It doesn’t upset me, it doesn’t annoy me, but I am aware of what is going on and I am actually concerned about the culture that is allowed to manifest. The culture of the workplace is determined by the minimum standard the management is willing to accept – they control culture. 

So, I was working on an assignment in the Democratic Republic of Congo in 2019 where I placed a historical post Why talent leaves and non-performers remain. I wrote this post back in 2015 for an someone named Emilly. 

She performed to a high level, is highly intelligent, is extremely motivated, somewhat outspoken but a little disliked in her workplace due to the politics of personal power and jealousy. She was looking for new opportunities when a management role was offered to her in a global company.

I reposted this article when she was offered the role of Area Manager, she had accepted and was in her new role. This post was picked up by one of my colleagues and discussed at length in my absence in very derogatory terms. This just happened to be when I was in the Democratic Republic of Congo; however, this was reposted when she accepted the role and moved to another city to start this role. Whilst this was just a coincidence, this was interpreted much differently by my colleagues.

One person had printed the post out and placed it on the noticeboard for all to read. Naturally all the office gossip mongers were in overdrive shooting their mouths off, not one of these fools even thought to look at the published date of the 24th of January 2015. The questions I ask, this is an open plan office where the management read the noticeboard and sit at the table. What were they doing when this highly slanderous and highly emotional discussion was going on in an open plan office?

Whilst I do not need the protection of management against workplace bullying as I have shown that I am more than capable of taking workplace bullies down on my own. They have certain obligations, they need to shut down these malicious discussions with facts. This was relayed to me all the way in Africa, there were apparently people with plenty to say. This was a topic of conversation in an open plan office and I received notification from multiple sources indicating that these loud discussions were taking place with plenty of people involved.

With the post printed out and placed on the lunch table where everyone congregates, it would be difficult to defend that management had no knowledge that this discussion was going on. What is most disturbing is the lack of critical thinking abilities of my colleagues, groupthink, pack mentality and follower mentality.

As a longtime NAB customer I held a Visa® card with the bank, I was then informed by the bank that I would be sent a Platinum Qantas American Express card linked to my existing Visa® account.

I preferred using the Amex® card as the benefits and protections were better and I guessed this would improve the acceptance of the card with merchants who had previously avoided American Express®. I am a little annoyed as I had previously held an American Express® card but cancelled it when I received this credit card. This was really forced upon me, I had no choice in the matter, I am annoyed about how I am being manipulated.

As I frequently travel overseas I want multiple cards as I once faced the prospect of being stuck without cash after my card was locked for suspicious international transactions. Those were my transactions, I appreciated the protection the bank offered but making an overseas phone call to reactivate my card when I pretty much was out of all cash turned out to be more difficult than anticipated.

Luckily, in modern times all that is required with electronic banking is online access to my account and I can nominate the country and the time transactions will take place. Still, I like to have multiple credit cards so if one is lost, stolen or locked, I have access to funds. I keep the credit cards separated so if I am robbed, card is lost or the card damaged so I still have access to funds.

My spare card is kept with my passport in a secure location as a back up. There used to be American Express® offices located in major international cities where a cash advance could be organised. To the best of my knowledge those Amex offices are mostly closed, I certainly don’t see them around anymore. In these modern times, cards pretty much work anywhere and you have the ability to withdraw cash anywhere and anytime.

I have been wearing polo shirts pretty much since I was a late teen and I still wear them now. Ok, so they looked better on me as a 25 year old rather than as a 50 year old, the muscle definition was pretty well apparent then and body fat was low.

Over the past 25 years, adding kilogram per year has been the norm and I don’t train to anywhere the same intensity. There is not much I can say in my defense, when I moved from the workshop floor to the office, the decline began. Still, in a casual setting a polo shirt is a pretty good option, the style is smart casual and the collar keeps the sun off the back of my neck. That’s a pretty important feature when you live in Western Australia, those UV rays are nasty. A collar shirt is important, being able to flip the collar up saves your neck from sunburn and is still respectable casual attire. Still, as a person pushing 52 years of age, I can still get out in a polo shirt for casual occasions and not feel poorly.

I have an interest in watchmaking and I am moving past Swiss watchmakers instead looking to German horology for inspiration. A German watchmaker gaining my interest at the moment is Lang & Heyne. Based in Dresden, the elegant yet simple designs of Lang & Heyne have garnered my interest. This small boutique manufacturer is producing some excellent timepieces in low quantities.

So, what makes Lang & Heyne interesting for me is their rectangular collection, the Georg is a fine example of an elegant dress watch. The white enamel dial with a circular seconds sub-dial is perfect. The blued lancet hands match with the art-deco numerals, very cool. They portray a certain style, the Anton is a pretty decent style that for me is timeless. The hand-wound skelatonised tourbillon is outstanding. A 55 hour power reserve gives it plenty of kick. Add a platinum case, rose gold lancet hands contrasting with the exposed tourbillon movement, a nice piece of engineering.

Henry Mintzberg’s book is worth occupying shelf space in any management library. Visionary management guru Peter Drucker elevated the status of management as a science, currently leadership is the organisational goal and displaced management as the science of running the business and measuring resource allocation.

Mintzberg feels “instead of distinguishing managers from leaders, we should be seeing managers as leaders, and leadership as management practiced well.” Restoring management to its proper place in the organisational hierarchy is Mintzberg’s aim. Mintzberg feels real world managers cannot be the reflective, systematic planners as idealised in current management textbooks. Researching management as actually practiced in real world situations as opposed to management classes in university lecture halls.

As such, Mintzberg shadowed twenty-nine managers undertaking a typical work days. He viewed current management realities requiring an unrelenting pace, frequent interruptions and a high level of activity. Such a pace according to Mintzberg makes textbook management practices near impossible to implement. Recognising the current conundrum managers face, Mintzberg envisions a contemporary management model.

His proposal outlines a a dynamic process that managers accomplish their purpose working through data, people and direct action; not list of tasks needing to be crossed off. This is why Mintzberg insists management is not a profession but a practice learned primarily through experience and rooted in context. Here is a book that sat in my bookcase for a number of years untouched until finally over the Christmas break I was able to crack the book open and work through this highly engaging read.

Much to my embarrassment, I do not know much about India apart from Indian food and Indian cricket. Well, apart from the fact that all my interactions with the people I have met have been positive. With just over a billion inhabitants and a long history, India is the dominant culture in central Asia. I admit to not knowing much about Indian history, that is even post-British colonisation. Since Indian independence in 1948, I know more about this period of Indian history than the rest combined.

As a cricketing nation, Australia and India have a very fierce rivalry on the field. Hopefully the shared values that occurred through sport can transcend the sporting field to business and cultural interests. What I am going to do is a little research of Indian history, I do have an interest and would like to know more about pre-British colonisation.

I am really enjoying watching the mayhem unfold, I am a firm believer in returning stress with interest and that is exactly what is occurring. They are not enjoying the attention or the stress that they are experiencing – well, that’s too bad.

Now we have a situation where the special interest group who have only their own interest in mind are failing us again. So where does this leave us? Well, for me it isn’t so bad as I just don’t care anymore. Watching them squirm, well that is fun, the lax working conditions they have become accustomed to are now becoming so stressful, it just isn’t worth it anymore. As the pressure increases, watching the effects is an interesting case study.

Bypassing merit selection principles to achieve manufactured consent are their tools of trade, maybe they have a high tolerance to stress – let’s prove this theory. Apparently, promotion without process comes at a cost, now we will see the cost people are willing to pay. They thought they were bypassing mandatory requirements, this is what was happening, but as their incompetence is being exposed, they are unable to hide from the exposure their own lack of knowledge has now uncovered.

This was not the first time I had been to Brussels, I had spent a couple of days back in around 2004, not long before my brother married his now wife Marieke. Going back to Brussels more than a decade later is long enough to make me excited enough to want to return again.

They are still happily married and living in Sydney, I remember this time well as I was happily hanging in Zurich and returned for their wedding – just don’t ask me the date or the year. Owing to circumstances, I never returned to Zurich at that time and haven’t been back since, it was, I guess, a pivotal point in my life. As I recall, Brussels wasn’t the cleanest city in Europe, in fact, I found it pretty run down. Yes, Brussels has plenty to off the weekender in terms of sightseeing, there was plenty to do.

Now, close to eighteen years later, I’m seeing more of the same. Yes, Manekin Piss is still a drawcard, Grand-Place de Bruxelles is magnificent as is wandering the streets looking at bars, restaurants, waffle sellers and chocolate shops. I have to ask myself, do you revisit a city you have been to before or an entirely new city. For me, revisiting Brussels was great because we used this city as a central location for visiting other cities in Belgium.

We had our arrival day, that was a bus from Luxembourg City that took over three hours with a midday departure. After finding accommodation, that left the late afternoon and evening to look around the city. We then spent the next day walking around checking the sights of Brussels. Then a day in Ghent, the next in Antwerp, the following day in Bruges and the final day in Liege. Belgium has a great train network with the major cities easily accessible from a base in Brussels.

Well, we came full circle, we began this trip in Frankfurt and we ended in Frankfurt four weeks later. Plenty changed, we arrived at the start of September and the weather was still warm, our final day was warm in Stuttgart in the morning and cool to cold in Frankfurt. I wanted to get back to the mall where the pop-up bars created such a great vibe on a warm Friday evening but to our disappointment, the bars were all packed up and gone except for one food vendor who was yet to pack up.

I think Frankfurt is a city I could live in, it is large enough without being too big. I liked the vibe of the city, this is interesting as I was never especially interested in visiting Frankfurt. I had been only the once before where I landed and immediately caught the train for Basel and onto Zurich. I had also transited through the airport on a number of occasions without leaving the airport so I couldn\’t say I have ever visited this city. Now, I will fly into Frankfurt in the future and begin European trips from this important transport hub, already looking forward to my next visit.

So a job came up as a Hydraulic Trainer in Kazakhstan, the remuneration wasn’t as good as I expected but I decided to give it a go anyway. The problem is the job was advertised through a recruitment firm and they have been less than professional. I had seen the position advertised about six months ago so I had some apprehension, why did the last person only last such a short amount of time? Was the incumbent not up to the job? Possibly, but as this was a worldwide search then one would expect a professional selection and recruitment process.

Kazakhstan is a miserably cold country, possibly the conditions were too harsh for the incumbent, there may have been management issues or even performance problems, the facilities were not up to scratch or no resources existed. I firmly believe that from uncertainty comes opportunity so the more disorganised and under-performing the facility is, the greater chance to turn it around. There is also a worldwide search going on for a Training Manager, this may have something to do with retention. I would be looking forward to such an opportunity – always up to the challenge.