Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Cycling and er... the Economy

There comes a point in time when even a committed cyclist can't keep on ignoring the state of the economy. As I have mentioned before one of the things I do when cycling, apart from listen to the Archers podcast (a UK radio soap, 15 minutes a day 6 days a week) is to muse. Well, the state of the world and UK economy has given plenty of scope for musing over the last few months.


Before I start on that though, a few words about the weather. Here in the UK it has switched from snow to rain, some reports indicate we have had a month's rainfall in a day. Certainly it has rained pretty steadily. I had to get up in the middle of the night a few days back, squirrel problems - don't ask, and the evening rain had turned to snow but by the morning it had turned back to rain again. On top of that we have had freezing overnight temperatures and our councils are running out of salt/grit for the roads.

There have been floods and loads of traffic accidents. When I popped out on my bicycle I was fortunate enough not to have too many problems with the ice, except for Wicken Fen, it was noticeable how full the rivers were though. Although I took this picture for the light it shows the River Cam full to the banks on both sides. In places the path was covered and the fields around were waterlogged.



I like the picture for the light but I also re-took the picture zooming in to the chimney stack. It belongs to the Cambridge Museum of Technology - although technology from a bygone age. If you look very closely to the right of the chimney are the electric power lines for the Ely to Cambridge railway line and to the right is the aerial tower for a Base Station. (Which is what your mobile phone communicates with.)



Whilst on the subject of light here is Ely Cathedral lit by a ray of sun light, I know it is a bit of a dot on the horizon, but not bad for a picture taken using my Sony pocket camera.

Later on that day the clouds were moving and the sky was clearing, which is why it froze overnight and we had problems with icy roads. This picture is a composite, made from three pictures taken at Wicken Fen. This was one of the few places where there seemed to be quite a lot of snow/ice and slush still around. It is not quite mountain biking but you have to keep your wits about you.




So what was I musing about whilst cycling. Well a couple of things, one was the Bankers appearing in front of a Select Committee here in the UK to explain themselves and as it turned out to say sorry. The other was the way in which our MPs seemed to get remunerated for their work.

One aspect of the current situation is that everyone is keen to seek to apportion blame. However whilst the good times were rolling no-one, including the politicians seemed to want to enquire too closely. It appears that some of those saying sorry did not have a background in Banking. I studied Physics at University and remember my tutor Dr John Acton asking me to derive a complex equation on the blackboard (I know showing my age!) I did it and smugly stood back with the board covered with my work. He then asked my how did I know it was right - well I knew it was right - I had memorised it and not slipped up - it was right. He then taught me a very valuable lesson, how to take this complex equation and simplify it so that I could get a feel for it.

Well I have taken that lesson and applied it to business, I have also had the benefit of working with like-minded people who don't take things for granted but dig in to things they don't understand. The point of my story - well if you run a business you really need to be able to understand the complexities of what you do, maybe not as well as the "rocket scientists" but certainly well enough to be able to consider the risks being taken. Having been involved in the management of a public company I understand the pressures to deliver profits and they are significant and perhaps that is were we all share some blame. The "more" culture we are all part of drives higher and higher rewards which leads to more and more risk-taking, it is only when it fails do we start to question things more closely.

So onto musing about MPs there have been press reports about the way MPs can claim a second house allowance. What amazes me is that whilst they might be adhering to the letter of the(ir) law they cannot see how their actions can be perceived as morally dubious. Some appear to be at the front of a greed culture yet act outraged when asked for more openess. With leadership like that is it any wonder that some companies follow suit.

No comments:

Post a Comment