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SBL looking for new Director of Operations.


Painy

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31 minutes ago, FDC484950 said:

Actually CSFs and KPIs are usually set by external consultants these days :)

Not the case in most businesses I have been in, why use an outsider to write/set your KPI’s when they have no knowledge of the business.

KPI’s are usually driven from the top management downwards and they all link  in to help achieve the overall objectives of the business.

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4 hours ago, musicbassman said:

My daughter works in London for a large well known charity - no names.

It seems charities are run like any other big business these days.

At a recent management meeting, she was seriously asked by someone if she could 'solutionise' a problem......

Oh the glamour of big business...

I used to be CE of a modest-sized charity. In conversation with a friend who, like me had come up through the ranks to become CE of a related charity it transpired that we both had unblocked our office loos because the staff were too lily-livered...

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6 minutes ago, steantval said:

Not the case in most businesses I have been in, why use an outsider to write/set your KPI’s when they have no knowledge of the business.

KPI’s are usually driven from the top management downwards and they all link  in to help achieve the overall objectives of the business.

In fairness, both situations might pertain.

I consulted to a number of companies where the management asked me to help them establish KPI's where the brief was usually heavy on the objectives of the exercise but were significantly light on specifics. So I'd toddle off to have a chat with the people on the front line. Then I'd come back and marry up the actualities with the objectives. 

I often got the feeling I was there to spare the management the necessity of discussing specifics with those they employed to do the job. Might this have been because so many senior personnel these days seem to be management generalists who flit between industrial sectors and are happier talking about management theory and strategy rather than the nuts and bolts? Who can say?

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1 hour ago, Delberthot said:

I have the contents of my cupboard alphabetised from Actimel all the way to zucchini although problems arise when I'm faced with whether to put the Pot Noodles under P or N.

I still have no idea what a key performance indicator is 

N.

It's Noodles, Pot. The Pot describes the type of noodle.

Unless, of course, you're classifying them as a Snack Meal, in which case it's M for Meal, Snack.

A KPI is a metric that is established at the beginning of the year (and invariably actually given to you at the start of Q3) against which your performance is measured and your bonus (not) paid. CEOs generally have KPIs that maximise their bonus potential but have nothing to do with the actual performance of the Company. In this way, large corporations can haemorrhage cash and customers like nobody's business but the CEO somehow, magically manages to achieve all his (or her) KPIs.

 

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12 minutes ago, Ricky 4000 said:

I'm in a remote position, but I think Scott might be missing a trick by not considering applicants whom live in towns etc - but what do I know?

Interesting that there's no mention of gloves.

This seems like a handy opportunity for Scott to find someone who can take all those unused right hand gloves off his, er, hands.

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57 minutes ago, skankdelvar said:

I consulted to a number of companies where the management asked me to help them establish KPI's where the brief was usually heavy on the objectives of the exercise but were significantly light on specifics. So I'd toddle off to have a chat with the people on the front line. 

Spoken like a true consultant...! 

57 minutes ago, skankdelvar said:

I often got the feeling I was there to spare the management the necessity of discussing specifics with those they employed to do the job. Might this have been because so many senior personnel these days seem to be management generalists who flit between industrial sectors and are happier talking about management theory and strategy rather than the nuts and bolts? Who can say?

From experience I think that I can hazard an opinion, which is that is that you may well be on to something there... 

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11 minutes ago, Skinnyman said:

Interesting that there's no mention of gloves.

This seems like a handy opportunity for Scott to find someone who can take all those unused right hand gloves off his, er, hands.

He does need to wear the right hand gloves sometimes. 👍

Anyway, being beastly about that is off-limits because he has focal dystonia, which is the type of thing that must be a bit terrifying for him (or any bass player). 😬

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26 minutes ago, Ricky 4000 said:

He does need to wear the right hand gloves sometimes. 👍

Anyway, being beastly about that is off-limits because he has focal dystonia, which is the type of thing that must be a bit terrifying for him (or any bass player). 😬

sorry, Scott. sorry, Ricky

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It does make you wonder how hands on this role would be as opposed to management. Such as transporting and setting up equipment for video shoots, organising interviews, transport etc. Rather like a PA (personal assistant as opposed to public address) cum roadie etc. 

Who knows!! Or maybe the D Ops manages the people who do that? 

It sounds like the CEO comes up with the strategy and the D Ops sorts out the implementation. A bit like John Hall and his senior management team. 

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5 hours ago, peteb said:

Spoken like a true consultant...! 

Best paid and most mind-numbing job ever was when I was attached to an 8 person sub-team on a project led by Hewlett Packard and working on a staff internet usage policy (!)

Six months on site, five days a week to turn out a 4 page document which basically said: 

  1. Don't view porn via the company network
  2. Use 11 point Arial for emails
  3. Er...
  4. ... that's it

As one might expect the company in question was an absolute swamp of management-speak.

Edited by skankdelvar
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Knowing how Scott's business has evolved I can see that creating this role is a good move for him. 

In the early days everything was new and exciting and to be on the site. The community was good fun. There was always discussion going on an making friends was easy.  There were Monthly "Challenge" competitions going on. Between myself and one of the mods we were answering all the tech questions, most of which were often pretty basic, but it was exciting and Scott was packing in more and more members. This, I guess is how the million members comes about.

As it got busier, things changed. A few key people who were active in the community started to disappear. I dropped out too as things happened I wasn't happy with.

I went back recently and the discussion forum is now dead. You can almost see the tumbleweed. If the business is to survive Scott needs to do something to relaunch it. Relaunching isn't as easy as the initial launch and very possibly Scott needs someone with marketing and sales experience to see how to boost it again and see where it all went wrong.

Good luck to him. It was good and it would be good to see it buzz again.

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Tbh, his asking for KPIs is probably only a matter of, if he's paying good money, he needs to see a strategy and believe in the ability of the person. What the person says and does needs to make sense to him. I'm also sure it would be a hands-on role. It's not a big organisation.

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  • Consistently demonstrates a passion for values alignment, focus, simplicity, and clarity across the organisation.

This is quite funny - is there anything at all about this ad that projects focus, simplicity or clarity?

I'm sure he's a really good bloke and a very capable player, but this ad uses words the way he uses notes.

 


 

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7 minutes ago, Soledad said:
  • Consistently demonstrates a passion for values alignment, focus, simplicity, and clarity across the organisation.

This is quite funny - is there anything at all about this ad that projects focus, simplicity or clarity?

I'm sure he's a really good bloke and a very capable player, but this ad uses words the way he uses notes.

 


 

I assume he's engaged an agency to do the search? They'll be the w@nkword specialists who'll have assembled the advert....

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The ad reads as awful corporate BS-speak.

It's a tricky thing to do expanding the management team when the business is so focussed on the founder/CEO, releasing some control to people that may have different opinions is not easy, but has to be done to grow the business beyond the reach of one arm (so to speak).

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10 hours ago, Delberthot said:

I have the contents of my cupboard alphabetised from Actimel all the way to zucchini although problems arise when I'm faced with whether to put the Pot Noodles under P or N.

If I was arranging them, they'd be 'Noodles, Pot' and would sit between Noodles, Egg and Noodles, Rice. Yes, it's precisely the sort of thing I would do because I too am that anal :D

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I don't think the ad is too bad... Probably because I've seen many far, far worse!! I think it's a bit confused, not sure how you can be an experienced and respected  contributor to the business of your job is to make sure everyone does what Scott says. Also being remotely based but being responsible for team culture just doesn't work IMO. There are some specific skills and experiences required so it's not just hopeful pie in the sky stuff. I just think it's a bit of a confused mix of stuff he's asking for, in a language that may turn off a lot of people who would want this kind of gig, and it seems a bit "big corporate" for what seems to me like it should be a tight knit small but successful enterprise.

 

That's £1,500+ VAT and expenses for my insight.

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16 minutes ago, hiram.k.hackenbacker said:

The two things that bother me most about the ad (and I accept it might just be the way this thread has been worded) are firstly, if he’s looking for a ‘new’ D of Ops, what became of the old one and why is he/she leaving. Secondly, for all the characteristics he wants ticked off, it seems to me that the best way of achieving some of them would be to actually be there, rather than being a ‘remote employee’.

 

Those are definitely two things to ask at the interview when inevitably asked "do you have any questions?". I am told that these days, an applicant can succeed or fail on the basis of what they say at this point -- saying "errm, not really no" is the kiss of death.

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52 minutes ago, Grangur said:

I went back recently and the discussion forum is now dead. You can almost see the tumbleweed. If the business is to survive Scott needs to do something to relaunch it. Relaunching isn't as easy as the initial launch and very possibly Scott needs someone with marketing and sales experience to see how to boost it again and see where it all went wrong.

Maybe SBL has reached the limit of it's potential.

* There are only so many bass players out there.

* There's an ever decreasing number of opportunities to play live, which must decrease enthusiasm.

* He's preaching to an ageIng demographic.

* Just maybe.

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