Keeping customers according to Terry

I saw a sign hanging from the ceiling of a work area the other day that read "Keep your customers...Think 2 year PSTN"

[Photo withheld to protect the guilty].

Laws of Terry

#12: The most non-obvious, completely ass-backwards, most expensive, most complicated approach will always be taken.

#13: Any perceived progress or actual things happening at a Telco happen randomly/by chance.

#14: IP (v4 or v6) is not the way forward. Just because everyone is using it just means its worth funding a study to investigate it further.

#15: Any meeting is worth having again. Any great meeting is worth a recurring Outlook invite.

The Hierarchy of Things

In Terry's world, there is a rigid hierarchy that must be observed. A chain of command if you will. Take any short-cuts through the chain and the links you have hopped over will become agitated and may retaliate in interesting ways.

If you have an issue, it must first be discussed with your manager. Preferably in an official fashion via email, or with meeting minutes. If it is determined that you must get an answer from someone above this person, the whole discussion must first be rehearsed and "sanitized" or "filtered" prior to going out. This usually comes in the form of an email message being previewed prior to being sent up the chain. If messages are to be sent to senior management then messages must be doubly-checked and filtered so as to not "offend the sensibilities" of the seniors. After all, these guys generally have the attention span of a 4 year-old with severe ADD, and so catching their attention for more than 20 seconds is a challenge in itself, but getting an actual reply that is meaningful and that can be acted upon -- that is indeed the trick.

The Irony of Meetings

The irony of meetings with Terry is that "meeting actions" are always to take further non-action.

Terry Wants You to STOP Using The Internet

It is ironic that when Terry plans to build a network, it is well over-built: 4-ways redundant paths, multiple power-failure counter measures, massively over-provisioned, etc... But when it actually comes time for users to do what their name implies -- use the service they are paying to consume, well, Terry doesn't quite like that and often recoils.

http://brainstormtech.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/2009/12/28/what-brought-att-to-its-knees/

Could Richard Attenborough Be The Voice of Terry?

I've been thinking would would be the voice of Terry if we ever decided to make a movie about Terry Telco, and I've come to the conclusion that it would be Richard Attenborough:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Attenborough

Terrnovation

Terr-no-va-tion [terr-noh-vey-shuh] n,

-noun

The lack of innovation. Opposite to progress. To stop things in dead in their tracks.,

See innovate.

Related Forms: Terrivation (verb)