It's like when the IT team / sales reps claim 99.8% up time - sounds
impressive till you realise it means no system for 19 mins a month, or
more realistically, everything great for three months and then you are off
the air for an hour. Or it's like an organisation I'm not the remotest
bit connected with which had its outgoing mailbags go astray for a couple
of days a while back. First time in 4.5 years, which works out at 0.09%
error rate, but one of the bags had a letter containing a cheque for $4.9
million, for a business deal the CEO was keeping a close eye on. Isn't
Murphy wonderful?
It is always worth quantifying this sort of thing. I've used percentages
to fight off criticism and auditors, but they do distort things, and can
make it hard to do real risk assessment Five or ten or twenty unsuccessful
'things' a year could be devastating, even if it is a low percent.
What is much more important is the reaction of the vendor/supplier. In the
mailbags case above, the CEO, and the intended recipient of the cheque,
found out first from us (sorry, from the RM Section of the unnamed
organisation). Made a big difference to the CEO's attitude, let me tell
you. Hiding things by failure to communicate proactively, or by hiding
behind percentages, doesn't impress.
Cheers
Glenn
Glenn Sanders MRMA
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Australia
These views are mine alone. They may or may not be those of any
previous or present employers or clients. I don't know. If I'd asked
and they'd agreed, I would have signed it "Bloggs and Co and
Glenn". Or whatever. But I haven't, so I didn't.
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