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The Director's Cut: My room 101
David Taylor's hates...

By David Taylor

Published: Wednesday 24 April 2002

If you have tears, prepare to shed them now. I want to tell you what to consign to the fires of hell. And remember, I said what, not who!

So in the next 500 words I will destroy forever our biggest obstacles, challenges and hassles. Let's get burning. Here's a suggested top 10, then I'll be wanting yours...

10 Burn all those useless manuals from the training courses you never did anything with. I know they stand as a testament to your policy of lifetime learning - and I'm hardly one for advocating the burning of books - but be honest, have they also led to lifetime action? Your shelves were beginning to buckle under their sheer weight anyway and will be hugely grateful.

9 All those posters hanging around the office telling us all to be motivated and to take pride in our work. True motivation comes from within, not from an A3 cartoon character. If you can't burn them, hang them upside down.

8 Reserved car parking spaces for 'Executives'. Why? A great way to demonstrate equality and openness. However, when you decide to do this put a five minute time limit on the discussion or it will go on for hours. Come on, you've got a company to run!

7 Drinks machines that pretend to be so sophisticated they can store 500 different varieties... when we know that whatever we press we always get the same muck! Dispense with them now, as it were.

6 Invitation to tenders on anything. It is sadistic to force suppliers to fill out the damned things - no one even reads them, let alone bases any decisions on them. (Supplier contracts just survive, as we need something to take home for our children to draw on.)

5 All TLAs (three letter acronyms), in particular BPR, of course - also anything beginning with ISO. It's all good, combustible stuff.

4 Competency assessment forms. Replace them with a dartboard. Actually, on second thoughts, file them - in a year you will cry with laughter at the way we used to measure talent, skill and human potential by a multiple choice, emotional quiz.

3 Your office walls. Be visible. It is not only the way of future leaders it is also the fastest route to that magic thing called charisma. Strip it down and do it today - we need the wood to keep the flames alive.

2 Service level agreements. No one really cares how your service teams perform - it is how they think you are performing that counts. The days of boring, percentage-based performance are dead, forever.

1 Annual budgets. Anyone still doing them is living in the last century. We simply cannot plan more than three months ahead, if we are to be fast, flexible and fit enough to survive in this new business age.

That should clear out a lot of paper, unnecessary workload and frustration. And by the way, before you write in, while I say burn, I do of course mean recycle. After all, over the last few years, isn't that what our companies have perfected - to the art of genius?

David Taylor's new book The Naked Leader is out in June. He is the president of IT directors association Certus and a regular contributor to silicon.com.

Did he get it right? We'd love to hear your choices. Write in by adding a Reader Comment below or email editorial@silicon.com

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