Of course, I wouldn't dream of having such a motivational poster in my workspace. Apart from anything else, as a spreadsheet jockey, I take the idea of a clear desk policy seriously – paper is unsightly and fills me with unease. It's so... permanent and unforgiving. On-screen, in-cell editing can cover a multitude of sins – and fast.
Mind you, sometimes you just can't dodge the rah-rah brigade. Take last month. FD's return from a week off invariably heralds trouble and this was no exception. Reading a management guru book does not fall into most people's definition of "spending time with the family", but he fair bubbled into the office, full of enthusiasm about this volume.
It was written by a former CFO of an unheard of US utility who's now a "visiting professor of supply-side logistics" (the finance equivalent of media studies) at the State University of Euphoria or somewhere. He claims any company can cut its costs by half by following three easy steps.
FD "missioned" me to do Step One. Ugh. The idea is that you put into a spreadsheet every penny you spend – not in a sensible, purchase ledger way, but in a "value-driven location matrix" with the biggest "value eaters" at the top. Then some mug (me) has to do extremely complicated analysis ("Excel formulae not included," the book jacket might have read), including benchmarking performance against competitors, to see exactly how your suppliers are shafting you. This is, apparently, "supplier analysis reverse profitability".
Step Two, or "not my problem" as I subtitled it, is genius. You (get this!) start asking the suppliers if you can pay them a bit less! It's that kind of conceptual breakthrough that's made the US an economic superpower...
Taming AP may work if you're a US utility and your supply is oil or gas; if you've got one plant it could be done on a fag packet, never mind Excel. But as a leading player in the personal leisure sector, Blaminio has thousands of suppliers and items going to hundreds of sites. "Value eaters"? I could chuck a snooker ball into the car-park at 5.30pm and hit three of 'em, no problem.
But FD wanted the spreadsheet. We're talking a couple of dozen tabs on each of several worksheets running to hundreds of columns and rows just to get to first base. After that, it would be murder trying to manipulate the data. So I sent a memo to FD explaining my doubts. All I got by return was: "Think positive, Barry – miracles just take a little longer!" Bloody payroll.
The one good thing was FD told everyone else I couldn't be disturbed for two weeks. The downside was he wanted to see a fortnight's work at the end of it, and, although I'd put together some pretty impressively complex workbooks, I knew he wouldn't get any answers out of them.
Luckily, he refused my offer of sending the spreadsheet on email – he insisted it was printed out so we could go through it. Result! When I walked into his room it looked like I'd pitched up to refill his laser printer, even though I'd reduced the column widths and point size to what some in the toner industry are calling "theoretical limits".
FD started to perspire but worse was to come. My spiel was cut short by the financial systems consultant (I don't know either, but he's paid by the day which always intimidates FD) who shot me a withering look and said Taming AP was "so last year". The author is under investigation by the SEC over accounting discrepancies and "no leading edge outfit would touch it with a barge pole".
It was never discussed again. Now there's a space on the FD's bookshelf, maybe
he could put up a sign in the gap: "You don't have to trace precedents
to work here – but it helps!!!"