Every time I fly Cebu Pacific the story is always the same, flight delayed and no information as to why. Even worse, flights are frequently cancelled without any communication whatsoever. When taking short flights of an hour to an hour and a half, if you are still sitting on the runway when your flight is supposed to be landing then something is clearly wrong.

If a plane is late arriving, tell us as we understand that this occurs from time to time. Likewise, should there be a technical issue with the aircraft – then keep us informed. We may need to change flights, contact transfers or reorganise flight connections, it is still an inconvenience but we have at least the opportunity to organise alternative arrangements. This lack of customer service exhibited by the management of Cebu Pacific damages the brand and hinders growth whilst alienating the very people who they derive their income from. How about treating your customers with respect?

The touchy subject of executive pay is once again a hot topic with Yahoo! CEO Marisa Mayer looking to receive a severance pay of around $36 million – it’s hard to believe. Former Woolworths CEO Paul Simon once stated no executive should earn more than 30 times the wage of the lowest full-time employee in the company – that was a very astute observation. Now Woolworths is in real bother, the company is once again seeking the services of Paul Simon to repair the damage.

Furthermore, Paul Simon spent three days per week walking the aisles of the supermarket chain talking to not only managers; he spent considerable time speaking to rank and file employees and customers alike seeking ways to improve the business – he managed to position the supermarket as the leading retail business in Australia. As a shareholder, they are destroying the value of the company, yet the way they pay themselves you would think the share price is rocketing skyward unabated. We need sense to prevail, we need to respect the principles of corporate social responsibility.

It has been said you don’t leave jobs, you leave managers – in my case, how true it is. Henry Mintzberg once stated “managers not MBAs” are required, we are teaching the wrong skills to the wrong people. In my case, my manager lacks the pre-requisite and necessary communication skills, lassiz faire combined with the avoidance of important issues and conflict does not translate into leadership nor does it constitute a management style – it is just a accountability mitigation strategy.

While Mintzberg does not say we don’t need MBAs, he believes we should differentiate business and management as they are totally different skill-sets. What he says is the average MBA candidate lacks the people management skills honed through actual experience. In my case, the manager has plenty of experience, insofar as, he has been there too long and he has a title but that is about it. So where does that leave us? Shuffling funds around a spreadsheet does not constitute good management practice, we need a holistic approach to management.

Yes, managerial accounting is important and must not be discounted, but if that was all that was needed to run an organisation, universities would be pumping out accountants en mass only. This is not the case as the subjects of leadership, management, human resources, ethics, globalisation, sustainability, marketing and operations are taught together with accounting, analysis and finance.

A balance of capabilities is required; this is not what I am seeing in my workplace. All I see is a guy who has inherited a highly capable portfolio, has failed to invest in physical resources and human capital and diverts funds out redirecting to divisional revenue to enhance his personal reputation whilst penalising the efforts of highly efficient workers.

These funds prop up inefficient business portfolios, the question is, why not re-engineer the inefficient portfolios to become self-sufficient instead providing disincentives for efficiency and rewarding inefficiency. Ambition is good, business is a team game and the principles of inclusion and team-building should dictate strategic direction.

Recently I was thinking, what happened to AltaVista? This was a very popular search engine in the early days of the internet, yet here is another early internet business that is no longer around. Founded in 1995, AltaVista’s traffic is now redirected to Yahoo’s search engine after being purchased by Yahoo! in 2003 that has now been redirected to Microsoft’s Bing search engine – who would have thought?

Google has dominated internet search after Microsoft’s Internet Explorer has lost favour with consumers. While AltaVista was not as dominant as Google’s search engine; it was a serviceable search engine along with Yahoo!, Netscape Explorer and Lycos. While some of AltaVista’s innovations made it through to Yahoo!, the name AltaVista has been relegated to internet history.

A week earlier, I had been diving down in Bohol just as the weather turned inclement, the Philippines can turn pretty nasty weather wise with a multitude of typhoons ravaging the islands frequently. This wasn’t a total lock-down typhoon, there was still a chance of getting some diving in so I decided to head up to Subic Bay as the harbour is fairly protected; as it turns out, it was a wasted bus trip.

The week I was down in Bohol a ferry sank with a major loss of life and a day or two later some Korean divers were swept away in strong currents resulting in more loss of life. Notwithstanding, the coastguard were somewhat apprehensive about allowing dive boats to depart in rough conditions and you can’t complain about the coastguard being ultra-conservative. Hence, local shipping was restricted with the coastguard requiring clearance to set to sea. I wasn’t going to get any diving in, I just sat around the shop waiting for a coastguard permission that wasn’t forthcoming so it was back on the bus and back to Manila – such a waste.

The central business district of the Philippines is Makati; located north east of Aquino International Airport, the Philippine stock exchange is located on Ayala Ave. The major financial institutions are based in Makati as well as major international corporations.

While people think of Manila, that is really the greater Manila area made up of the various sub-districts extending east of Manila Bay, north to Quezon City and south to Parañaque. You can still head over to the rundown and shabby old central Manila area, but it really isn’t a worthwhile experience unless you want to photograph outdated and rundown infrastructure.

An area gaining both influence and affluence is Ortigas, on weekdays the area is buzzing with workers in this business district; yet on weekends, the locality had the atmosphere of an out-of-hours business district where all the office workers had headed home – it’s empty. Major businesses are investing in the area, large property developments transformed the district including commercial retail property, residential hi-rise apartments, commercial office property and naturally for the Philippines – multiple large shopping complex.

The nightlife is improving, many consider Manila nightlife to consist only of go-go bars, massage parlors and other establishments of ill-repute. The fact is, many reputable bars, restaurants and cafés flourish in the area. This is not a bad area to hang out during the work day as the vibe is pretty good, the area is clean and everything seems to work. 

Way back in the mid 1990s when Windows 95 was introduced to the public, Netscape’s Navigator was the dominant web browser. Microsoft’s Internet Explorer then dominated the internet browser market as a free add on to Windows operating systems. At work, Internet Explorer is still the default browser to connect to the company intranet, as soon as we require internet browsing capabilities, most switch to their favoured browsers as most people have their preferred product. 

The introduction of Safari in 2003, Firefox in 2004 and Chrome in 2008 saw Internet Explorer’s dominant market share decimated. Although Internet Explorer still maintains just below a 15% market share slightly behind Firefox’s 16%: Internet Explorer dwarfs Apple’s Safari browser at slightly over 4% with Microsoft Edge trailing Opera at around 2% market share.  

Now that Windows 10 replaces Internet Explorer with Microsoft Edge: this effectively spells the end of Internet Explorer as an operating system. Technical support will apparently continue for the latest version for each operating system for an undetermined period as each product life cycle differs – it’s almost gone.

According to Sanjay, the business of command and control is dead. Unfortunately for me, my employment in the state government tends to contradict modern views found in contemporary business enterprises. The unleashing of potential does not exist my workplace, instead we resort to cronyism and nepotism including other outdated and unsavory tactics to manipulate workers. 

Trust, this is a foreign concept discussed in textbooks that I am yet to be exposed to during the hours of work, I am guessing we will not be seeing people’s potential unleashed. Instead, the manipulation of the workplace to meet the needs of the few to the detriment of the many still exists. We don’t trust the manager and his circle of cronies who actually have are at the same level as the rest of the workers in a flat organisation.  

Legendary investment vehicle of Warren Buffett, Berkshire Hathaway Incorporated is a diversified multi-national company headquartered in Omaha, Nebraska. Berkshire Hathaway Inc owns Dairy Queen, FlightSafety International, GEICO, Lubrizol, BNSF, Fruit of the Loom, NetJets, Helzberg Diamonds and 26% of Kraft Heinz. More recently, Berkshire Hathaway Inc purchased The Free Lance-Star a Virginia newspaper.

Berkshire Hathaway Inc holds significant minority share holdings in The Coca-Cola Company, John Deere, Wells Fargo, Munich Re, Mars Inc, Goldman Sachs, American Express, The Procter & Gamble Company, Wal-Mart, Moody’s Corporation, Restaurant Brands International, The Washington Post and IBM among others.

Buffett began purchasing shares in Berkshire Hathaway in 1962 after learning his trade as an investment salesman, securities analyst and stockbroker. Originally a textiles business, Buffett transformed the company into an investment vehicle that now has diverse range of businesses that ironically moved back into clothing manufacturing, distribution and retail of clothing and footwear.

Berkshire Hathaway Inc has phenomenal share price growth under Buffet’s leadership, a $1000 invested in Berkshire Hathaway Inc in 1964 would be worth $11.6 million in 2015 according to Business Insider, now that’s a return on investment. Warren Buffett is a long term investor, this is the ideal position, he is a value investor and he makes long-term investments that have paid off for the investors Berkshire Hathaway and I believe they will continue to outperform.

In what must has to be one of the dumber inventions on offer, the Nescafe red cup machine attempts to turn instant coffee into barista style coffee. That’s not going to happen, as far as I can work out, it pours hot water over instant coffee – an expensive kettle with a logo. 

I can’t profess to ever using such a machine so I can’t report on the quality of the drink, I just won’t force myself to drink instant coffee. Really, I am asking what is the point? The whole purpose of instant coffee is exactly that, just add hot water. Now if you are going to the effort of making a crema, why not just just purchase beans and a coffee machine capable of creating a half decent coffee.