John Linton I began the Exetel Sri Lanka review process yesterday which was made more difficult than it needed to be by the illness of the SL GM which prevented him from attending the office as he had acute laryngitis. However very little was lost as I re-jigged the review process to speak with the individual departmental managers and supervisors. As I have noted on several occasions when talking about the difficulties for any business in any country to find and develop effective managers the task is only possible at all if you have a basic recruitment policy of only employing very bright people and then giving them the opportunities to grow into management positions by giving them the freedom to make their own new decisions without curbing their boldness by 'punishing them' when they inevitably make very bad decisions.
I lose count of the number of very poor decisions I continue to make each month and I am well aware that it is barely less than in the first months I was given the opportunities to make my own decisions. What I did learn very quickly was it was essential when I made a mistake that I didn't attempt to hide my errors of judgment but that I immediately sought out the best possible assistance in rectifying my error. Such assistance was rarely, except with one person, ever provided by my immediate line manager who, with that one exception, would not only have been of no help, but would have wasted precious time documenting what a fool I had been and how I should be 'punished' and how it was absolutely no fault of theirs I had got in to such a mess before telling me they couldn't help me.
So it was unsurprising that the recurring theme in the reviews with different people here is an overt reluctance to make changes. I think it is more evident in Sri Lanka than in Sydney because of the restrictions we/I put in place from the beginning to prevent too many changes being made before the individual situations were fully understood and that view has persisted way past any useful interpretation of when and what changes need to made to documentation and procedures. I have tried to do something about this situation over the past nine months but have clearly failed miserably so far. I will complete the individual reviews with the remaining managers and supervisors today and will then attempt to find better ways of making progress in the future.
Exetel SL's overall requirement is for the current supervisors and managers to exercise more direct control over their responsibilities and make more of their own decisions as they are the only people with a first hand knowledge of how the problems and issues change day to day and how changes in Exetel's products and services change and therefore how customer's needs and problems change. How I can assist bring that about is very far from clear to me. Having slept for almost twelve hours overnight I am hoping the remaining jet lag effects have been overcome and I can bring a clearer mind to bear on the issues. It is a major inconvenience of these short duration trips that too much time is spent sleeping or thinking about sleeping.
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