MP and swimming pools

June 1, 2009

On Friday I was watching “Have I got News from you” a satiric program on the BBC where comedians comments on weekly event. For the ones not based in UK, at the moment there is a big “scandal” regarding English MP claiming allowances in an allegedly improper way (the program can be watched on the iplayer for the ones in UK http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00kq2lq/Have_I_Got_News_for_You_Series_37_Episode_6/ ). I loved the description given “people have been pis..ing in the pool, hence pools are bad, we must ban pools“. It reminds me of the logic of so many decision both in work and in life… As a parent, when the children have a little accident because of improper use of a toy, we tend to take the toy away, if they chase the cat around relentlessly for 10 minutes and cat scratches the kids, we start to think, the cat is dangerous is aggressive (BTW the cat is still at home!). Needless to say that it happens in the work environment as well (Can you give examples from your own experience? I think it might make a very interesting reading….) abuse of any company property/process/system, often ends up with the property/process/system be banned/restricted/controlled also for the vast majority who is using it properly and correctly…

We tend to get the causes (even when there are simple causes) completely wrong, I really do not understand why…
If there is wee in the swimming pool, swimming pool are still OK… Just get people not to wee in it. Indeed in most public swimming pool they have some stuff which reacts with urine, to make it turn red. A good example of managing the boundaries in a way that does not impact the majority of users… We should learn from public swimming pools….

Luca

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