Monday, March 10, 2008

Is This So Wrong?

Today I got a call from Derek Jeter saying that A-Rod wouldn't be in today due to a family emergency. My initial reaction (which I didn't say - that particular reaction was "okay") was "sweet! Now we're going to have a quick, effective meeting and I won't have to worry about him messing anything up." Is that a terrible attitude, or just realistic? In related news, my immediate supervisor (and the actual CFO/COO of the company) works on our finances as though he's using a ...For Dummies book. His sole measure of our success is the number of clients we have. He doesn't care if we get their copays/coinsurance/deductables or not, as long as they get on. For some reason, he thinks we're playing a zero-sum game where it's (for example) 80% of revenue or nothing. If we could get 100% by collecting that 20% coinsurance payment, wouldn't that be better? Shouldn't we be looking for clients who will pay 100% rather than trying to get in a fleet of 80%ers? This is one business where I completely agree with the Best Buy school of thought - some customers need to be fired because they are sucking up all our resources but not giving us enough revenue to go off of. Should I start campaigning for his position and having him move to another department (say...marketing?), because his school of thought is completely congruent with how they work.

In other, completely unrelated news, whenever I drive down University Parkway in Orem I think that I've moved to Beirut. There are potholes in the road from the Geneva Road intersection to the 400 West intersection that are certainly bigger than those caused by car bombs. Meanwhile, you have enough gravel from the road being chewed up that's collected on the side that if you accidentally get over a little too far, you'll strip off all your paint and make the car behind you undrivable due to the shrapnel you'd spit out. I don't know if the Utah Department of Transportation is scheduling some repair work, but I know that their salt trucks have been jointly responsible (along with the weather), and I would love to have a somewhat pristine road to drive on, as I use it all the time.

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