As I am easily given to flights of fancy and irrational behavior, this post is probably not a good idea. The proof is in some of the comments I have received at various stages of my life.
My kindergarten teacher noted: His mind is everywhere except where it is needed most – class. He demonstrates a vicious lack of respect for pets and will most likely receive Hall of Infamy award from the SPCA. Should he choose to become a vet, it is advisable that the police keep close tabs on him.
In High School the headmaster wrote: This boy has the potential to become great. Unfortunately, he is working extremely hard to make sure that his potential remains untapped. So far, he has remarkably done well on this front.
In College, the dean noted (after I made it to the Dean’s List for superior academic performance during the same semester when I was kicked out for cohabiting): As a devotee of hedonistic pursuits, his performance, whereas impressive, is quite anomalous given his infinite affinity to mischief, continual lack of focus and a generally lackadaisical attitude.
Having read an article by Tony Poulos, “C U in the C-Suite”, I commented that for a CSP, a good Head of RA is candidate for CEO. Let us for one moment assume that I haven’t gone bonkers and consider the idea, if for no other reason because every mad man deserves clinical diagnosis and access to decent medicare…
- Who has seen company performance affected by process gaps and organizational issues?
- Who knows that the CCO, CTO and the CIO are running functions that work mostly at cross-purposes and lead to poor company performance?
- Who has seen the company lose money because of the airheads in Marketing and the sloppy engineers?
- Who has seen CRM systems rolled out at great cost only to deliver marginal benefits?
- Who has seen signed-off agreements that do everything except benefit the CSP?
- Who has seen unnecessary costs being incurred for SIM card costs, excess leased lines and unnecessary radio spectrum?
- Who has had to suffer, patiently I might add, heads of functions who suffer from acute cases of myopia, lack of business appreciation and a penchant for bickering – all this so that a process can be improved to avert leakage or in order to recover revenue?
- Who knows better the people that need to be fired and the signs of an area where somebody needs to be bulleted?
- Who knows, first hand, the effect of unmanaged regulatory pressure on revenues and costs?
- Who has seen company strategy and targets being made in absolute disregard of statistics and the resulting mess?
- Who has seen products rolled out in a manner that ensures the CSP, the customer and the regulator are all fighting?
- Who has served as friend to the oppressed, an enemy to the oppressor yet a faithful colleague to both?
Answer: Head of Revenue Assurance
I say anoint him. Crown him.
Thursday, January 6, 2011
2011 - what yours truly predicts
Since everybody is making all manner of predictions with regard to 2011, I have decided to make a few of my own. I must confess making predictions is a very fulfilling exercise and gives one an air of importance that can only be achieved by sleeping in a three-piece suit and a bowler hat.
So here goes...
1. Cloud computing will continue to be big. In the midst of billowing smoke, lightning, thunder and clouds will emerge a new breed of consultants, sharper than the sword and vicious like sharks. They will come up with new terminologies and they will sell big. The only thing bigger than their mouths will be their invoices.
2. SaaS for RA may yet find its place.
3. New concepts, mostly offshoots of what we already know will come up.
4. With regard to (3) above, Rob Mattison will keep on evolving. GRAPA will have a course on revenue assurance for cloud services and effective prevention of information leakage based on a case-study of the US embassies wiki-leaks debacle. Courses will be offered in Capetown and Dubai and Kuala Lumpur and Abuja and Glasgow..and your town.
5. Conferences at exotic venues will happen. A lot. Many keynote speakers will also make their dollar, while gaining lots of frequent flier miles.
6. Big4 firms will continue to issue flashy reports containing lots of insights (ahem, what we already know will be restated in very verbose terms and possibly a new font-type and pie-charts that remind one of pizza will be invented so that the reports can look new and improved). The old fashioned way of walking down to the Ops team and the Marketing to ferret out issues of leakage will triumph over these reports. RA fraternity is hereby reminded that it is however advisable to keep a sleep-inducing copy of a Big4 report by the bedside for those nights when insomnia strikes.
7. Vendors will issue new software versions. Mergers and acquisitions will happen and each RA vendor will be the “leading revenue assurance solutions provider, consistently and demonstrably offering innovative solutions to tackle any past, present and future leakages as well as foreseeable and any imaginable RA problems”.
8. The classic RA problems will remain. If for no other reason, because human beings will still make mistakes and the best laid plans will still be subject to Murphy’s laws. Like it or not, we are here because of a simple fact: human beings infinite ability to screw up anything. And I guarantee that 2011 will have enough screw-ups to warrant RA.
So here goes...
1. Cloud computing will continue to be big. In the midst of billowing smoke, lightning, thunder and clouds will emerge a new breed of consultants, sharper than the sword and vicious like sharks. They will come up with new terminologies and they will sell big. The only thing bigger than their mouths will be their invoices.
2. SaaS for RA may yet find its place.
3. New concepts, mostly offshoots of what we already know will come up.
4. With regard to (3) above, Rob Mattison will keep on evolving. GRAPA will have a course on revenue assurance for cloud services and effective prevention of information leakage based on a case-study of the US embassies wiki-leaks debacle. Courses will be offered in Capetown and Dubai and Kuala Lumpur and Abuja and Glasgow..and your town.
5. Conferences at exotic venues will happen. A lot. Many keynote speakers will also make their dollar, while gaining lots of frequent flier miles.
6. Big4 firms will continue to issue flashy reports containing lots of insights (ahem, what we already know will be restated in very verbose terms and possibly a new font-type and pie-charts that remind one of pizza will be invented so that the reports can look new and improved). The old fashioned way of walking down to the Ops team and the Marketing to ferret out issues of leakage will triumph over these reports. RA fraternity is hereby reminded that it is however advisable to keep a sleep-inducing copy of a Big4 report by the bedside for those nights when insomnia strikes.
7. Vendors will issue new software versions. Mergers and acquisitions will happen and each RA vendor will be the “leading revenue assurance solutions provider, consistently and demonstrably offering innovative solutions to tackle any past, present and future leakages as well as foreseeable and any imaginable RA problems”.
8. The classic RA problems will remain. If for no other reason, because human beings will still make mistakes and the best laid plans will still be subject to Murphy’s laws. Like it or not, we are here because of a simple fact: human beings infinite ability to screw up anything. And I guarantee that 2011 will have enough screw-ups to warrant RA.
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