You know, any (Tues)day.
Hey, “I drink only three glasses a day, so practically, I’m a teetotaller.”
Category: ERM, GRC
Being busy bodies doing busy work
… Anyone noticed that the ‘trend’ (development) where everyone claims to be oh so busy with, basically busywork, started with the demise of the secretarial profession ..?
Where secreataries (either a pool of or a single personal, or in a pool altogether for sharing i.e. load balancing) and like support staff were (sic) there to alleviate all the chores that now, all underlings/specialists, ‘managers’ and even up, are supposed to do now, in stead of the work they were hired for and be productive in the thing that labour specialisation had made them best, most productive, in, like a Ricardo trade deal within the organisation.
Yes, the secretaries were doing much of, superficially!, uninteresting work but were so labour-specialised in that, that they were more productive, effective, than any heap of managers ever could dream to be … Where the specialists as well as the managers once were specialised folk, with suitable spans of control, but now, no more…
That has been chucked out of the window. Despecialisation resulted indeed, and has included the tons of changeover time involved. Making everyone miserable with having to fill out dumb forms (dumbed-down to the max because now even managers needed to understand, not only the understand-experts that the secretaries were) in stead of the interesting work that one came over to the organisation for.
The hyperbolic extension to socmed addiction and FOMO, and a prefix Impostor Syndrome, of course leading to a neat total burn-out. Thta prefix thing, I’ll elucidate later in some seperate post, if you don’t git it.
The solution also being Obvious: Bring Back The Secretaries! And give them proper status and reward (in all ways; monetary, too, since they raise productivity and morale so handsomely — the latter not literally meant, btw).
Let’s all admit that productivity increase by firing lowest-level staff first, doesn’t work as far as we (???) have done that over the past four decades, and revert that trend. Plus:
[Wide, high, mighty, needs no tower; Metz cathedral and yes, that’s part of another building on the right not a pic error … (?)]
Comedy crashers
No capers, frankly no comedy either, when some of the most respected in the field are concerned about pervasive probing of whole countries in one go. As here.
Probably, the same is pulled off on smaller countries as well; the infra doesn’t distinguish, but the protection budgets probably are much smaller, so a proof of concept might be interesting. Though this may trigger better protection in the larger country/countries, if done ‘right’ the attack(s) may be class break kind of things not so easily protected against in the first place.
And for now, the smaller countries probed, will have even smaller budgets and capabilities to even detect the probing all together / in the first place. Interesting …
But maybe budgets are better spent on all the other actual risks out there, like: ..?
[Suddenly (of course !!) turned up at the Joinville château; Haut-Marne]
Thoreau’s Meteor (quote)
New ideas come into this world somewhat like falling meteors, with a flash and an explosion, and perhaps somebody’s castle roof perforated.
Again, one that is true on the surface. And true deeper down. Apart from the link to ‘true’ disruption of the cozy dinosaur life, the flash and explosion are of course the hype and bubble burst that we see so often. But the castle roof perforated… Often, yes, either blowing away the castle / imcumbent or giving a foundation for a rebuilt dwelling. Note ‘castle’ not ‘house’: The (well…) mighty being hit mostentimes not the underlings (?).
Note also the wish of many to the ‘shooting star’, that their life may change for the better some way i.e., current life needs improvement. If truly so, the wish may be granted, if not, it will not since then it’s a false claim to provenance to bestow even more on the ones that already Have. The nots, are the reason to keep one’s wish quiet — out of shame, perhaps.
Never overstretch a quote’s explanation. Hence:
[Pharsalus on the wall — sometimes, not a meteor but a decisive battle gives fate the chance to intervene; or you were up against Julius, then you were doomed anyway; chateau Ancy le Franc, Aube]
Dronecatcher, now with dronespotter
Ah. Found; yes, probably @DARPA already had theirs, this one’s more (?) private-sector though: A partial solution to the Attack of the Drones thing.
Back some time ago I posted this gem, on a solution against drones, e.g., around objects of ‘vital infrastructure’ — that weren’t, like, so, about a hundred years ago and people may have been happier then.
Once drones were distinguished from birds [the in-the-air kind not the ones you spot on the beach, topless], any kind of mini-Goalkeeper preferably with buck shot (since short-range effectiveness is required only, without any long-range bystander damage risk) might suffice. I’d say Mini- indeed; more like a double-barrel pointed up above e.g., 50° or more to prevent nasty fall-out on hoomans but with some swing capability to cross-fire.
The problem being, was, to have an installation small enough to be easily placeable in sufficient number to get good air dome/cylinder coverage but to not be too obtrusive. Yes, probably @DARPA already had theirs but didn’t want to beat the drum too much, to not lure ‘DoS’ swarm attempts or false-negative probing. But at least, for the rest of the World, there now is Elvira, instantly in fixed, flex as well as military versions.
Apparently, their aim is to prevent bird/drone collisions in mid-air (triggers association with this great clip work, and also this one) but I see use for the inverse, too, picking off the flyers/drones before they don’t, up against ‘vital infra’.
But aren’t we then reverting to an arms’ race where the silly, petty, may be stopped but not the countermeasure-escalation pro’s …? Like these:
[But hey, seems to be on a carrier exactly like I have in my back pond for fun and impressing the babes so can’t you have one, too ..?]
Oh, about yesterday's culture
… to return to yesterday’s topic; an afterthought.
That, most, al-most always, thinking about culture from the bottom up is. Leading to the babble that is.
Where of course this bottom-up thinking should be the very first thing to do. Otherwise, incompleteness in ‘control’ will result, to the amount that it isn’t taken this way.
So, … approaching Culture from the top down, is the surefire way to guarantee all the LIBORgates that linger in your organisation, will surface. Like an avalanche, they will. The tones at the top will not be nice but nobody will listen, eh?
So, …:
[At the top, for whom the bell tolls..? Barça]
Culture for breakfast, since it's so light and airheaded
Yet again some oversight body / de facto regulator gave wind that they already had changed to auditing Culture and the Tone At The Top including Behaviour and Awareness, apart from mere ([ed.]) process and technology.
To get the latter off the table: Good. ‘Technology’ wasn’t understood the least bit anyway; really (sic).
And Process, ah finally they found that about all they had done in the past, was windbaggery of the worst kind. Yes, process has its place, but a so much more minor, subaltern one than the past Tragedy (sic, again) that ‘governance’/GRC/compliance/SOx was …! Yes again, it really was the little chicken pretending to be a full-grown eagle.
So now, they ‘have’ turned to Culture and related blah. About which they have no clue or would had to have fired a majority of own staff and hire complete+ replacement with psychologically skilled (i.e., fully a square angle to -educated) staff. Which they haven’t, or would have found out that the new skill set would have burned down the house that was.
Of which no (smoke) sign is in sight.
So, … words; the Tom Tom Club was right.
And:
[Blockhead and Culture with a capital C here …; Casa de, Porto of course]
Another Thoreau
Yes another one in a series of The Annotated Alice Thoreau, with:
I am constantly assisted by the books in identifying a particular plant and learning some of its humbler uses, but I rarely read a sentence in a botany which reminds me of flowers or living plants. Very few write indeed as if they had seen the thing which they pretend to describe.
And so it is with, e.g., books and other theory of GRC. Not a living thing to be discovered in them. Just as if the dust of centuries had already descended on ‘process’, ‘structure’, etc. etc. — which it might have, when it is the errand interpretation of what management (sic; not ‘governance’ as that is a nonsense phrase as per this giant) has been around since the dawn of settled farmer civilisation. Note that all that seems, at superficial and likewise erroneous misinterpretation, rebellious might hearken back to the glorious days of the hunter-gatherers as expressed here. But at least, summa, they’re alive as the books/GRC aren’t hence fail.
[Old guns still work, even as a model they’re still pretty, too; Rijks, Amsterdam]
ORM will not fly B-4 People are included
[Warning: Longread]
On the ails of the Basel-IV ORM proposals:
1. Unwarranted, certainly unscientific overreliance on ‘models’;
2. Modeling for prospective use in stead of hindsight understanding;
3. Too much top-down, not enough bottom-up;
4. No humans in the picture, hence the wrong and unactionable indicators.
Introduction
About all of the banking industry, and other financials in their wake, have had to deal with loads of regulatory requirements. Justified, some say, for ‘they’ cause(d) so much misery beyond mere most temporary loss of bonuses that the ‘un’ should be (have been long before) detached from bridled. So, Basel II and -III regulations swooped in requiring much more explicit and detailed handling of financial business than ever before. The move from laissez-faire to regulation, to regulation with sanction schemes, to sanctions (possibly interpreted as ‘token’…), was extended with provability and then complete proof-demonstration as minimum requirement.
This all, however, has created a large, and in general even I would say quite overpaid [disclaimer: am profiting too] industry of consultants, quants, ‘risk managers’, reviewers, assessors, auditors, and scores of Toms, Dicks[1] and Harries of the GRC kind. That are all very likeable nice lads and lassies, but maybe not all quite worth their salt, certainly not their bonuses, or even be sure to be worth much lending one’s ear to.
Keep reading!
The Annotated Thoreau, part of many
It is a record of the mellow and ripe moments I would keep. I would not preserve the husk of life, but the kernel.
And so, one would not do well by overly tending to Process in stead of Content, where ‘overly’ will all to easily and quickly be reached. Where Process is just Talk. Sic; just think that one through in earnest. Where an ethical life calls for not Talk but Action, as through a Man’s Actions ‘his’ Character will speak. Only.
So Big Th discusses not only some diary, but also the virtuous life.
Oh well, and:
[An airplane; apt art museum masterpiece; Stedelijk Amsterdam]
