And Then There Was A Cabbage….

Please find below the first year progress regarding the Cabbage Marketing project.

At the start of the year we successfully located to new offices and completed the hiring of new personnel. Through careful selection we managed to keep the new hire figure to just two hundred and fifty for head office.

This figure was also kept low by taking the decision to out-source some of the work thus we require only liaison departments.

We are also continuing a-pace sourcing, staffing and arranging accommodation for the new staff, for our offices located in all the major cabbage growing countries. Hotel accommodation will be block booked in these countries to alleviate possible problems for our Travel and Accommodation Department.

Each country manager has also been instructed to out-source the provision of limousines, drivers and security details, and to ensure they are ready to go 24/7. This will be closely monitored, involving frequent visits and meetings, by our Health and Safety Department.

It has been requested by the Health and Safety Department that we should lease an aircraft, for their use only, to be ready to go at all times in case they are required, PDQ, for issues and investigations. I will talk to you shortly regarding this, but can’t see how we can say ‘no’ given the two words ‘health’ and ‘safety’ are involved with the request. The Health and Safety manager has informed me he has contracted out the compilation of a Power Point presentation to re-enforce his request. The delivery of this, he tells me, is a tad behind schedule and thus over budget.

If this goes ahead I will, of course, hold an ‘away week’ and meeting with all department heads and their families to explain why they can’t all have their own jets.

While on the subject of away time, the HR Department have been organising monthly staff ‘away days’. These have been a great help regarding team building in relaxing surroundings and have also give me the opportunity to repeatedly remind staff what exactly it is we are supposed to be doing. We may need to increase the frequency of these away days as deadlines approach. I feel the cost of these days will be more than be recouped in quality reports re cabbages.

Back at Head Office; the IT consultants must be complimented on their sterling work. After only three months all our desks could communicate with each other and we are assured that communication with the outside world is now only weeks away.

Another two out-sourcing projects were the design and implementation of our website and a ‘brand name’ for the project.

The web design company report they have encountered some difficulties and the launch of the site will now be pushed back by another twelve months and, sadly, be more than double the original quote. They assure me they are giving the project their full and undivided attention and I am being kept up to speed on their progress, or lack thereof, although, I must confess, they may as well be speaking Zirgon for all I can understand.

Similarly, the branding and advertising consultants had a huge over-run, but, given the extremely difficult task, this is understandable. However, despite the time and huge added cost, we are highly delighted and very excited with the final, very cleaver brand name, “The Cabbage Patch.”

I have been alerted to further delays and added costs regarding the logo. This will feature a cabbage being held by peoples of all nations. This logo will personify the global and culturally diverse nature of the cabbage and it’s place in society. The delay arises from problems sourcing a big enough cabbage to have a lot of hands on it. I have given the consultants a further six month deadline and, if nothing is forthcoming in that time, then we will resort to knocking something up with The Gimp.

The Global and Ethnic Diversity Department are forging ahead and are presently attempting to researching the roll of the cabbage in differing religions and cultures. This will also be a much longer task than anticipated given the IT people are struggling to get Google working. As the lead on this project I did suggest to the Global Diversity people that they could possibly use books and libraries for their research. They pointed out to me, like I was some stupid six-year-old, that they would still need Google to find out what ‘book’ and ‘Library’ meant.

Finally, a couple of points for your consideration.

Firstly, the Remuneration Department are having problems clearing staff expense claims in a timely manner. May I suggest we take an average of all expense claims for the last year, multiply the result by three and just pay this, along with salary, to all staff members.

Secondly, everyone wants a new iPhone.

Looking to the future, we hope to have a preliminary draft document of proposals for discussion out-lining the many and diverse ways we could move forward regarding the selling of cabbages, ready for consultation and the committee stage, towards the end of the third quarter of next year, in time for the first Cabbage Patch Conference.

Quote; Mark Twain.

“Cauliflower is nothing but cabbage with a college education.”