The What Goes Around Blog

Authenticity is Never Enough

Authenticity. I must have read that word a bazillion times this year, how it failed to make it into the 2013 LinkedIn top 10 buzzwords is anyone’s guess.

I spotted Gemma Reucroft commenting about this on Twitter earlier today:

The dictionary defines authentic as being ‘of indisputable origin and not a copy’. We seem increasingly keen to search out and honour authentic leaders, and whilst I think authenticity is important (and currently over used), by itself it is never enough. In a workplace context I think people see being authentic as being true to themselves.

Think about that for a moment, being true to yourself. What if someone’s true self is a psychopathic money grabbing selfish bastard? They’re out there you know.

So as well as being ‘the answer to everything lately’, I think the term can also be unhelpful. And whilst I guess I’d always rather see someone’s true self than a sham cover up, I might add stuff like humility, dignity and even vulnerability into the mix. And if you can’t cope with vulnerability – swap it for courage (just don’t tell anyone they are often one and the same thing).

Virgin on the Ridiculous

16th December 2013 – a day that is seared into my memory. The day we let Virgin Media into our home to provide us with TV, phone and broadband services.

I had to leave the house before the installers finished their work – and when they did – they showed Carole the TV and phone were working, but not the wireless broadband. We immediately started having problems with the new router – having to reset it every couple of hours to get service.

On Christmas Eve, after acknowledging their online systems were showing faults lighting up like a Christmas tree, Virgin Media returned and replaced the router. They call their router a SuperHub, it doesn’t feel very super to me. The replacement misbehaved in exactly the same way. After further attempts to fix the problem by phone, Virgin Media sent another engineer out on December 30th. This time – another router, something called a D-Link, was placed into the mix, and the SuperHub was reset to work in modem only mode. I was told the purpose of this set up was temporary and necessary to see if the problem was with the SuperHub, or with interference in our house. Inelegant yes, but at least it was functioning.

On December 31st we got a phone call to see if everything was OK, but unfortunately the call came during a short power cut so I wasn’t able to test anything. The caller promised to phone back on January 3rd. January 3rd came and went with no call. A couple more days passed then I hopped onto Twitter for a bit of a moan. The only help I was offered on Twitter was a suggestion that I call back again. I called and explained my frustration with the lack of call backs and the temporary nature of the fix and was told my call needed to be escalated – could I please leave it with Virgin Media and they would get back to me. Promise.

Another week passed and no call back. Another promise broken. All this time we had been powering two routers, the SuperHub and the D-Link, and while the service had remained constant – this was only ever meant to be a temporary test fix.

I called Virgin Media again just over a week ago. This time – the guy who spoke to me berated the previous jobs, demeaned his colleagues and proceeded to fiddle about with everything via a remote connection and with my help. I couldn’t believe how much he slagged off his colleagues – and by the end of this call, the D-Link router was back out of the equation, various things had been faffed with and reset, and I was being reassured that everything would be OK.

Since Mr Arrogant came to our rescue we’ve had to continue to reset the SuperHub in order to get service. Seems his attitude about his other colleagues was not only rude, but misplaced too. I called Virgin Media again today and spent 51 minutes trying not to lose it with the guy on the phone. I’m afraid I wasn’t convinced he knew what he was doing and I felt like I had more idea about what was wrong than he did. The problem is exacerbated because all the case notes written on their system by Virgin Media people previously are sketchy at best. So each time I call I have to replay most of the story, you can imagine how happy I am about that!

So here we are five weeks down the line, paying for a service that doesn’t work, promised phone calls not happening and getting conflicting information when we call to chase Virgin Media. I’ve tweeted Virgin again and this time been asked to fill out an enquiry form. Whoop de doo! I await their response, with minimal faith.

How can you get customer service so badly wrong?

#1 Update – aka you couldn’t make it up.

This morning I have been contacted by Virgin Media again. They’re asking me to complete an enquiry form – identical to the one I filled in yesterday. Maybe I’m just not awake yet? The nightmare revolves and continues. Eat. Sleep. Mistake. Repeat.

#2 Update – Poetry Style

While I wait for Virgin Media to call, I’ve put my customer experience down in a rhyme.

So far I’ve had this by way of a response – but no call yet…

Hello Doug.

We’ll get to your form and we will race, to get your broadband fixed and put a smile on your face. I know it’s a worry but please don’t fret, you’ll soon be connected to the Internet. Your experience has been bad, that I’ll admit, but we’ll turn it around, we won’t quit. We’re here to help and we’ll find the cure, for your dodgy broadband that’s for sure.

#3 Update

Over four hours has passed since our earlier poetic exchange and I’ve not heard any more. Just sent this to Virgin Media:

4 hours ago you said you’d rush. So far no call, only hush. How long you gonna keep me waiting. More delay is just frustrating.

#4 Update

We’ve had Virgin Media installed for 8 weeks and one day (today is February 12th 2014), and the service has been and remains faulty since the first day it was installed. Four engineer visits (one of which involved trailing an 8 foot wire across the room leaving the router balanced on a cupboard door to see if the service was any better there), replaced hardware, numerous phone calls and emails. No resolution.

#5 Update

We had another engineer visit, making five site visits in total. On the fifth visit, the engineer reinstalled the temporary fix, bypassing their equipment with a third party router. We have agreed to accept this mess if in return we get a reasonable, stable service. In addition, we are seeking compensation via the adjudicator for all the inconvenience caused by Virgin Media. Most recently, Virgin Media has submitted an 8 page defence of its appalling service. It is full of inaccuracies and frequently states that Virgin Media do not support third party hardware – despite installing third party hardware in our house twice. The matter is unresolved as at March 9th 2014.

Happy Anniversary

Maybe it’s just me but I think I’m seeing more than the usual share of Happy ‘Work’ Anniversary messages on LinkedIn this month. Doubtless some of my recruitment friends will either endorse or disprove the theory that more people get new jobs in January than any other month of the year.

I also read a loving, uplifting tribute to a father by Neil Morrison this week. His Dad has turned 70, and Neil’s ‘Lessons in Life’ is a great piece about dignity, trust, wine corks and more. Real birthdays beat work birthdays hands down.

Neil’s post put me in mind of my Dad, and then it hit me that he died two years ago today. In the immediate aftermath I wrote about aspects of loss several times, and then disappeared down a rabbit hole of paperwork and grief. That stuff got done, like stuff does, and I wrote about a sense of emergence for Alison in her December 2013 advent blog series.

The emergence continues at pace. In business terms, 2014 has started how I always wanted a year to start, productively and enjoyably. I am crafting a space where I help people collaborate more effectively, help them explore better ways of working, and get comfortable with creativity and experimentation. More and more people are asking for that help and I’m thankful and excited. I love my work – it often brings me to huge laughs and tears, and much more besides. I’m thankful. Did I already say that? Who cares – I am thankful.

I choose to believe that where I am right now is a complete product of where I’ve been before, and in making that choice, I am able to see the death of my father as one of those pivotal moments that lends huge support to the foundation of my life. Taking strength from loss is one of the hardest things I do, and one of the most humbling and fulfilling things too.

As my good friend Heather put it:

There is so much out there about how to succeed, but so little about how to make it through a hard time. Learning how to rest, grieve, change, and get through difficulties are the essential ingredients of any success. Thank you for this!

Thank you Dad, and happy anniversary.

In a lovely coincidence – I have today received a note from the Friends of LittleHeath Woods (FoLW), a place we played as kids, and an organisation Dad supported staunchly. We made a donation to the woods after Dad died, and the FoLW has decided to reintroduce English Elms back into the woods in Dad’s memory. A regeneration project in Paul Shaw’s name – what a lovely thoughtful thing to propose, made even better by the fact that I learned of it today.