The Art of The Swiss
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Friday 10 of September, 2010
 
Articles written around the Critical Context we find ourselves in in the 21st Century. New thinking about how to create sustainable changeA series of short articles that describe the context within which we need to work if we are to make a difference to the way we operate and survive in the 21st Century - 
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Road report on our Swiss Bank Session - the 14th December - from 6-56am until 4-47pm – the important bits.
The Swiss are a funny lot.
Their trains run like clockwork, their clockwork does too. Not surprisingly therefore this clockwork turns out some of the most amazing watches to be found anywhere - anywhere. They famously fashion their chocolate into geometrically intriguing shapes. I don't know why they do this. Maybe because it’s so hellish cold outside. Protestants are the second biggest denomination after the Catholics. Maybe because it’s so hellish cold outside.
Women are expected to live 6 years longer than men but are not forced to. In 1471 a chicken in Basel, Switzerland, was found guilty of laying a brightly colored egg ‘in defiance of natural law’ so it was burned at the stake as ‘a devil in disguise. In Switzerland, until recently, it was against the law to slam your car door. In Switzerland, it is illegal to mow your front lawn while you're dressed as Elvis.
Freddy Mercury and Queen really loved Switzerland and ended up buying a recording studio outside Montreux on Lake Geneva. There is a statue to Freddy on the shore (featured on the cover of their album – Made in Heaven). The song ‘Smoke on the Water’ by Deep Purple is about the smoke from a casino fire when a fan at a Frank Zappa concert accidently burnt down the casino in Montreux leading to smoke over the waters of Lake Geneva.
Oh and they store all the money in the world. You would think that it would really be a very exciting and creative place to be.
Hmm...
The drive there: Sunday13th December
So we arrive at an airport where you can eat food off the floor. Some people do this. The bags were already off the plane. If we had asked I am sure someone would have unpacked them and folded them neatly. The car hire lady was expecting us - she had already programmed the sat nav with our hotel, and kindly also programmed how to bring it back. She said it would take 1 hour and 27 minutes. She got this totally wrong by around 1.5 minutes.
The motorways had no roadworks. Every road was new and clean. The houses and factories all spanking new and shiny. With lights. The cars were all new. With lights. The trees and mountains had the requisite amount of snow and charm. And lights. Some were equipped with those lights that go up and down.
Bern is Switzish for bear.
Apparently they have recently been given two by those neighbouring sycophants – the Russians. These bears are probably literate, have an MBA and can drive. You could eat your food off them. Bern is approached (and departed) over a very impressive river and high, very high bridge thing. I don't know how the bears approach Bern.
The hotel rooms were exactly what we expected from the pictures except, while we all do, the walls wouldn't accept Roger. So the nice clockwork lady on reception said we could use the meeting room without any fuss or any money. They brought us very good coffees. We prepped.
The day of the session: Monday 14th December
A 5-30 alarm call was received at 5-30. The sat nav got us to the client site exactly as scheduled.
The car park captain, who you could have eaten off, was expecting us at 6-56 am. That was the time we arrived. The host was there exactly on time 7-00am. The clients walls were perfect. Roger was delighted. Coffee was flowing by 7-08am. The framework went up as planned. The clients turned up exactly on time. They all loved the session.
There was 5.6 moments of humor and brevity. The average per day in Switzerland is apparently 2.8. We talked about that. They talked of doing more with us. There are lots more banks in Switzerland. We nodded. We finished on time. We left the perfectly manicured car park at exactly when we thought we would. The captain probably waved but we drove very fast.
I've never been so ****ing bored in all my life.
This morning: Tuesday 15th December
As predicted the alarm went off at 2-30 am. The expected time of arrival at Zurich Airport was 4-58 am. You've guessed it.
I'm now on another plane out of Zurich. Yep it was on time.
Aaaaaargh!!!
Road notes - The Heathrow Part. - Wednesday 15th December
6 Hours on and keen to keep you up to speed.
We made it from Bern via Zurich without missing a beat. Arrived Heathrow. Even stayed smiling darkly through the traditional and distinctly toxic welcome home. Executed to perfection by the vile - arcane transit and Border Systems that exists in the UK.
Find the Fast Trak after 3 attempts. No signage. So - not Fast now not on Track. The bag search and security process is such a stupefying insane and degrading rigmarole I won't even attach words to it. What can possibly go off in my belt? What have I managed to rig to it since the previous 4 checks?
10 Hours on.
The peace and sanctity of the Virgin Lounge, complete with endless lattes, bacon sandwiches, cool music, a massage parlor, free delicatessen, delicatessen free everything, dodgy internet connection, wears off rapidly as we glance the screens. The plane is now imminently leaving. Apparently. What happened?
What happens is that the message on the plasma screen snaps from 'Wait In Lounge' to 'Flight Closing' in less time than a Swiss person takes to attract, hoard and turn another $Billion. A split second of huge significance for us though. Gate 22. An unassuming title for a Gate. This particular alert system has to be the single most impressive and efficient thing about Heathrow. I love the the double jet of death grade stress and pumping adrenalin that it induces. No I do. They must really plan hard for it to do that. It's so effective. I am hugely grateful to them. I would like to meet the person face to face to explain this. Somewhere of my own choosing.
- To get that jerk of realization that the 10 hours you have spent just to get this far could end immediately - now - with your bags being dragged off because you missed glancing at the plasma. Amazing.
- Folk now waving at you from their little airplane windows knowing you made them wait at all - with their fists clenched into a friendly two fingered sign of victory while you stare out across the airbridge as your plane disappears - knowing this was all for naught. Priceless.
10 Hours and 30 Seconds on.
Flying through the familiar mobbed Heathrow retail hell tsunami of pitiful chaos cum skank trading floor I noticed no-one eating off the floor. As far as I could tell. People were sleeping on it though, or drunk with the excitement of modern air travel or just drunk of course. Or dead. Predictably all around us delightful sensory treats were laid on.
The Heathrow Customer Segmentation.
- FSO’s: The Foul Smelling Ones - the dirty nesters.
- UEFTT’s: The Unpleasantly Excited First Time Travelers with new, massive and stupid handbags, trailing ridiculously large families and comfortable slacks.
- BBC’s: The Blaring Baby and one Crying parent families. Words.
- MAS’s: The Malingering Airport Staff. ***k knows how to further segment them but words like obsolete, lazy, ignorant, wiped, fraudulent, philandering, leech, scum and thief would be in the titles I am sure.
- BLIND’s: The Oblivious to any Peripheral Consciousness. They just stop anywhere at any moment - right in front of you - with no warning - they don't look around - they think they are completely alone in the airport - and they become a wholly justifiable case for homicide.
- T’s: The Terminals. People do die at Heathrow and they simply remain littered around the place. No one knows they are dead but many newspapers and Costa Coffee cups build up around them. That's a clue. They become like the road accident shrine where people leave their used airport stuff - instead of flowers.
Attacking them all, indiscriminately with severe malice and purpose made the run to the furthest gate at T3 such brilliant sport. It's probably the single remaining reason why I enjoy traveling so much.
Gate 22 is the furthest gate. So far away in T3 that it is in fact part of T4. I know I rammed home 100% on at least two people with my 5ft tube (Which remains unopened but has now been to as many continents as me and has more air-miles than most of the people I've run over.) I now can't remember what's in it. But it doesn't matter it's my flight sabre. Wasn't Ben Hur a great movie? Although I've gone off Charlton Heston I have to say.
A fabulous day at the office. Oh and I am now so sick of the HSBC advertising. Valued. Valued. Accomplished. Accomplished. Irrelevant. Irrelevant. Move on for goodness sake. We get it.
10 Hours and 4 minutes.
If they check my passport and boarding cards one more time the lettering will come off completely. They ask me for my flight number. I give them my room number from 3 hotels ago. They let me through. I feel very safe.
10 Hours and 50 minutes.
'The plane is going to be late leaving'. Remarkable insight. We have sat on the tarmac for 50 minutes. Grey skies through the window and matching - at precise Pantone levels - grey overhead baggage bins complete a dazzlingly grey picture. Perfect.
12 Hours and 4 minutes.
Been up 12 hours and now really reflective. Sitting on this plane bound yet curiously not bound for Miami.
The announcement, surely shocking everyone aboard with its novelty, is that air traffic congestion at this time of day suggests a further delay of 20 minutes. That makes me feel much more at home. Grounded even. Please fasten your seat belts.
13 Hours.
Been up 35 hours now and the amazing news from the still stationary plane is there is what's known as a 'discrepancy'. This means that the bags don't tally with the manifest. That means somebody can't count. It also means that somebody wasn't really focused on world class service and attention to a true 360 Degree Customer Centric Service framework sitting atop an operationally efficient service model.
Simply put that also means around 300 people, paying through their genitals, have to put their whole life on hold and alter their entire futures and those of their immediate relations. But of course the real thrill of this piece of news is that as soon as they have worked it through we will be on our way. I hadn't thought that bit through. Please re-fasten your seat belts.
130 hours.
We are pushing back. I am now pushing back. Everyone is. We are now bolting some 3 hours after the Gate 22 has closed. I can hear birds singing. Please fasten your seat belts. It fills my heart with rare passion and momentary - let's say fleeting delight. We have now been on board so long they have had to play the safety video again for those who had forgotten it. Please fasten your seat belts.
1543 hours.
Taxiing has never been so much fun. It's impossibly exciting. Tarmac is a great concept. Think about a world without Tarmac. I wonder what is the strategic roadmap for Tarmac. I have for hours. Tell me what you think.
3045 hours.
'Crew please be seated for take off'. I unfasten and get up. Just to see what will happen.
Other Road Notes
- Ibadan & Perfect Living Systems
- The Art of The Swiss
- Miami By GPS
