? Clearly many people were affected negatively and this posting is not to diminish their hardship, but were enough people impacted to actually mean more widespread change for the better? This human condition of only acting when things are really bad is actually quite depressing. In sales we even celebrate this type of behaviour – we rejoice when we find that, “the customer has a compelling event!” Why can’t people just do things because common sense dictates that it is the right thing to do? Surely there can’t be that much of a difference between Northern and Southern European common sense – surely everyone must understand the getting things for free can’t last forever? Surely everyone must realize that having someone else who has carefully husbanded their resources (Germany) pay for those who have not (e.g. Greece) is not right? Unfortunately many of my (sensible) Spanish friends suggest that there is indeed a slew of people who don’t share the same version of common sense that I do. Whilst I clearly am not advocating more recession or depression, it is why I worry that the beginning of the end of the Euro crisis won’t actually make any long term difference. I fear that in time history will simply say that what we’ve gone through since 2008 was just another protracted slump in the economic cycle. Right, where are those sunglasses (not bought using credit)…

The future’s an Asian female

Overall I had a good week at work. It really feels like we’re making progress. I’m on the verge of my third major signing in the space of two weeks. I think we’ve got an increasingly powerful story and it seems to be resonating with people – I am managing to get the team I want. I’m excited about getting all of these rock stars in front of our internal and external clients. That’s all positive, and having the right team in place will allow me to spend more time on our most intractable challenges, which includes working with the team in Spain who face the biggest obstacles.

All of that said, I can’t help but think that if I take a couple of steps back and look to my side or behind me, then there is another huge big hamster ball rolling my way full of Asians and women. These two articles from last week’s Economist only served to remind me of this… http://www.economist.com/node/21562195 and http://www.economist.com/node/21562174 Is the west finished? No, because in a globalized world place matters more than ever (http://www.economist.com/node/21561109), but I can’t help but think that by the time I retire, if I haven’t moved from where I am now, then I and the kids definitely won’t be working in the region of the world that is driving global growth; when Sandie says to me we can’t ask the house cleaner to wash the patio windows because that isn’t in her job description, then I can’t help but think of the people in India who would fight to work to earn that additional income...Are men finished? Absolutely not for lots of reasons including the fact that it isn’t us who bear children, but I do agree with the idea that the skills required to be successful today include adaptability and communication, (which surely must include the ability to speak multiple languages), which women generally tend to be better at than men. Work is going well and I am enjoying it, life in the south of France is extremely pleasant and comfortable; I will however keep my head down for a little bit longer otherwise one might be faced with some much more difficult questions with answers with big consequences.

Morning gory

It was going to be a bad day, but a good breakfast in the Hotel Du Louvre has set me back on the right track. After a fun evening last night with the French team at the horse racing at Vincennes I got back to a rather dingy hotel at around midnight. On arrival they told me the hotel was fully booked, but that they had arranged for me to stay in another hotel on the other side of town. Great. Worse still when I got to the next hotel - the unhelpful staff and sick on the floor (which stayed there all night until I pointed it out) belied its four star rating. I stomped out on an empty stomach at 7.36 this morning after they refused to iron a shirt or provide me with an iron to do it myself. It was all going wrong till a fine croissant and hot chocolate put the world to rights. Now off to brave the Parisian public transport....

Morning glory

OK, so I can complain as much as I want about excessive amounts of travel, but I have to say that (1) as a youngster I always found getting up in the middle of the night to get a plane e.g. to go on summer holidays, extremely exciting, and (2) as I sit here above a white fluffy blanket of clouds looking at the morning sun far into the horizon, I have to say it’s not all bad.

Cars and politics

One of my small pleasures in life is to go and check on the children just before I go to bed myself. It’s nice to see them relaxed and peaceful. When I walked into Maxime’s bedroom last night I went to put his quilt straight. I saw that he had taken two of his little cars out of their special garage and he was now fast asleep with one car next to his head and the other in his left hand. It made me think how enjoyable life must be at that age when one of your chief concerns is which toy you want to take to bed with you. I compare that with the world of pathetic office politics into which I am about to walk…

Chassez le naturel, il revient au galop

I took Gaston to mass this morning for the first time. It was a delight. Normally I go with Maxime who is somewhat more turbulent. The only real way I can get Maxime to sit still for an hour is if I take a Santa Claus size sack of toys and a full pack of chocolate biscuits (and even with that we still have to pay a visit to the candles and also the choir loft). Gaston on the other hand was delighted to sit on papa’s knee for the full duration. A crust of bread and solitary pencil was all that was needed and even then, I would contend that pencil was overkill. The whole episode got me thinking. It is fairly obvious that I will now be more tempted to take Gaston on a Sunday rather than his more active brother. However I wonder if this is the right response – surely a parent must be able to take a child into any environment and expect appropriate behavior. Furthermore I also started to wonder if you can really change the inherent nature of someone – even if I forced Maxime into a childhood of Sunday services and Gaston into twenty years of debauchery and night clubs, as soon as they left home would they not just revert to type… I suspect I am just realizing the age old nature versus nurture trade-off that all parents before me have had to face. Given that I do think that you should be able to take a child into a range of different environments I suspect that Maxime is destined for a few more religious outings and that the share price of United Biscuits (http://www.unitedbiscuits.com/brands-page.php) is not going to crash when the markets open tomorrow morning.

Our big Moyenne Section Winner

It’s been a long time since I’ve had to seriously think about the value or importance of being physically big (at work we’re always contemplating how we can become big in monetary terms). Maxime however seems to be somewhat preoccupied with it. He has just started his second year at school. After last year in “Petite Section”, he has now moved into the “Moyenne Section”. This change has not escaped him. In fact it has become a regular justification for a number of different, completely unrelated things e.g. I don’t have to hold your hand anymore because I’m in Moyenne Section, I can eat chocolate now because I’m in Moyenne Section, I can "--- insert phrase of your choosing ---" now because I’m in Moyenne Section. The other big change in Maxime’s development over the last couple of weeks is the fact that he has started to display one character trait that both of his parents possess; he’s becoming somewhat competitive… He happily beats his 2 year old brother and sister in the shortest of running races and he proudly exclaims that he is a “winner”. I’m already starting to see the advantages of this development; it’s never been so easy to get him to run up the stairs, brush his teeth and get his nappy on (yes he’s not that big yet) and into bed.

Two weeks in the life of

The focus of the week before last was five days of intensive Spanish lessons. I was in a mix of fun but grueling one on one grammar classes with one of four Spanish teachers, individual computer assisted hour long language labs, and evening group discussions. Each day lasted from 8.20AM until 9.15PM. The good news was that I managed to understand the structure of the language quite well (thanks in no small part my ability to speak French). The bad news was that after five days of talking Spanish my pronunciation was as good as, well someone who’d only been speaking Spanish for only five days i.e. not great (and with something of a French accent to boot). That said I left the language school in Den Bosch (yes I went to the Netherlands to learn Spanish) on Friday feeling happy confident and tired, armed with a little speech for my team in Madrid the following week.

Last week was my first week back at work after a month away. My first stop was Madrid in Tuesday. It was a super day with a lot of very productive and positive meetings. The team was also very complementary about my Spanish which was nice – I even managed to raise a (intended) laugh in Spanish. Wednesday was a day in Zurich with the Swiss team. One of the most important meetings there was a closing interview with a pre-sales guy. It was a very enjoyable conversation in which I discovered his passion in life was to build wooden boats by hand. I learned by the end of the week that we’d managed to complete the negotiations. It’s so much more enjoyable building teams rather than letting people go. However I firmly believe that the latter type of experience only helps you during the recruitment process – having to release people makes you so much more aware of what you’re doing when you bring new people onboard. Thursday was a day in Paris. We’re entering a period of not insignificant change in France, so I suspect I’ll be spending a serious amount of time there over the coming weeks. Friday was a day spent with my old friend Dell Latitude – i.e. a day of emails. By 1AM on Saturday morning I considered myself fully up to date after holidays…so now the real value add work can start…

A taste of reality

Mother: Did --insert child name-- pee in his bed?
Father: No, why?
Mother: Because he stinks of pee.
Au pair: I never want to be a parent...

Me, but not me

This latest piece in last week's Economist didn't come from me... http://www.economist.com/node/21560546 Even if I had the time, I am sure I couldn't write so eloquently. I couldn't help but agree with the contents of the article, and it also made me thankful that we've got four grandparents close by in the south of France...

Old but amusing (no, not me)

1. Money can't buy happiness, but somehow, it's more comfortable to cry in a BMW than on a bicycle

2. Forgive your enemies, but remember their names

3. Help a man when he is in trouble, and he will remember you when he is in trouble again

4. Many people are alive only because it is illegal to shoot them

5. Alcohol doesn’t solve any problems, but neither does milk...

Beleuchtung, Kamera, Aktion

It's well known amongst my friends that I'm no film buff. However one of the advantages of having young girls in the house as au pairs is that they keep you in touch with Generation X (or Y or Z or whatever it is now)....The latest one, Jessica, introduced me to a wonderful website which allows me to watch movies online for free (the end of Netflix you understand www.netflix.com) ...check out www.1channel.ch. It was me however who informed her that a .ch suffix denotes a Swiss registered website (Confoederatio Helvetica for the (other) geeks amongst you...http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confederation_Helvetica). She even went one step further and wrote a complete list of all the movies an old fogey like me just has to watch...some more homework then...

Old dogs, old and new tricks

Shortly after getting back from Spain we had some old friends come and stay in Biarritz for 4-5 days. It was great to relax and spend time with them. I really appreciate being with old friends – it’s so easy just to slip into old friendships regardless of how long it has been since you’ve seen each other. I was also proud to take them to a show jumping competition with me in Prechac near Bazas (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bazas). I’ve been rabbiting on about the horses for a few years now, so I was happy to finally show them what it was all about. We also had super weather – they arrived lamenting the poor weather and rain in Northern France, they had definitely changed their tune after 5 days of “canicule” and temperatures of up to 40C.

Mormons, Tattoos, Spanish Dancers and a sore shoulder

It was definitely a good thing to get away for a week. Too often we fool ourselves into thinking that spending the summer in Biarritz will be like a real holiday. It is not. The fact that we could disconnect from everything domestic was really beneficial. I managed to get up to date with all my outstanding copies of the Economist (I learnt that if it wasn’t for the lack of a spell as a missionary I’d probably be a Mormon… http://www.economist.com/node/21554173), I did some open water swimming in the Atlantic, I spent large amounts of time in the pool with the kids, I also spent large parts of the week trying to count the number of Spanish, German, Scandinavian and English people who didn’t have tattoos. I even managed to strain a muscle in my back lifting a Spanish dancer (don’t ask). Sandie really enjoyed the fact that someone else did the catering all week, Maxime loved the pool, Jessica lapped up the sunshine and the twins were just generally happy with everything. The only downside was that Maxime fell out of his bed on the last night (no drink was taken m’lud). After a fall of only 30 centimeters, one week, three doctors and six x-rays later we are still trying to work out what is wrong. Hopefully a trip to an orthopedic surgeon next week will shed some more light on a troublesome left shoulder. He has however learnt the meaning of “man flu” and “milking it” and he still makes a pretty good stab of opening chocolate yoghurts with his arm in a sling even if it is in a degree of genuine discomfort. I sense a week of excessive pampering with Papy John coming up…

Check in and chill out

The new flip flops not only played an important psychological role in the holiday preparations, they also played an important role once I’d arrived. I am sure the person who originally designed them did so in such a way that he made it impossible to walk quickly with them. This more than anything else forced me to slow down and take things a bit easier (although I do confess temperatures of 44C and an open bar did also play a part)…

Check out, check in, and don’t forget the new shorts

I remember with fondness our family holidays to hot getaways such as Greece or Portugal when I was growing up. Obviously today I wonder if the exchange rate was more favorable given the current Euro crisis but that’s just because I’ve become old and boring. At the time I was much more focused on the new set of summer clothes and shoes that we were always allowed before we set off. Newcastle is a cold place so a trip to buy summer clothes was a noteworthy event indeed. This shopping trip to Northumberland Street and Eldon Square in Newcastle was always a big event and often ended with a trip to McDonalds before we all trundled back to the car parked in the Relate car park. This (and invariably getting up in the middle of the night to go to the airport) is what really told me that a holiday was upon us. However when you live in a hot place such as Biarritz you typically already own shorts and flip flops. That said as I packed my suitcase for Gran Canaria the absence of any special shopping trip to get an article of summer clothing or two really prevented me from feeling like it was a real holiday. So less than 24 hours before the flight took off I whisked myself off for an hour or two of summer retail therapy. Two pairs of short, a pair of swimming trunks and some new flip flops later, and I was finally ready.

Good morning!

At 7AM it felt a bit crowded in the bed. Whereas that might have had a completely different connotation 15 years ago, at the age of 34 that could only mean only thing…during the dead of night, little Maxime had crept into our bed. He was clearly very comfortable as I tried to crawl out of bed without waking either him or Mrs. O’Brien. If anything he looked just too cute…clearly too cute because it later became something of a regular occurrence during our Spanish holiday when we had to a share a room with him. What a little scamp.

Olympian positivity

What do I like about the Olympics? The fact that it is in London, the medal league tables (some people tell me I am highly competitive), the copious amounts of sport on every TV channel known to man? Nope, what I like is that news coverage is invariably more positive and upbeat than at any other time in the (four) year (period). It seems like stories of bombings, killings, floods and economic crises have to work that bit harder to steal some of the limelight. If it didn’t take 9 billion pounds and 7 years to plan the 2 week festival of sport, then I’d vote to do it on a monthly basis.

Are you hearing me?

I started to try and analyze some of my own conversations at home (obviously made more difficult because I’m trying to do it at the same time as actually having the conversation). I have started to wonder if it is just me who thinks that our conversations are constantly happening on two levels; firstly what is actually being said, and secondly; what the other person thinks you are actually saying. I’ve found myself saying out loud more and more, “listen to what I’m saying, not what you think I’m saying”, and oh yeh, let’s not even start to think about the subtleties of doing it across two languages. Great for mental agility, less good for easy living!

Rome, the Vatican and the CTO

I headed to Rome directly from Madrid. I travelled there with our global CTO (and his wife) who had flown in from Colorado in the US. He had wanted to spend some time talking through some things before our meeting in Italy, so I managed to convince him to come to Spain a day early. I was also very pleased to be able to introduce him to the team there. I continue to believe that to really learn a language you need to understand the culture of the country…another reason why I was happy to go with them to some bona fide flamenco dancing on the Tuesday evening. It really made me look forward to my week’s Spanish lessons at the end of August – I’m itching to immerse myself in all things red and yellow and to understand the land and the people more (even if I doubt I’ll get much of a flavor of it whilst in Gran Canaria...).  The two day meeting in Rome went well and that plus a fascinating visit of the Vatican archives, a roof top dinner and farewell drink for my now ex-boss, and a well-received wall chart all meant that the week whizzed by and that I was pretty exhausted by the end of it. After 11 months in two new jobs, I was ready for a holiday…

Yo vivo a Riberia del Loira

Before travelling to Milan last Friday I started my Spanish lessons in Utrecht (as you do). Some very basic stuff you understand, but it meant that on the Tuesday morning of my last week at work I managed to order my taxi in Madrid in Spanish for the first time. A small step but definitely one in the right direction! I was proud as punch all day until I told the story to one of my local colleagues. He didn’t know how to put it, but he was very kind as he explained to me that I had effectively proclaimed to my somewhat surprised Spanish taxi driver (who spoke perfect English) that I “live” (vivir and yo vivo) in the office, rather than I wanted to go (ir and yo voy) to the office… Back to the drawing board it seems…

Enlightened working

I worked from home on the Monday after the trip to Milan. I spent the day working on a 6 metre wall chart which I will present in Rome on Thursday. The only (series of) tables in Biarritz big enough were outside in my parents’ garden so I spent a pleasant day outside avoiding emails but still doing real work. It was glorious, if only I had thought to put some sun cream on the backs of my knees…

The turning worm the morning after

The weekend of July 27-29 was spent in Lake Como for an old friend’s wedding. It was unfortunate that Sandie and the kids didn’t come – it was such a beautiful place, they would really have enjoyed it. That said, they probably wouldn’t have enjoyed the drive out of Linate airport….I should know by now that I’m no good at multi-tasking… that includes trying to speak to colleagues and drive in unfamiliar countries. It was only after I finished talking to Jean-Francois about work that I realized I had been driving in completely the wrong direction (even despite the GPS having been configured by the Avis rep before I left the airport). It was even more unfortunate that the conversation lasted an hour… Thankfully I was meeting my schoolboy friends so despite arriving at Lake Como in the driving rain at 11.30PM (thanks to Kieran’s telephonic co-piloting powered by Google Earth), I still found them in the nearest local bar, just as I had left them the last time. Thankfully some things never change. The weekend was a success and Mick and Eva were married by the end of it. One thing however that did cause much mirth was the fact that I, “Mr. Organised” by comparison to my old school friends (and the vast majority of the world’s population if you listen to them), managed to get myself locked out of the hotel on Saturday night. At 2AM I finally ended up sleeping on the couch in an apartment that had been rented by the most disorganized member of the whole group. How the worm had turned…

De retour!

Although it’s been a month since I last posted I definitely hadn’t forgotten about my blog. Quite the contrary if anything; I’ve actually been travelling round Europe for both work and pleasure scribbling random thoughts on odd scraps of paper which I’m finally managing to make into full sentences tonight. I hope you enjoy this series of rapid fire posts which will seek to bring you up to date on the events of the last four weeks…

Fashionista!

This morning I am tasting the delights of Ryanair, (thankfully not their cuisine), for the first time in about 3 years as I fly to London from Biarritz. Once again I have to conclude that they are bang on time, they do what it says on the tin, and that even with a screaming baby next to me (my niece), the journey has been good. Air France et al could definitely take a leaf or two out of their much maligned book (read “Ruinair” for more details http://www.amazon.com/Ruinair-Paul-Kilduff/dp/0717144348/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1343039270&sr=8-1&keywords=ruinair). On arrival I’ll take the train to Liverpool Street. I’ll be in London today, travel to Paris tomorrow night for the rest of the week, and then on Friday night I’ll fly to Milan for a friend’s wedding on Saturday. Needless to say it was my 22 year old female au pair, not me, who pointed out this morning that I was doing all of Europe’s fashion capitals this week…

As much as I’m looking forward to the different parts of this particular trip, I doubt whether any of them will be as lucrative as last week’s visit to Madrid. I took my new boss down to Madrid last Thursday to meet my Spanish team. As a surprise they had organized a night out at the horse racing. It was a really fantastic idea – the guys had obviously picked up on my love of the four legged animals. We had drinks and tapas followed by racing that started (started!) at 10.30PM. We stayed for the first three races and I had two winners which enabled me to pocket a healthy 45 euros! Crisis? What crisis? More importantly was that we had a really good night together and that I think the team really appreciated some good quality “down time” with the big boss (Lorenzo that is, not me!).

You can judge a man…

There is an old age adage which says that you can judge a man by the friends he keeps. Whilst I do believe in that, even if the waters are muddied by social and professional networks such as LinkedIn, Facebook, Google+ (you see I am cool with the kids) etc, I also believe that you can judge someone by the reaction of either animals or small children to them. Another bizarre theory I know, but I believe that if animals (prey rather than predators such as crocodiles and piranhas you understand), and small children, are prepared to trust someone, then that’s a pretty good sign. This sounds like the start of an argument to convince someone at work to buy me a horse for the office, (definitely more preferable than having more small children given my current multiple offspring situation).

Online, offline, breath….

The holiday in Spain is fast approaching. I’m looking forward to the break. At the minute it feels like I’m living life in a series of sprints or bursts. I’m “online” in a very intense way meeting and talking to lots of people in my different countries; I then go “offline”, often in the evenings, to allow myself time to catch up on blog postings or emails (both are like London buses – nothing for ages and then a whole host come together); but if I’m not careful I’ll forget to take a step back to breath, evaluate the progress we’ve made so far and then recalibrate where we need to go next. I’m hoping that I’ll get a chance to do some of that this week or maybe at the weekend on my way back from Italy.

Vive le velo!

We spent last weekend in Biarritz. I also stayed there at the start of this week. That was nice because the sun was glorious (does a blue sky make one feel better or worse when doing emails inside the house?), but the downside was that we weren’t in Pau when the Tour de France was passing through. The disappointment was doubled when Sandie rang last night to tell me that the Belgian TV programme Vive le Velo had turned up to do 3 days of filming from the stud farm in Gelos! She said it was an impressive affair with big trucks all over the place. They came with a staff of 54 people including 2 full time chefs! I didn’t even have time to think that Sandie was trying to tell me fibs to get me to come back to Pau before one of my Belgian friends who loves his cycling was on email exclaiming that he’d seen the stud farm on TV and that it looked wonderful in the sun! A small world indeed, and yet another opportunity to kick-start my TV career missed….

The music of the future

When I am in Zurich I always stay in the same hotel (http://www.zuerichberg.ch/en/home.asp). It is tucked away in the outskirts of the city by the zoo. It’s nice to feel a bit cut off from everything – the proximity of a huge forest and not having English TV channels such as the BBC or any real internet connection only adds to that feeling. As a consequence I typically watch MTV when I’m getting ready in the morning before work. When I was watching MTV on Friday it was clear to me that we’re at the start of the summer because there are currently lots of catchy tunes such as Flo Rida’s Whistle or Carly Rae Jepsen’s Call Me Maybe being played. On Friday I was reminded of this time of year when I was 18 and went to Majorca with a group of school friends after we had finished our A Level exams. The equivalent song at that time which has always stayed with me is Born Slippy from the film Trainspotting. What I like about this genre of music is the optimism which it instills in me. I hear a series of tunes like that and I hanker for being 18 again – or at least at an age, or a phase of life, where you feel like the world is your oyster, that all avenues are still open, that your future isn’t completely defined and mapped out for you, that there is still everything out there to do, achieve and play for. That’s a precious feeling. Although it may not be my reality at 34 with three small children, I’m always keen to go to my hotel in Zurich at this time of year to be reminded of that feeling.

Rain rain go away

I got my taxi at 6.15AM on Thursday morning to go to the airport en route to Zurich. As I stepped out into the darkness I felt a cold drizzle on my face. My spirits dropped as I realized pretty quickly that rain would mean the cancellation of Maxime’s school picnic in the mountains on the penultimate day of his first year at school. He had been looking forward to it for a number of weeks and I was sorry for him especially because when I got to Zurich it was glorious weather with a bright blue sky. As I headed into the office I couldn’t help but think that the sun was in the wrong place. It’s now Saturday and the good news is that, as is often the case at the age of three, the disappointment didn’t last for long especially thanks to a promise of a rearranged trip in September. His attention has now turned to our upcoming family holiday in Gran Canaria in 5 weeks time – he’s already worked out that this should theoretically be a good excuse to buy new “Cars” flip flops, a new “Barbarpapa” bag and new “Spiderman” T-Shirts and the like. He didn’t get any of what he whined for, but he’s not daft that one.

A nation of hedgehogs

So finally it is confirmed that the Germans do have feelings. I do have to say that I do love their attitude... http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/18635834 It's very unfashionable to like the Germans and Germany, but I was never really that fashionable at the best of times....Hats off to them and I will look forward to seeing them again in the world cup in two years time...

Moneyball Plus

It's been a busy week - Paris on Tuesday, Brussels briefly on Wednesday, and then back to Paris for Thursday. In the past the diary had been full of pre-arranged meetings. Clearly we've moved into a different phase of my new role - no longer do I put anything formal into the diary, but that doesn't prevent me from being called into various conversations starting at 8AM and finishing late in the evening. I now need to think about how I can carve out time to do some proper thinking to keep up the momentum that we've gathered thus far. Despite everything that is going on (it is the last week in the quarter of course for those of you who don't live in the wonderful world of publicly quoted companies and stock markets!), one of the articles that stuck out for me this week was the following http://www.fastcodesign.com/1670059/moneyball-20-how-missile-tracking-cameras-are-remaking-the-nba particularly interesting because at work we struggle to tell easy to understand stories about "big data"....

Bilbao and Bacon Butties

I went back to Newcastle this weekend for a get together with 30 or so of my schoolboy friends. It did me a lot of good. On Saturday morning as the train made the final approach over the River Tyne it felt good to be “home”. When I stepped off the train at Central Station a few minutes later, the next thing I thought was, bloody hell it’s cold here….and to think we used to play football with an orange ball in the snow not so many years ago. Over the last couple of years I have started to wonder whether or not the only reason you spend time with certain friends in the evenings and weekends is because they happen to have children of a similar age. This weekend reminded me that life and conversation is all the easier with the friends who you grew up and shared so much with for so long – it’s all so natural, even if we hadn’t seen each other sometimes for 2 or 3 years. What was even better was being back in the traditional North East environment – I stayed at an old friend’s house and the thing that finally woke me this morning was the waft of his wife’s homemade grilled bacon sandwiches. Even better was when I asked for the iron to sort out a t-shirt for the journey home, his wife just told me to give it to her without even batting an eyelid – no negotiations or conversation required! I just laughed as I got out of the shower and found it hanging perfectly on a coat hanger outside my room. Now that’s all wonderfully relaxing, if only we hadn’t got to bed at 3.30AM.

The other big benefit of a trip to the UK and Newcastle was that I could actually go into a travel agent and book our family holiday for August. Sandie and I made a forlorn attempt to do it together earlier in the week but we quickly realized that it was quickly becoming a certain cause for divorce, so I offered to do it myself at the weekend (obviously Sandie gave me a long list of strict criteria to which I had to adhere – everything from suitable flight times and interconnecting rooms to baby crèches and airport transfer times). Thankfully I stumbled across a very patient young girl in Thomson’s holidays on Saturday afternoon, and 90 minutes later we’d cracked it with Ryanair flights from Bilbao to Gran Cranaria, a Tuesday to Tuesday check in, and a guaranteed sea view. Sandie received the information, was allowed to lodge any key objections before a 12 hour cooling off period for overnight cogitation. Then this morning the deed was done! Finally, a family holiday for a week in August in a Spanish speaking country. Now let’s just pray for warmth and sunshine!

The fox and the hedgehog

An interesting read... http://www.ianbell.com/2009/05/19/the-fox-and-the-hedgehog-which-one-are-you/

9 days and counting

It's been 9 days since the last post but it feels like a lot longer because work continues to be very busy. It's now been 12 weeks since I started the new role and the initial signs are very positive - the teams and the other departments in the company all seem receptive to what we are going to try and do. Each of the five different countries is slightly different, but all are heading in the right direction. Last week it was Paris and Amsterdam. Next week it is back to Madrid and then Switzerland (Geneva) on the Tuesday. The downside is that the levels of fatigue are high, and that's not helping the horse riding, any other form of sporting activity or blogging. Thankfully today was a fairly relaxed day at Maxime's School Fete with the end of the school year fast approaching. Whereas I can normally more or less organise teams of adults, I have to confess that I impressed even myself today by being able to orchestrate 15 young children who were playing on a half inflated bouncy castle this morning. I didn't win the "guess the weight of a Bayonne ham" competition, but it was a nice day all in all. After a day at school I readily recognise that looking after and educating 35 Maximes for 8 hours every day must be extremely tiring. Although that line of work isn't my lot in life, I do also have to say that I am definitely looking forward to the summer which will include 3 weeks of holiday and a week of intensive Spanish lessons.

3 Cities, 3 Stitches

After a couple of days in Paris last Wednesday and Thursday, Brussels, Zurich and Madrid are on the agenda this week (I am currently sitting in my 7AM plane to Zurich waiting to take off). Yesterday’s meetings with the EMC country manager and the CIO of a Belgian bank have gone well. However any end of day optimism was definitely tempered when Sandie rang on her way to hospital with Gaston whose head was pouring with blood. He had been pushing a stool which had overturned, which he then fell on top of. After some drugs to calm him down he received three (expertly executed) stitches just about his eye. Not being home for that type of thing is definitely one of the major downsides of this type of job.

Equine Highs and Lows

On my return from Las Vegas I was off to see the horse as soon as Maxime had been put to bed for his afternoon nap. The intention was to get back into the saddle ahead of a big three day show jumping competition over the Pentecost weekend. That session on the Friday went badly (no surprises really after 19 hours in a sardine tin), but at the end of it I felt that I had understood something and that I knew what I had to change (Ordre, Equilibre, Ecarte mains, Reins, Monter le virage, Attendre, Jambes). I was delighted to see that when I did change things the next day, it resulted in a clear round…another three clear rounds followed over the next two days which resulted in a ninth place finish (out of 120 horses) with only two horses going clear over all four rounds. I was feeling quite happy with myself that is until I went to the next show jumping competition last weekend in Pau. The wheels most definitely fell off as things deteriorated over the course of the three days culminating in the ignominy of a fall and elimination on Sunday. Not the way to start the week. I think I’m going to take up triathlons instead….

Bright spark big brother

Something that has struck me recently, mainly during a series of conversations in Vegas with one of our pre-sales guys who is a serial entrepreneur, is that having good ideas isn’t the real challenge. It’s how to take those ideas and make them a reality e.g. it is not hard to see how combining face recognition, social media and video surveillance technology at big gatherings in real time could give you the possibility to reunite parents and lost children quickly – and I am sure there are more than enough people who are prepared to pay for that. Trick is, how does one get from the idea to the prototype stage quickly? That’s what I don’t know enough about today.

Sweet Nothing

I’m now long back from Las Vegas. I first went to the US when I was 21 to do my initial training with Andersen Consulting in Chicago. Apart from losing my voice in the plane going there (my first ever intercontinental flight), I remember being amazed at the scale of everything and the “customer is king” culture which everybody seemed to buy into. This US trip was different. For the first time I really found the US to be a small minded and officious place (I’m not sure how much this perception is due to the fact that I’ve lived in “pragmatic France” for the last 10 years or so). There seemed to be an excessive adherence to petty rules, and the whole idea of complete strangers trying to make your life easier and better had completely disappeared. I was most disappointed. However that said, even if you had given me the happiest and most helpful hotel, security and restaurant staff, I doubt whether I would be banging my drum to go back to Las Vegas anytime soon. The weather was lovely and warm, the skies a beautiful clear blue, but the casino atmosphere and “Venice in a box” reconstruction complete with indoor gondolas, didn’t really float my boat. As for the content of the EMC World meeting? It was useful to see the full breadth of what EMC does (much of which I don’t profess to understand), and to see a conference of 15,000 people executed ruthlessly (the catering was a military-esque operation in itself), but the real utility of the event was me being able to take some time with a selection of senior people to get their buy into what I am trying to do following my recent role change. It was just ironic that 95% of this group of people were European and that we had to go to the west coast of America to get some time together. One other thing that struck me during this trip to the US was that anyone who manages to remain thin deserves immense respect; one morning I went for breakfast to McDonalds. I chose the healthy fruit salad option. Apart from it being the smallest meal on the menu by far, when I peeled back the lid, I was shocked to see layer upon layer of sugar suffocating a handful of helpless little strawberries and raspberries. God bless America and its heavily overworked heart surgeons.

Taxi! Get me out of here

As if 24 hour hours of travel wasn't enough, when I finally got out of Las Vegas airport I was then confronted with an hour long taxi queue. The audio edition of the Economist on my iPhone helped pass the time. Thankfully I was taken to a beautifully modern, clean, fresh casino free hotel. Or not...I was more than happy to call it a day at 9PM. Things have started a bit better this morning - I escaped the dingy hotel and went out for an hour long run under a wonderful clear blue sky. Las Vegas reminds me of Singapore but it is less crowded and its layout is much more linear, or American, rather than the European randomness of the penned in city state. The hotel where the conference is also wonderful...happily they've found a spare room for me here tomorrow and Wednesday. Off to register now and hopefully to enjoy a few of the key note speeches...

Smash Vegas

I decided to be sensible last night and only watch the first half of the Champions League final between Chelsea and Munich…so clearly I missed all the action there. Despite my best efforts at avoiding unnecessary fatigue, I was woken by Maxime at 3.45AM who had wet his bed. After sorting that out I got a quick shower and then left home in Biarritz at 4.55AM to head to Pau to catch the 7.20AM flight to Paris. Given that the day started so well, I suppose it’s only normal that I’m now sitting in an airport lounge in Los Angeles because of a two hour delay on the final one hour leg of my journey to Las Vegas. In between the start of the journey and now, I had a 90 minute drive in the pitch black in driving rain, a 75 minute delay on the runway at Paris, a suitcase falling on my head in flight, a wireless connection which stubbornly refuses to send the 81 emails I wrote during the 11 hour 40 minute flight (they were long emails), and then an awkward game of “avoid the colleague” played when you spot a co-worker who you are just too tired to talk to in the lounge. So even despite my managing to watch Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and Slumdog Millionaire in the plane, it’s not been the best day on record. Indeed even the All American, “how are you sir have a nice day sir” only raised my spirits so far…What’s worse is that I am not expecting a great deal more from the rest of the week; we’ll see, but I’m pretty convinced that I’d much rather be back at home in Europe with the family (wet mattresses and all).

Hollande, Consulting and South Ken

Maybe one of the key reasons why having external consultants has its merits is illustrated by this interesting critique of the current troubles in the Eurozone in the American publication the New Yorker... http://www.newyorker.com/talk/comment/2012/05/07/120507taco_talk_gopnik  although don’t tell that to the 21^st arrondissement…. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/globalbusiness/9261905/High-earners-say-au-revoir-to-France.html

Bust Lip, Split Head

Gaston is the pretty boy of the family. People will literally stop Sandie in the street to comment on how beautiful he is with his blue eyes and Swedish blonde hair (a distinct rarity in the Basque country you understand). I am increasingly convinced that our financial future rests not so much on his shoulders, but on the attractive head that is perched on those shoulders. As a consequence, after the events of the last 10 days I am thinking about changing a few house rules; firstly I am going to ban myself from ever trying to cut his hair (last week’s first attempts to shave his head with some shears had to be aborted half way through the operation leaving a rather odd looking “end” result), secondly by buying him a rugby scrum cap to prevent him from walking into tables and splitting his head open (this has the added advantage of hiding any efforts I have made to cut his hair), and thirdly, and most importantly, banning him from going within 10 meters of Maxime….On Saturday Maxime decided to use a mattress to create a little slide for Gaston. This worked wonderfully well until Maxime decided that the slide could move midway through any particular ascent or descent, even when in use by his little brother. The disappearing squidgy mattress was unfortunately replaced by a rather more solid wooden bed. Gaston’s lower lip didn’t appreciate the change. Whilst they tell us we won’t see anything in a week’s time, it’s not looking too good at the minute. Maybe I should start investigating appropriate insurance policies…

Parenting 101

Read the following article. Read the last two lines really slowly. If you ever wondered what it was like being a parent, now you know. http://www.economist.com/node/21553479

Hannibal’s Cigar

When I was growing up one of my favourite TV programmes was the A-Team http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_A_Team.  I was always a big fan when Hannibal would proudly proclaim towards the end of the show that he loved it when a plan came together. The champagne is still very much on ice, but the initial feedback is very positive, and I am in the process of talking with some great people, both internally within consulting, elsewhere in the company, and also externally as potential new people to bring into the business. We’re not out of the woods yet (as my P&L indicates), but I think I see a way forward for our consulting business in each of my countries. I’m currently on my way to Amsterdam to meet the country manager here, before heading back to Madrid for a similar meeting on Thursday.  It’s all very exciting really. The trick now? How can I convey that excitement to the team, get them to understand that they have a role in actually making this a reality, and how can we do all of that faster?!

The Laffer Curve of Acquaintance

For some reason the Laffer curve (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laffer_curve) is one of the few economic theorems that I remember from Oxford, particularly the quote, “one potential result of the Laffer curve is that increasing tax rates beyond a certain point will be counterproductive for raising further tax revenue”. As we start five, no doubt glorious, years of Socialist leadership in France, this idea sprang into my mind again today…. It also got me thinking that maybe there is a parallel in terms of meeting people. I blogged recently that I think that despite the advances in technology you still need to meet people in person. Then I thought that before the advent of the internet, people met their colleagues on a daily basis (many still do of course). I wonder then that if I believe that you can’t maximize the effectiveness of your business activities without having met the other person, then maybe having too much face to face contact with them is actually detrimental to professional success? Maybe I should ask my Finnish friends who tell me that they prefer to send an SMS to their office colleagues rather than actually having to talk to them “live”.

Self awareness and the markets

At the age of 3 Maxime thinks that he is already capable of going to the bathroom and cleaning both himself and the toilet afterwards all by his little self. As I cleaned a rather dirty toilet brush and holder this morning under a cold shower I can indeed confirm that this is not the case. I think my eldest lacks a certain degree of self awareness. I wonder if the same can be said for the French population who today voted in a Socialist president - something tells me a cold shower with an excrement laden toilet brush may well be a good harbinger of what the next 5 years in France is going to feel like. For the record, Maxime's day ended with a homemade haircut using his Papi's shears. The end result brought tears to his mother's eye, but I wonder if something similar might happen to Francois Hollande courtesy of the markets and ratings agencies…

125 meetings, 3 tweets, 2 shifting goalposts

Since my last post on the 11th April things have been somewhat busy. I've started my new role at work and I am in the middle of meeting everyone in each of my new teams in France, Spain, Belgium, Holland and Switzerland. Since the 11th April I've had 125 meetings, many of which have been extremely interesting. I'm off to Zurich for a couple of days this week to finish off these initial conversations. During the last couple of weeks I've also worked out how to Tweet (follow me at @ajdobrien) and I'm currently in the process of trying to work out the new look and feel of this blogger site - lesson of the day - you can't stop progress.

Mind your own business

In a recent conversation with an uber smart guy (running the privately owned CIA type organization), he said that the problem with Silicon Valley these days is that too many really smart people live in a world of abundance, and therefore unfortunately spend their times using their considerable brain power to fix problems that don’t really matter. This reminded me of everything I’ve read about frugal innovation in the developing world recently, and it prompted me to start thinking what companies and businesses might look like in the future... there were a few things close to my heart that my thoughts centred on…

Always on…today we live in a society of instant gratification that includes things such as LEDs on Blackberries that flash constantly as soon as one receives a new email, 24/7 TV, iTunes downloads on mobile phones and Facebook likes. Whereas there may well be some sort of yoga flavoured backlash in the future as people wish for greater time for reflection and simpler pleasures, now that Pandora’s Box has been opened, businesses have to live in this new reality. One of the most interesting ideas I heard on this topic is that companies need to understand that there is an internal and an external clock, and that very often the two run at different speeds. This begs the obvious question how do you ensure your own tempo is in synch with that of your key customers, and how do you effectively dial up or dial down your own speed as a company as required for different types of customers whilst retaining a consistent feel and culture in your own organization? Could the style, culture or “pace” of customers be a better way to classify them than by size, industry sector or geographic location?

Data deluge….another facet of life and business today is the sheer volume of data and information that exists and is being created every minute of every day, and the fact that all of this spans across producers, market places and consumers, effectively creating what one might call a “network of intelligence”. What I like about information is that it is information regardless of whether it is in the emerging or the emerged world – it’s something of a leveler in that respect. I heard an interesting quote from someone who works closely with Nike. He said that senior executives in Nike have started to ask themselves if they are still in the running shoe business because at times it feels more like they are an information management company as they try to understand their customers better, (even to the extent of collecting running data whilst people are wearing their shoes). Another interesting quote was in the Economist article (http://www.economist.com/node/21547217) which examined whether or not online match making actually improved the chances of finding a soul mate. The article stated that, “The greater choice is unarguable. But does it lead to better outcomes? …the very volume of alternatives may be a problem. Studies on consumer choice, from boxes of chocolates to restaurant wine lists, have shown that less is more. Half a dozen bonbons, or a dozen bottles, are easier to pick between than 30 or 40...(Dr. Finkel) found studies which showed that when faced with abundant choice, people pay less attention to characteristics that require thinking and conversation to evaluate (occupational status and level of education, for example) and more to matters physical. Choice, in other words, dulls the critical faculties”. Physical, online or virtual, companies and people are going to have to work out how to manage and exploit all that information whether it be to have a consistent approach to a customer across all channels, to find new opportunities based on more sophisticated analysis of data, or adhere to rules and regulations in a timely fashion. At any rate, in a world of abundance, having more is no longer enough; simply collecting more information is not the same as learning how to find out what’s really valuable.

Travel and face time….Another thing which dominates my working life at the minute is the need to travel and meet people face to face. I often wonder if we can ever reduce the amount of travel and still be as or more effective (e.g. through reduced fatigue). Businesses have had Tele-Presence for a while now, and as much as we see lots of younger people being comfortable with technologies such as LAN parties and Skype (e.g. the young Indian son of an ex-Wipro colleague who was living in LA and who asked his Dad if they could “hang out” on Skype when he was in Zurich on a Saturday morning). However I still can’t help but think that genuine trust and friendship only comes when you actually meet, touch and look people in the eye. Maybe technology will still be able to take us a step closer e.g. maybe we can have shared electronic whiteboards that people in Bangalore and Paris can share and draw on simultaneously, maybe we will even one day have Star Wars-esque enhanced virtual reality where life size holograms can give you the impression of having a colleague from a far flung destination in the same room as you, and maybe younger workers will be more comfortable to do more of the initial work with people they have never actually met in person, but in a globalised world with different languages, cultures and customs, I can’t believe that even they won’t benefit from being able to walk in corridors and stumble into chance meetings, and to go out for dinner after the allotted 60 minute meeting has been completed. No matter what I might read in George Orwell’s 1984, and although I do believe that leaders will have to learn how to communicate through multiple new channels simultaneously, I don’t think we’ll get to the complete virtual leader any time soon.

Funny Food

I definitely have a sweet tooth. A meal without a dessert has always felt like unfinished business to me and I think it’s safe to say that I’ve got an odd relationship with food – anybody who is concerned about putting on 300 grams between January 1st 2010 and January 1st 2011 surely needs help in some form or other. The other thing which I learnt about myself recently is that at times, I when I treat myself to something that I really shouldn’t, I often find myself wolfing it down at break neck speed as if that will lessen the misdemeanor and or guilt. This is despite the fact that taking my time would actually be much better from both a utilitarian and a health stand point. Funny old world I suppose.

Fly me home Hans

I am currently sitting in the airport at Bangalore waiting to take Lufthansa flight LH755 to Frankfurt before a connecting flight back to Toulouse tomorrow lunchtime. The wedding of a friend in Kochin yesterday was beautiful, definitely unique, and successful, (i.e. they are now happily married if nothing else, although apparently there is some bizarre Indian tradition called Bride Burning or Dowry Death which requires him to kill her within 24 hours http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bride_burning), and I’m really looking forward to seeing the family and eating some European chocolate now that it’s Easter.

A few things struck me during this particular India trip… (1) I’ve been speaking with an Indian colleague for a few weeks now but on Thursday we made more progress in a 10 minute face to face conversation with a whiteboard than in about 4 hours of intercontinental phone calls; (2) that whilst the young team in India might have less client experience, their passion, enthusiasm and desire to work is most uplifting and in sharp contrast with some people back in the old world; (3) that as much as I am increasingly comfortable in India, and even enjoy some of the sweeter smells, it’s not a place where I could ever live permanently; (4) that the day I am the father of the bride, I must remember not to stand on my daughter’s veil whilst leaving her at the altar; (5) that in multi cultural weddings a few words in the local language go a long way. As a result of (very) briefly addressing half of the wedding congregation in the Malayalam dialect, I now have two new Facebook friends including the local wedding singer (who made me laugh when I caught him using his Android phone to read the lyrics of Bryan Adams’ “everything I do I do it for you” whilst singing at the end of the ceremony); and that (6), there are some people in life who are have a greater attention to detail than me, that these people are typically German, and that even in India, the antithesis of organization, it is very useful to have a German maid of honour and second groomsman – respect to Rebecca and Frank for their ruthless efficiency on Saturday in the face of a relentless wave of Indian approximation.

Don’t watch the eyes

Shane’s mum Monica is an absolute treat. She really got into my good books this weekend when she said that she thought that I looked youthful and fresh. I on the other hand seemed to have spent the last 18 months monitoring the ebb and flow of the bags under my eyes ever since the arrival of the twins. And it was only this morning I got a shock when looking in the mirror – I’ve been so focused on my eyes that I hadn’t seen two and half furrows quietly settle into my brow. I’ve no idea where they came from, but this eye and brow combination, some obvious flecks of grey up top, a bad back, a cut on the side of my mouth and an inexplicable desire to listen to classical music earlier in the week, makes me think middle age is well and truly upon me. With all this physical and mental decay swirling around me, I suspect I’ll be happy tomorrow morning with tonight’s decision to upgrade to business class for the overnight flight to Germany.

Deeds not words

On the flight to India I took the time to watch the film “The Iron Lady” all about Margaret Thatcher. It was enjoyable enough, although not a patch on “Les Intouchables” that I saw recently. That said, there were some choice lines and ideas in there which I absolutely want Sandie to see once see has read the following background article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Thatcher. One of my favourite lines was when she was remonstrating with her doctor that people in the 1980s were too focused on how one feels and not enough on thoughts and ideas. I paraphrase, but basically she said “ideas become words, words become actions, actions become habits, habits become destinies, why do people not talk more about ideas”. Another idea which I liked, and which I am about to oversimplify massively, was when she said that we strive as people to ensure that our children have better futures than we did – I was reminded of this when I spoke to one of the other wedding guests who lives in Bangkok who told me that for the last 12 years he has been paying $35,000 a year for his daughter’s education in an international school…

God bless you Joseph

When I used to get lost whilst running in Paris I always had my Carte Orange (metro ticket) which meant that I could get home to the Vaugirard station safely. That system doesn’t work so well in Bangalore for obvious reasons. So when after running for about an hour this morning I found myself particularly lost in a shanty town somewhere in the sprawling 8 million person metropolis that is Bangalore, I was starting to get a bit concerned. The first conversation with a non English speaking dalit (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dalit) didn’t go so well. Thankfully things took a turn for the better when a kind motorcyclist called Joseph pulled up on the dusty dirt track road. He explained that my hotel was a good 5 miles away. He told me to hop on to the back of his bike and off we sped back to the city centre (I decided not to ask to see his driving licence nor if he had a spare helmet because this was obviously de rigueur for any self respecting Parisian moto-taxi). As I got on his bike he introduced himself and wished me a Happy Easter. It turned out he too was a Catholic with a Protestant mother. I enjoyed the chat as we bombed along (when the Indian roads permitted of course).The whole ride lasted about 10-15 minutes; definitely another good experience in a country in which I am feeling increasingly comfortable.

Third time lucky, very lucky sir, yes sir

I finally managed to get to India at about midnight on Wednesday. After the fiasco on Monday I was told to drive back to Toulouse on the Tuesday, this time to get to Bangalore via London. Imagine then how un-amused I was when I arrived in Toulouse to see those Tuesday flights cancelled as well…in fact the only time during that day when I was even more annoyed was at 9.30PM that night. At that time I received an email from Air France saying that my Wednesday morning flight from Pau to Paris had also been cancelled. They told me to fear not because they had put me on a later flight to Paris, and although that would mean that I would miss my connection, that was not a concern, because they would put me on a flight to Bangalore the day after. Ridiculous…but if living in France for over 10 years has taught me anything, it is to know when to throw a good fake strop. One 10 minute outburst later I had secured a place on the 6AM flight to Paris the next morning…yes you guessed it, from Toulouse. So, off to bed for 4 hours and then up at 2AM to drive to Toulouse for the third time in three days. By contrast the flight to Bangalore went very smoothly. That, you would think, should have been it for one week…but no, when I found out this morning at 6AM that my domestic flight to Kochin had been cancelled because the airline (Kingfisher) had gone bust, it really was just water off a duck’s back. By 6.30 I had a flight with another airline (Indigo) and a full refund in my back pocket. In the true spirit of the glass being half full, a later flight means that I can now go and get a 90 minute massage on my sore back this morning in my rather plush Bangalore hotel. After the week I’ve had, I think I deserve it.