Dear Blog,
Yesterday, I broke one of my cardinal laws of existence - I went to see a movie alone, something I very rarely do as I find people who go to movies by themselves just sad. Somehow it radiates the message, I'm such a loser, I can't even find anyone to go see a film with me. Well, Karen from the Internet Cafe wanted to go with me but had to work, so nyah! nyah! - I wasn't radiating loserness. And the movie I went to see, Sherlock Holmes, was on its last legs here - yesterday was the last day, so I'm very glad I went. Amazingly well-made, obviously the first of hopefully many more to come. Ever since they seem to have managed to get Robert Downey Jr. dried out or off the drugs or both, he has been on fire. Iron Man was amazing (with No. 2 in that series to be released here shortly), and so was Sherlock Holmes. Jude Law was also sensational in it (which actually is a good thing for him, since most everything he's been in for quite a while has been absolute crap).
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I don't know why I find TV advertisements such a fascinating topic, probably because I have so much time on my hands and some of these ads are better than the actual programs running on South African television. And so on to more South African TV ads, this time both good and bad.
After a little research, I was actually able to find the ad I mentioned in yesterday's blog for Robertson's Spices on line, so here it is - tada!
A few others came to mind as I watched TV last night after getting home from the cinema, and the vary from wonderfully imaginative to absolutely stupid. I had forgotten about the commercial for Cadbury's Lunch Bar until I saw it last night, and it definitely deserves to be seen by everyone.
Another good one is for Klipdrift, a South African (rotgut) brandy. Watch it and enjoy it - quite funny how some, er, um, tea with ice can lubricate those vocal chords...
Stimorol, the Danish chewing gum that took the world by storm, also has its own bizarre but funny campaign going here -
And here is a clip of what I would definitely rank as South Africa's dumbest, stupidest and worst ad campaign currently running. One of our local supermarket chains, Checkers, has a sale once a year apparently, called Heydays, and this year's campaign is so bad, it is unbelievable! Here's the ad without the actual products (there is about 10 seconds sandwiched in the middle where they advertise two items on sale; ad people call this type of ad a donut). What floors me most about this very sad ad is that of the 30 seconds it runs, about 20 is taken up with the grimacing face of an old fart, and his oh-so-hilarious (not!), cutesy (not!) barbershop-old timey movie antics. The agency that made the ad definitely lives up to its own name of 99 cents, since that's about what the ad is worth...
Finally, on this topic, here's a weird ad by Allan Gray, a brokerage house. It features James Dean, the actor who died in a tragic car accident in 1955. The only purpose for this appallingly tasteless, poor ad I can extract is that it is supposed to make people think about how rich Dean would be if he had lived and had invested with Allan Gray. I've got news for the makers - James Dean was a major young star and very rich when he died. He would have enjoyed a long, rewarding movie career and been able to buy all of Allan Gray easily, so what's the point?
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On Tuesday, I interrupted my blissfully peaceful vacation by returning to Merde Hill for a meeting with my fellow team members at TITS. It was the usual dull stuff - we saw a nice little PowerPoint presentation with statistics on how many mistakes we had made versus the other two TITS locations. We did quite well in some areas, but, as usual, that was not good enough for the powers that be, who continue to insist that we must be perfect in all we do. Again, there's nothing more likely to create and foster a positive work environment by being told on a regular basis how badly you've done! Of course, this approach is and remains positively Teutonic. The Teutonians have never quite grasped the concept of positive reinforcement...
During the topic, the point was raised that our work assignments, called Tischeinteilungen are often so badly set up that perfection is a lost cause, a point agreed upon by most (except one little sycophant who must be sleeping with someone in the department that does the Tischeinteilungen or hoping to...). When our Fearless Leader (not our Team Leader - the man who is our keeper, so to speak) was besieged by voices complaining about the high stress levels we are enduring due to the bad work lists, and was given actual examples of how they have worsened in the past few weeks, he went on the defensive, telling us that when we signed our contracts we knew very well that there would be stress involved, which was a new tactic.
Sadly, that's also an argument in and of itself that TITS may want to reconsider - after all, millions of scientific studies around the globe will substantiate the fact that humans, when under duress and stressed make many more mistakes than when less taxed and relaxed. Common sense and the mind of five year olds even know this. So if TITS wants perfection, then reducing stress, not hiding behind contracts, is definitely the way to go...
The argument brought forth by Fearless was that we are dealing in human lives (a fact none of us ever forgets) and therefore perfection was not negotiable. Agh, shame, lovey - it looks like this is a losing battle for all sides now!
The solution is actually quite simple, dear TITS -
- Never promise any client 100% perfection. If you promise a margin of error no greater than 98.5%, you are in the ballpark, as the statistics on our performance we saw easily will prove. Besides, we are already delivering nigh on 100% perfection as relates to safety; it's delays that are the main culprit, and those are indubitably and unquestioningly linked to the crap Tischeinteilungen, stress and the blame-shifting which TITS culture fosters...
- Fix the crap Tischeinteilungen already! Stop making excuses for the wankers (um, sorry, er, naturally I meant soldier bees or ants) doing that job - if we get rated on performance, why don't they? And how would one do that? Easy - you have us rate their work, as we are the ones who must bail out TITS every time aforementioned wankers do a crap job. Also, each time any of us incurs a delay, part of the blame must automatically be attributed back to them by means of the crap paperwork we already have to file anyway.
- Rework the work schedule so as to provide two days off in a row in every break scenario. Again, numerous scientific studies have shown globally that a human being cannot recharge and recover properly - especially in stressful jobs! - when she or he has less than 48 hours off work in which to do so...
- Never ever hide behind a contract again. Many of my fellow worker ants (or bees) have worked for companies around the globe. Each of these companies is convinced their work environments, pace, work load and deadlines are stressful, even though in reality they might better be termed relaxing or spa-like when compared to ours. Those applying for work at TITS usually have only such previous experience elsewhere as point of reference. After all, exactly how stressful the life of a TITS worker ant (or bee) really is does not become apparent until well after that contract has been signed... Correct me if I'm wrong, but legally speaking, doesn't that somehow smack of false pretenses?
Disclaimer: The characters, companies, personifications, names and facts in the preceding entry are entirely fictitious. Should they inadvertently be similar to or resemble any actual company or persons or entity, this is a pure coincidence and entirely unintentional.
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Fun footnote - yesterday I found out one of the South African FaceBook buddies I met online before I came here has moved into my apartment complex! What a coincidence and what fun!
And so, dear Blog, I close once more for the day. One last shout out to my wonderful sister Peggy, about whom we are all a little worried these days. She's married to a wonderfully able and competent endocrinologist, thankfully, so the recent diagnosis of pancreatitis and possible cancer of the pancreas is not quite as dooming as it otherwise might be...
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