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Refilling my prepaid fido account…not!

June 1, 2006 By Uncategorized One Comment

I’m fond of saying that I’m the last consultant in the world without a cell phone.   While that is true for business, my partner and I have one that we use for personal purposes.   And because we use it so infrequently (mostly for emergencies or urban logistics when we’re in the big city) we have it hooked on to a prepaid plan from fido.

Now fido offers you a couple of ways to handle prepayment.   You can either buy vouchers or use a credit card.   A credit card is preferable for us.   So because we are running low on our initial minutes, we called the handy prepayment number to refill our prepaid account …or not.

This evening we have been stuck in voice mail jail trying to register to have our fido mobile phone account refilled by Visa.   It has taken quite a while and we still haven’t gotten any help.   Here’s what happens:

  1. Dial 611 (or *46 or any of the other numbers fido says to call…they all take you to the same robot.   She says her name is “Andrea.”   Nice.)
  2. Follow the robot’s directions patiently to register for instant prepayment, so that we can use our credit card to refill.   Optionally don’t be patient and just say “representative” into the phone.   It will take you to the same place anyway.
  3. One of two things will happen.   You might get an English speaking representative who will tell you politely that he can’t do this manually, and that you have to speak to the robot about it.   If this happens, the robot takes you through the same logic chain that delivers you into the lap of an English speaking representative, who will breezily deny that this reality even happened.   We had several very nice young people speak with us this evening, and we think we actually even witnessed a shift change down at the old call centre.
  4. Once in a while Andrea will not direct you to a friendly but useless English speaking representative, but instead will forward you to another robot who, in French, politely informs you that the French customer service office is now closed and will reopen at 8am.   She then terminates the call, leaving you flummoxed and with no recourse but to blog the whole experience.

So that’s it.   If anyone can help us figure out how to get credit card refilling authorized and then done, that would be nice.   If you fido guys are reading this, give us a call, but don’t mince your words, we only have two precious minutes remaining in our account!.   Your robot has the number.   Her name is Andrea.
In the meantime I guess we’re thinking about switching to Telus or something. The bottom line for fido: crap customer services trumps friendly robots.   The French twist on the whole thing was pretty funny though, so the evening’s entertainment was not a total loss.

[tags]fido, bad+customer+service, voice+mail, cell+phone, help![/tags]

Art of Hosting Facilitator Training

June 1, 2006 By Appreciative Inquiry, Art of Hosting, Conversation, Facilitation, Leadership, Learning, Open Space, World Cafe

I have been working lately with friends and fellows Brenda Chaddock, Tennson Wolf and Teresa Posakony to co-create another Art of Hosting training. We will be gathering on Bowen Island here in British Columbia from September 24-28 in a practice retreat to deeply investigate these questions:

  • What could my leadership also be?
  • What if I would practice using collective intelligence and learning in my organisation and network?
  • What could strategic conversations also be if I host them with wisdom and courage?
  • How do I create authentic involvement that leads to real implementation?

The practice retreat is structured along the following principles:

  • Our learning will grow out of participant contributions and presence – we will support each other as co-learners
  • We will learn by observation, experience and practice, using interactive processes to build a safe and inspiring learning environment – we will explore Open Space Technology, Appreciative Inquiry, Circle Council, reflective practices, World Cafe, and other participatory methodologies
  • Taking a chance to explore – and experiment with – applying these tools to your own projects-in-progress will help you to apply your skills, as well as develop and continue a new practice that will last well beyond this training

And through a variety of processes and conversations, we will investigate:

  • Hosting conversations as a core leadership practice and competence for leading change
  • How the Art of Hosting is an organising pattern/culture that invites new ways of living and working
  • The conditions needed to create space for meaningful conversations
  • Specific interactive processes through which learning and creation can emerge
  • Sensing and shaping the conditions and timing for using particular methods and tools
  • How the practice of hosting can be applied to key strategic change projects in our lives and work

This is a powerful training, and we invite you to join us. For more information, or to register, visit the Art of Hosting page or contact me by email.

[tags]facilitation+training, art+of+hosting[/tags]

Open Space and other facilitation resources

May 29, 2006 By Facilitation, Open Space

Having a weblog in addition to having a regular website means that there are two front doors to my online home.   There have been a lot of searches here lately for facilitation and Open Space resources, so I thought I would highlight the collections that I maintain through two pages here.

I hope you find these useful.   Let me know how they are for you.

When a gift is not a gift

May 28, 2006 By Music, Philanthropy One Comment

Thoreau, from May 27, 1851:

I saw an organ-grinder this morning before a rich man’s house, thrilling the street with harmony, loosening the very paving stones and tearing the routine of life to rags and tatters, when the lady of the house shoved up a window and in a semiphilanthropic tone inquired if he wanted anything to eat. But he, very properly it seemed to me, kept on grinding and paid no attention to her question, feeding her ears with melody unasked for. So the world shoves up its window and interrogates the poet, and sets him to gauging ale casks in return. It seemed to me that the music suggested that the recompense should be as fine as the gift. It would be much nobler to enjoy the music, though you paid no money for it, than to presume always a beggarly relation. It is after all, perhaps, the best instrumental music that we have.

A complex quote, for as you will hear below, it is not clear which is the kinder gift.

mp3: Chiappa Barrel Organ – Daisy Bell and Oh Mr. Porter

[tags]Thoreau, barrel+organ[/tags]

The world we want

May 27, 2006 By Conversation, Leadership, Open Space, Philanthropy 9 Comments

One of the most incredible application of Open Space Technology I have ever seen was the Giving Conference that was sponsored by Phil Cubeta and convened and facilitated by Michael Herman with an assist from me, It started something that has flowed out all over the place, and the story has been retold in many places, most recently on Phil’s blog The World We Want

Phil challenged me, at his other blog Wealth Bondage to put together a small manifesto on the world I want. As it relates to philanthropy, open space and democracy, here are a few thoughts:

  • Spurred on by a number of ideas, books and thoughts, we can convene local conversations about giving. These conversations need to invite a huge diversity of people, from many different political, economic, social and cultural types to engage around these ideas. We need givers and activists to be in attendance as partners and peers. We need bloggers to be there to witness the power of the story and to tell it to the world. We need thinkers and visionaries to challenge us forward and we need tech people to design and implement the network supports that can emerge and serve us in the moment.
  • Connected to one another by appreciative effort, we invite engagement and local action around the world/nation/community we want, and tie our passions to responsibilities, made easier by doing things together in networks, self-organized around what we love and what we are prepared to steward.
  • Supported by local networks and conversations face to face and the ever increasing intimacy of global networks served through the web, we find local expression for our action but together contribute to an open source world of solutions and designs for people and places that are stuck.
  • Spurred on by what is behind us we make good on our promises and what is budding in our work and use micro-philanthropy to leverage invitations to more open space events, more engaged conversations and more change. Small change becomes big news and yet the money amounts stay small, and the efforts stay local but the scale takes over. Imagine if Wikipedia were not a reference work but a change effort. Imagine if every hour spent working on that was spent working for the world we want. And imagine if we could choose the pieces to work on, contributing where we can, unafraid to make mistakes and muddle through and sense the success with nothing to lose and everything to gain…

I’m up for it. How about you?