Wasting Time With Alex

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Thursday, March 27, 2008

I call Bullshit!

OK, let me start off by saying that I am a hard core believer in the freedom of the market and that government has overburdened ours with costly and ridiculous regulations that do more harm than good, but when I read what the CEO of AT&T had to say about getting skilled workers, I just had to call bullshit. Walk through this exercise with me for a second, and you will see why.

SAN ANTONIO, Texas (Reuters) - The head of the top U.S. phone company AT&T Inc (T.N) said on Wednesday it was having trouble finding enough skilled workers to fill all the 5,000 customer service jobs it promised to return to the United States from India.

“We’re having trouble finding the numbers that we need with the skills that are required to do these jobs,” AT&T Chief Executive Randall Stephenson told a business group in San Antonio, where the company’s headquarters is located.

So far, only around 1,400 jobs have been returned to the United States of 5,000, a target it set in 2006, the company said, adding that it maintains the target.

The jobs in question are customer service jobs. Basically the person that gets the job answers phone calls by customers with issues, complaints, or requests for new business. Now this guy wants us to believe that a job that ranked so low on priority that AT&T figured it could drastically cut the cost of these customer services by outsourcing it to people that didn’t even have English as their primary language suddenly has a problem being filled here in the US? Think about that. The reason these jobs went overseas was simply because AT&T figured that it was not a priority with them and that as long as they could get someone cheap, they where fulfilling their obligations to the customers.

Now I am not trying to cast aspersions on the people that got these jobs. They are often very capable and hard working people. The problem was that most Americans had trouble talking to someone that they had a hard time understanding and that got turned off from companies that implemented this practice. AT&T is bringing these jobs back, not because it feels it is a good financial choice, unless you look at the fact that it directly affects their bottom line when customers walk because of their outsourcing practices, or even because it thinks these workers have not done a good job - frankly I think, and I speak from my own personal experience in IT, that the higher ups making these decisions often do not care about this quality as long as they can finagle it to show that they cut costs - but because they are losing business. now stay with me.

Stephenson said he is especially distressed that in some U.S. communities and among certain groups, the high school dropout rate is as high as 50 percent. “If I had a business that half the product we turned out was defective or you couldn’t put into the marketplace, I would shut that business down,” he said. Gone are the days when AT&T and other U.S. companies had to hire locally, he said.

I will be the first to admit that our high schools, especially in the urban communities which tend to be very liberal, in general have abysmal results, often because the people involved do not care about getting an education. Too many people have been told that there is nothing they can do to make the American dream happen for them because the system is rigged against them. The result is that most of them simply do not take advantage of the most important thing anyone hoping to get ahead in life needs: a good education. Couple that with schools that also do not care and peer pressure against those that do try to get an education, and you get the picture. No doubt about the fact that no company in the world other than the government or unionized teachers could get away with this kind of results. But even with that fact in mind, I can not help but call Bullshit! on this assessment. What kind of skills other than some basic reading, the ability to talk, and some good manners & people skills are necessary to do customer service? In fact the most important thing to do a customer service job is the ability to communicate with people effectively, and no school will teach you that in my opinion.

I am not sure he slipped up when he pointed out that no company had to hire locally anymore, but nobody should miss that. Our global world has made it possible for people in another company to do a job much cheaper than people here in the US. That is why these jobs went offshore. It was a conscious choice by AT&T driven not by their desire to provide better customer service, but by financials. This CEO is pissed because the people that pay for his product showed their displeasure at his company’s decision to use outsourcing to provide customer service used their ability to make a choice as well by taking their business somewhere else. Guess he doesn’t like others exercising their ability to choose either.

Stephenson said neither he nor most Americans liked the situation, and the solution was a stronger U.S. focus on education and keeping jobs. Business needed to help, such as AT&T’s repatriation of service positions and education grants, he added.

Now, I am all for America’s businesses to start forcing the current educational system to change and produce more capable people. The education system could use a healthy dose of the real world. Co-opted by the left with an agenda to create better collectivist drones at the cost of a real education, our students remain woefully unprepared for the job market of today where high tech demands skills. But please do not try to bullshit us about that being the case for customer service jobs. How freaking hard is it to answer a phone or work a computer? Maybe the issue is that AT&T also outsourced their IT work and now the quality of that is so lacking that they need much more skilled people to do the job of dealing with the constant issues?

Nah, do not get fooled. Their decision to outsource was based on money only. They thought they where going to save a big amount of cash by paying Amit 20 cents an hour over paying Tom $8 or more dollars an hour. When the AT&T customers showed their displeasure in a way that hit their pocket books, they had to rethink this cost cutting effort. The only problem is that they do not like having to pay people here that much for that kind of low skilled job. And that is why they are having a hard time moving the jobs back here. Not because of lack of capable people. It is because of lack of capable people that will do the jobs for peanuts. This guy Stephenson is not really helping us address the issue of how our schools are failing us as a society by trying to bamboozle us into thinking customer service jobs are high skill. In fact he is outright hurting it by trying to hide the fact AT&T would prefer to keep these jobs where it is cheap for financial reasons but is forced to change that because their customers do not want it.

Monday, November 19, 2007

Happy Thanksgiving

With the Thanksgiving holiday coming this week I have been thinking about what to say to convey the many things Americans have to be thankful for, most people in this country do not have a clue how much better we have it than the rest of the world and why, but Mark Stein seems to already have summed it all up, and done so with much more eloquence than I ever could, in this Thanksgiving article. This country is the only one like it on this planet. That is why it has been bountiful for those that have the privilege of being here - and despite all the complaints about how reviled America has become these days the people doing anything to come here keeps rising - and the envy of the rest that have not been able to replicate our success, including those nasty places that wish to spread some of the most horrible cancers mankind has ever thought up (communism, socialism and the lot of oppressive collectivisms). Rejoice about our blessings people.

Monday, November 12, 2007

Happy Veternan’s day

To all those that served, those that are serving, and those that will serve: some of us appreciate your sacrifices and know the only reasons we still live in the greatest nation to grace this earth is because of what you do. There are no words to express the gratitude we owe you so here is s asimple “Thankj you” from the bottom of my heart.

Thursday, September 27, 2007

CBS’s “The Unit” jumped the shark..

"The Unit” was one of the few shows on CBS that I watched. I say “was’ because after this season’s premiere I can honestly say I am ready to quit watching. The first two seasons of the show where of high quality, realistic, and showed the world and the dangers we face as is. However this third season started off taking such a radical and idiotic turn I can not help but agree with this assessment that its is a dead show. How freaking idiotic that we now have to deal with another conspiracy laden, anti-US & anti-military show, but this being CBS I guess I should have expected it sooner or later. Considering the path this is heading towards, this show might soon be off the air too. See, I doubt the left will watch a military oriented show like this, even one where the “good guys” have turned on the military and their country because of some conspiracy crap, for too long. And if they are like me, the audience that used to watch is going to get turned off fast and abandon the show if this tripe drags on. Sad to see it go, but much better to have it end than watch it devolve into another anti-American piece of garbage.

Tuesday, September 11, 2007

9-11 commentary

I think the best commentary for this 9-11 anniversary are Popular Mechanic’s debunking of the stupid 9-11 conspiracy theories and as much footage of the 9-11 attacks on the WTC as possible. Too many people feel that memories of what happened on 9-11, like terrorism, are just another nuisance.

Thursday, August 30, 2007

Maybe my kid is not wasting his & my time after all

I guess playing all those video games does have a payoff. While to focus of the article is military in nature, it does point out that there are other civilian fields where the skill does come in handy as well.

August 29, 2007: Much to the dismay of parents everywhere, experience with video games is, more and more, proving to be a lifesaving skill on the battlefield. Many crucial systems use video game type controllers, and troops with thousands of “wasted” hours playing video games quickly become expert at using the military gear. This includes remote control weapons (particularly the 12.7mm machine-gun turret found on armored hummers and Stryker vehicles), several models of combat robots and UAVs (like the Raven). Research has shown that eye-hand coordination is enhanced in proportion to the hours spent playing video games. This helps with everything from operating a fire control system in a tank, ship or aircraft, to using remote control surgery gear. Yes, even surgeons who found time to play video games have an easier time using the growing number of automated gear they use.

As an additional bonus, the army has found itself with lots of reservists that have programming and video game skills, thus making it easier to make simulators for the new equipment, using video game-like interfaces. In the last two years, the army has been particularly successful putting some of these simulators (like the one for CROWS, the remotely controlled 12.7mm machine-gun) on the “America’s Army” online game. There, potential recruits can learn what it’s like to use items based on video game technology. If one of these guys joins up, he will later find himself using the same “America’s Army” CROWS module to get ready for action in Iraq or Afghanistan.

I guess I should see that time my kid spends playing these things as an investment in his future. Still not going to let him skip homework or avoid learning the other stuff that he needs though. 

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

I bet he “supported the troops while opposing the war”…

Check out this practically unreported story about how some liberal anti-Bush, anti-US, anti-military (yeah I know this is cliché stuff) chose to make a “statement”. Here is a great breakdown of what is going on and how hypocritical the lack of reporting in this case is.

A random act of insanity? Not so fast. There’s more to the story. A reader whose son is the best friend of Senior Airman Schrieken wrote to Charles Johnson of the Little Green Footballs blog with background details:

My son’s best friend, Jon, who’s in the Air Force stationed in New Jersey at Fort Dix/McGuire Air Force Base, was shot by a crazed anti-military white guy on Independence Day and he remains in critical condition. He had been on leave here in Ohio and got back to his home off base and was unpacking stuff from his car when this 22-year-old guy walked up to him and asked him if he lived in the house. When Jon said yes, the guy said ‘not any more’ and shot him point-blank in the chest. He tried to shoot him again, but his gun jammed. Jonathan made it into the house. The guy then shot himself.

Turns out the guy left a couple of suicide notes stating how much he hated the military and he wanted to go out making a statement, so he chose to make his statement on Independence Day trying to kill a soldier. We are very worried about our Airman . . . he’s like a son to me. He’s been to Iraq and Afghanistan on our behalf and then gets shot in his own driveway here in the U.S. by an anti-war, anti-American lunatic. This is gut wrenching.

Now, imagine the scenario flipped: What if a soldier had attempted to murder a peace activist over the holidays in order to “make a statement”? The Times would be holding front-page vigil, and Katie Couric’s brow would be furrowed for a week. The yakkity yaks on The View would be clucking their tongues about the culture of violence bred by the military — and who knows what Rosie O’Donnell would be dressing her poor child in to exploit the story on her website.

Michelle Malkin, whom wrote this article, is dead on in pointing out how had this been a soldier that had shot a “peace protester” that it would be front page news. But because one of these lefty moonbats that we keep getting told “supports the troops but doesn’t support the war” and shows his patriotism by pointing out how evil America is and that Bush = Hitler let his mask slip and did what most of them really would love to be able to do, this story will get no coverage. Why should we trust anyone that these people would like to elect with power again?

Hope Senior Airman Schrieken pulls through. He is another victim of the left’s hatred of all things America and those that keep us free from the grip of socialism/communism these lefts seem to be enamored with.

Tuesday, May 15, 2007

No gun needed..

I guess unless you want to make the case that brutally killing one person is less offensive than brutally killing a lot of people at once it seems that a determined nut job will kill when they want to. No gun needed. But then again, people trying to take away guns from law abiding citizens are really only concerned with the fact that if they are too chicken shit to defend themselves nobody else should be able to do so either. The culture of equality of results that socialists aspire for at work. Anyway, the issue is that crazy people will kill no matter what precaution we take. Me, I would rather have a chance at defending myself.