The visible things matter - particularly in the absence of good communication - lessons from a car service

My car went in for a service and MOT last Friday.   It's a lease car so the garage selection and booking was done by the lease company, all I had to do was make sure the car was in the car park at work in the morning and it would be collected, work done and returned to me in the afternoon.

In the morning I called the garage to confirm the car was there and also to tell them that I had spotted that the rear wiper had started to split so please could they replace it.

Car was collected as planned and returned to the car park. On the front passenger seat was a survey form for me to complete and send off - no other communication from the garage.  The car had been washed so looked good but two things concerned me.  Firstly the feedback form had a box on it for them to tick if they had done an MOT and it was blank. Secondly the rear wiper hadn't been replaced.

I phoned the garage and they said that the MOT had been done but by a separate mechanic who wasn't the one who filled in the form on the seat.  As regards the wiper blade they queried whether this was something I had asked them to look at.  I confirmed I had, he did some checking and came back on the line to say that they "hadn't been able to get one the right length".  Suggested I should pop into a Halfords and get one .... which does beg the question why they couldn't get one...

That evening I checked the details in the service book and inspecting the condition of the wiper blades should be part of the service.

I now start to wonder what the quality/thoroughness of the rest of the service was like... if the thing I can see hasn't been addressed how confident can I be that things like brake pads/disks have been checked properly?
Odds are that everything else is fine but my confidence is shaken.   Full marks at this point to Leaseplan - having spoken to them they have booked car into a main dealer for them to do a check over for me and replace faulty wiper.

Things would have been so different if the garage had left a note in the car saying - we noticed that the blade is damaged but couldn't replace today, we have ordered one and would it be OK for us to pop over on Monday to fit it while it's parked in the car park?

Then I would have had an entirely different impression.

Communication is critical and so is making sure that the easily visible things are done well - they may not be the most important part but they set the tone for everything else.   I am reminded of the beautifully tied knots on a bandage round my head when I'd undergone surgery on my ear and the confidence that this inspired that the work inside my ear was good as well.  Irrational maybe but somehow reasuring :-)

Littleton & Harestock Show

For us this weekend has been dominated by the annual Littleton and Harestock Show.  Saturday morning saw us getting to the tent in time to set up our entries - photos, cake, veg, floral display, clay models, marzipan animals, pizza, collages, pictures.  Quick trip back home for a coffee and then we were back on site to set up the St Catherine's church stand where people were going to be able to make puppets.  Home again for lunch and then back for the show opening at 1pm.  The next 4 hours were spent on the stand or looking round the show.  Helen helped out on the Teddy Bear bungee jump (with 3 of Alice's teddies being on hand to take part in the jumps).  We also had the excitement after 2pm of being able to see whether any of our entries had won a prize.  Nothing this year for me or Carol but the girls managed a good haul of prizes each.

I managed to grab 5 more numbers (8, 33, 44, 48 & 99) towards my photography challenge which means I now only need another 40 to complete the set.

Sunday saw us return to the show once more, this time for the annual Littleton & Harestock Show Service.  This ecumenical service brings together the Churches in North Winchester for a celebration in the show marquee.  The highlight this year was without a doubt (in my biased opinion) the 2 performances by the "Ups and Downs" puppets.  Their first spot was a reprise of their award winning (in the southern regional puppet ministry competition) "I turn to God" and for their second number they gave us "He's the one that I want".  The performances were very well received and it looks like they may have some more bookings as a result.

Toilet Twinning

While we were at New Wine this year we came across the CORD stand in the Market Place offering the opportunity to "Twin" a toilet with a "bog in Burundi". We thought it was a great idea - the £60 payment covers the costs of building a toilet and you are then sent a certificate with details of your twinned toilet.

I'm very pleased to announce that we have received our certificate and our downstairs toilet... ...is now officially twinned with Latrine No 332 in Giharo, Rutana Province, Burundi, Africa (lat -3.852969, long 30.249261). Here is a link to the satellite image from google maps - sadly the image quality is low .. just to the west is a much better resolution.

If you want to twin your toilet get yourself along to toilettwinning.org

Ordinations at Old Basing for Diocese of Winchester

This evening I was privileged to be able to attend the Ordination of new priests for the Winchester Diocese. The service was held at St Mary's Church in Old Basing - a lovely church with plenty of room in the Sanctuary for the assembled clergy and deacons. I was there with the rest of the family as guests of Stuart our curate.

It was a lovely service and great to see so many people there to support the 5 deacons being ordained.

After the service there was a chance to chat over drinks and I was able to take to the opportunity to meet the Archdeacon. He and I are both speaking at a deanery meeting in a couple of weeks so nice to have the chance to meet him beforehand.

After availing of the evening sunshine to take some photos (clicking on the one below will take you to my flickr account where there are a few more)

it was time to head for home. I hope you noticed the way his stole is now adjusted to be worn in the manner of a priest rather than the sash configuration of a deacon.

God's blessing on you Stuart as you embark on this new phase of your ministry and we look forward to being at your first communion service in Chilbolton tomorrow.

Year 7 Celebration Assembly at Henry Beaufort School

This morning we, along with all the other parents of year 7 children at Henry Beaufort School, were invited to a "celebration assembly".

The morning started with coffee and croissant at the Beaufort Bistro - near to the hole in the ground that will become a fantastic new all weather pitch in the coming months.

We then moved to the hall where all of the year 7 children (just under 180 of them) were gathered with their form tutors.

The headmaster started with a talk highlighting some of the impressive list of achievements of the school over the last year and talked about how well the year 7's had settled into the school and how they are shaping up to be a great year.

This was followed by a short violin quartet performed by 4 of the year 7 boys to an impressive standard.

Next, 2 of the teachers read out statements from each of the form tutors which outlined some of their thoughts about the individual tutor groups.

Finally, we had the impressive logistical operation of presenting each of the children with a certificate of achievement. Each child had been assessed on 4 separate criteria (reward level/stamp total, attendance, uniform, and participation in school life) and for each given a score between 1 and 4 depending on level of achievement. Their total score then determined whether they received a bronze, silver, gold, or platinum level certificate.

The children didn't know what level they were going to receive until their name was called out. I think Helen was pleased with platinum - I know we were proud of her.

Sway - The irresistible pull of irrational behaviour

I recently read this excellent little book by Ori & Rom Brafman - ( with thanks to Michael who recommended it and lent me a copy )

Based around a series of engaging anecdotes the book explores some of the factors at play that can cause us to depart from what our experience, training and logic would lead us to and instead take seemingly rash and illogical decisions.

Influences covered included

- how the desire to avoid potential loss can lead us to illogical choices - "all-in" packages versus pay-as-you-go being one area where the risk of being charged more than the all in price causes us to accept the fixed rate even when the other option could well be cheaper.
- how the perceived cost of something affects how we value it - if it's free can it really be any good
- why as a man you should be wary of an attractive women who approaches you after you have just crossed a high rope bridge
- how the concept of "fairness" could lead people to turn down free money and studio audiences to deliberately banjax a contestant's chances of winning
- how offering a bit of money can lead to a worse result than relying purely on altruism. Altruism triggers the nucleus accumbens area of the brain whilst monetary reward triggers the posterior superior temporal sulcus - they say, and who am I to doubt them. They can't both operate at the same time so if you try and rely mainly on altruism but offer a small monetary sweetener you can end up closing down the altruism response completely.
- the value of dissent (and dissenters)

Ultimately I think the main lesson to take from the book is to be aware that as I take decisions and make judgments all sorts of hidden forces and influences are at work swaying my choices. By being more aware of what they could be, staying alert to wayward value attributions and assumptions about those around me plus taking steps, such as seeking out the dissenting voice, to counteract them, hopefully some bad choices can be avoided. I think the reality is that being "Sway"ed is here to stay so we need to accept that some of the decisions we take will be wrong and be prepared to admit it when it happens.

I hope there's a sequel sometime in the future and, like anyone else who has traveled out of Waterloo on the Weymouth train, my money's on the title being "New Milton".

LinkedIn milestone

I noticed today that my 3rd degree contacts on LinkedIn has just passed the magic 1 million mark. This is a doubling since October 2007 when I passed through the 500,000 mark. How long to the next 1m I wonder?