Mal de medicine

I had occasion to see an orthopedic surgeon yesterday: new doctor/new medical group for me.

I have both a personal and a professional interest in the culture of medical practices—I do, after all, work in the healthcare-technology field.

Also, the day they were handing out patience the line was way too long for me to stand in. So I have a short tether when it comes to medical office personnel, overbooking and doctors too rushed to find out what my medical situation is. And I pay close attention to how an office is managed and how they treat their patients.

For example, a couple of weeks ago I went to a dermatologist. The instant I walked into the waiting room I knew I wasn’t going to like it, because nearly every seat was taken. Sure enough, it was more than 20 minutes after my appointment time that I was called to the exam room. And when I pointed out to the nurse that fact—along with the information that, as a contractor, I don’t get paid for the time I spend in their office—she apologized and told me, “we were locked out this morning, so we got a little behind.” But no one coordinated lies-we-tell-patients with the physician, because when she apologized her story was, “a couple of patients ran longer than we expected.”

She made up time on me, though—I wasn’t in her presence for five minutes.

(The big laugh was that they wanted me to schedule a six-month check-up. I told them to send me a reminder; but I already have an appointment with another specialist for next week. It’s not like there’s only one dermatology practice in the South Bay.)

Anyhow, the orthopod. Twenty minutes behind the actual appointment time, around eight minutes examining me and telling me I’d need an MRI and a follow-up, and he’s out the door.

But the interesting thing was when I spoke with the woman who schedules the radiology appointments and follow-ups with the physicians: None of the more than 20 MDs working in that practice works more than two-thirds of a day. The last appointment of the day you can get with mine is 1300.

And they schedule four patients for that time slot. Assuming that the doctor is actually running to schedule, that means that you have only a 25% chance of seeing him at the time they specified. Arrogant, disrespectful plonkers.

I hope to God that I don’t have to have a long-term engagement with this guy, because my attitude is going nowhere but downhill.

Is she a witch or a wabbit?

Someone needs to write an opera about Amanda Knox, the ex-U of Washington student convicted two years ago in Italy of the brutal murder of her roommate in Perugia in 2007. She started off by accusing someone completely extraneous of the killing; he was arrested, but when he was cleared she became a person of interest.

The trial was a piece of theatre, but they convicted her & two others; one is serving his sentence and Knox and her ex-boyfriend are currently appealing their 25-year and 26-year (respectively) sentences.

And here’s where we hit about Act III of the opera: during the appeal the lawyer for Diya Lumumba, the fellow falsely accused by Knox back in 2007, called her “a spell-casting witch, a virtuoso of deceit.”

Now, seriously, is this not aria-worthy stuff?

But wait—there’s more: Knox’s lawyer has rebutted the demonic thing by likening her to Jessica Rabbit: she’s “not bad, she’s just drawn that way.” After that sort of exchange, any ruling is going to be anti-climactic.

Verdi—eat your heart out.

Clients (& other MBAs) from hell

I don’t think you really have to have worked in the creative or IT/Web services field to find the Clients from Hell vignettes amusing.

It helps, of course.

But what this collection of experiences does (in addition to validating the social media value of the Web) is go a long way to explaining the state of the economy. These clients are a microcosm for executive management & boards of directors & if you picture this sort of utter cluelessness in the DNA of captains of industry, well—it all becomes clear.

I believe these exchanges could also be taking place in the halls of Congress.

Be the hummingbird

It shames me to say that I did not know about Wangari Maathai, the remarkable woman—the force of nature—who died Sunday at age 71.

The obits cite her courage for standing up for women and the environment against corrupt governments and big business interests—and the Nobel Peace prize she was awarded for her Green Belt Movement. She encouraged women to plant trees, and when she heard from the Nobel committee, that’s what she did—she planted a tree.

She was, BTW, the first African woman Nobel Laureate.

Her protests continued in the face of tear-gassing, beatingsand whippings by goons from Daniel arap Moi’s government in her homeland of Kenya. Moi labeled her “subversive”, that all-purpose gov-speak for “unsilenceable and uncomfortable.”

But here’s what I love about her—she wanted to be a hummingbird. (Click on the video clip about 60% down the article. I could have given you the YouTube link, but the NPR story is worth reading, too.) Note that none of the animals rallies to the hummingbird; it just keeps on bringing water to the fire.

Think about it: all the troubles—all the insurmountable obstacles, all the massive forces aligned against the little guy—and it’s possible to do the best you can. It’s possible and worthwhile—whatever your beak will hold, carry it to the fire.

The story is powerful, but it’s Maathai’s telling of it that stops you in your tracks. Listen to her voice and look at the expression on her face.

And be the hummingbird, mes amis. Be the hummingbird.

Employment outlook

Finally some good economic news last week: Toys-R-Us announced it’s planning on hiring 45K people.

For the holiday season.

At minimum wage and no benefits.

I’m sure that’s welcome news for the 30K people who are about to be axed from Bank of America, who are mostly full-time employees with at least some benefits.

Oh--and no doubt Walmart will also be hiring for the season. And those temps can take comfort in knowing that they won't be paid worse or get fewer benefits than the bulk of Walmart's staff.

MemoirLeaks

Okay, if this story doesn’t exemplify pure irony, I don’t know what does.

Julian Assange is whining about the publisher of his memoir publishing his, you know, memoir.

Yes, that’s right—the proprietor of WikiLeaks, who has made the publication of state secrets a moral crusade, is scuffing his feet in the dust, thrusting out his lower lip & crying foul because the publisher he contracted with to Tell His Story is, um, Telling His Story.

One might feel a little more sympathy for Assange if he’d given back his $1MM advance. Putting your money where your mouth is is generally a signifier of your genuine intent. Assange doesn’t pass that test.

Business school rules

In the latest chapter in the continuing saga of “The Value of Having MBAs Running Industry”, I give you Wednesday’s news:

The board of directors of Hewlett-Packard is weighing whether or not to fire CEO Leo Apotheker, who only took office last November after previous CEO Mark Hurd was sacked over a scandal involving fraudulent expense reports and putting his mistress on the “consulting” payroll.

The board, which has already shown a clear and consistent capacity to hire nothing but cretins (Apotheker will be the third CEO in six years to hit the road, and Hurd was preceded by Carly Fiorina), is considering Meg Whitman as a replacement. Obviously the adoration of the hobgoblin of little minds isn’t limited to little statesmen and philosophers and divines, but pervades the H-P boardroom.

(Also, the phrase “doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results” comes to mind.)

HP used to be the gold standard for PC hardware, the best of the best. After Fiorina, Hurd and Apotheker they’re kind of the jest of the rest. (As we Bruins used to refer to USC.) But whatever happens, you can bet there’ll be more layoffs to demonstrate to shareholders that, by God, they’re taking action. And the board will ensure that compensation for senior management (and themselves) will continue to be “competitive”, because otherwise how could you ever attract high-quality talent out of the best business schools?

Along the same lines, Moody’s has lowered the ratings on Bank of America, Wells Fargo and Citi. This is because the investment services firm believes that in the not-unlikely event that the three banks’ management will continue making boneheaded decisions, the federal government will not try to bail them out again.

(I wonder if the banks are going to try to get back all those campaign donations they made to our elected officials?)

So it’ll be more of a challenge for executives at those institutions to collect their usual bonuses if we-the-people aren’t propping up their financial infrastructure.

The good news, though, is that they could toss their hats into the ring for running H-P.

Friendly skies, ja

I’m not sure why the Lutherans are so easy to poke fun at. Garrison Keillor has been doing it for almost 40 years, and you don’t have to be Norwegian, Minnesotan or Lutheran to get a kick out of them.

Perhaps it’s because Lutheran stories are almost invariably genial and gentle.

(Which must make that stern old reformer spinning in his Wittenberg grave like a dreydel on the fifth night of Hanukkah.)

However that may be, here’s an audio clip from Lutheran Air Lines.

I’m just hoping that none of the passengers in the hot dish rows bring lutefisk. That would probably spark a CS gas-like reaction in the main cabin & cause the oxygen masks to drop down.

Besides, I’m not sure you could get it past the TSA screeners.

Recruiters 22

I interviewed on Friday for a product marketing job. I hadn’t been wild about it—it’s a technology I didn’t find particularly exciting, in an Israeli-run company in Foster City.

You might think that you can’t be sniffing at boring products these days, but if I’m going to market them, I have to find something about them that’s interesting. I've never learned that all-important skill of faking sincerity.

Moreover, while I completely admire what the Israelis have done carving out a thriving nation in an inhospitable land surrounded by people who want to drive them into the sea, I’ve found that their management style is…abrasive. (The one may be connected with the other.) 

And, finally, Foster City is about 23 miles up Highway 101, which the recruiter who connected me with the opening referred to as “an ugly commute”.

That’s an understatement.

When I got to the actual interview I learned that the solution is actually a lot more fascinating than I'd understood, and I really liked the hiring manager a lot. But, as it happens, the number one item on her “must-have” list is deep experience marketing into corporate IT departments, and I’ve never done that. It’s not that I couldn’t learn it pretty quickly, it’s that she needs someone who already knows that segment and can lock onto them like a lamprey.

So I thought about it on the crawl home on Friday, all day Saturday and most of Sunday, as I was trying to compose my thank-you note. It turns out it’s a lot harder to write a thanks-but-no-thanks email than a thanks-and-will-you-give-me-the-job email.

I’m hoping I don’t have to gain a lot of experience in this line.

Cat-egorical amusement

God bless the Internet—we finally have hard proof that cats of all sizes can be cuckoo for catnip. Bookmark the link, because if you’re having a lousy day, this will make you feel much better.