End of Day: Friday 18th July

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Well it's Friday all over again and as usual time is flying back at a rapid rate. How long before the shops start selling Christmas stuff? Back to school stuff first I guess. So what's been going on during the course of this now, slightly sunny, Friday? Jen's first with the End of Week from the HR Team: So, it's the middle of July and it feels more like March, but hey-ho! We're still busy trying to deliver on all the things we agreed to this month as well as keeping on top of day-to-day jobs and tasks. Unlike the weather, the Employee Handbook is 'hot' off the virtual press, following it's launch earlier this week. I'll have to find some other bedtime reading now....so, it's now over to the rest of Plusnet staff to read and enjoy! Amanda has been working towards the BT quarterly HR meeting as well as reviewing agencies on our PSL. As a result, the team has reviewed our Plusnet Documentation and removed any Best Practices or info that now appears in the Handbook. Maybe not clear skies outside, but the HR sections sections at least look a lot better. Diane and Gem have been busy sorting out recruitment and Barbs has been helping out with all the bits and pieces that go along with it, making sure that everything is meticulously recorded. Diane's been working on the HR legal update for the summer. (Summer?) Barbs has been busy making sure all the information in CIPHR people is correct and up-to-date to make everyone's life easier using CIPHR net. We also sat in on the Tone of Voice workshops which proved very useful (thanks Martyn). Preparation for the MDLP later this month has been ongoing for Amanda, and I've been helping out by making sure all the relevant bits and pieces are in place. Company Rally for this quarter is next week, so Barbs and I have been getting together stuff for PNOTM and length of service awards. Diane and I have both been working on the induction time tables for our new starters next week and Barbs has been processing the relevant forms and contract, as well as sorting out forms for changes and leavers. Anyway, the weather is set to pick up towards the end of the weekend, so hopefully next week it might actually start to feel like July.... Have a great weekend! Adheel's next from the CSC: Hey peeps hope you have all got that Friday feeling! I'll be working all weekend, so think about us poor people... The Top 5 for today is as follows:

1. D-Link Set-ups = The main reason for calls coming into the CS today are customers wanting advise on setting up thier recently received D-link routers (wireless and not). Customers following the instructions as usual but sometimes failing on logging into the router or forgetting the correct username combination etc.
2. Provisioning Updates = Customers who have signed up recently chasing activation dates, router deliveries etc. Also supply key information like correct MAC keys which help our BOT (Broadband Operations Team) place orders and meet customer demand.
3. Email Set-ups = Customers calling in for advice on either how to configure popular email clients like Outlook, Thunderbird, Eudora. MAC Mail or asking for general help on creating mailboxes, aliases etc.
4. Fault Updates = Customers calling in to chase their outstanding faults or to provide us with an update after being left a message earlier in the week and now only getting time to respond to these. As normal mainly the no or intermittent sync fault types being queried.
5. Billing = General billing queries, such as customers making outstanding payments, supplying new payment details or querying their accounts types in search of a better deal.

Over now to Martyn in Marketing: It's Friday, so it must be my turn to write the marketing end of day. This week I've been getting the rest of the company to think about our tone of voice and how we write. There are so many of us here writing stuff that this has been a big job. I think it's gone well though, and if nothing else I've learned that Ali's favourite word is horse (see yesterday's end of day if you're confused). Mine is Dusseldorf. (Ed: I was in today's great workshop and my word was serendipity). Enough about tone of voice though. I've also been working on new designs for our sales pages, with the help of Spence and Brian. Amy and Chris have been busy as ever, working on ways we can get more sales from affiliates and generating press coverage. Meanwhile Phil's been downstairs with our sales team, hopefully getting them to make even more sales. That's it then, another week done. See you all on Monday. Over now to Bob from the Comms Team: It's been pretty hectic day today in the world of Comms. Chris has been at home all day waiting for his Sky TV to be configured (slacker), whilst Matt has been in training all afternoon. That's left me and James manning the fort and we've definitely had plenty to be getting on with. I've been helping out with a couple of particularly nasty P1 problems whilst James has been busy with change controls, the forums and trying best to be three people at once!! When I have had a minute to myself, I've been deliberating about the endless possibilities for potential domains using the new Montenegro .me ccTLD. Have a look here at some of the novelty domains that have already been claimed. If you fancy an .me domain of your own then you can see what's still up for grabs here. OK, the pub is beckoning so all that's left now is for me to publish today's random linkage... This is one I saw a while back and at the time I had to marvel at the ingenuity of it all. Some time ago, art graduate James Houston recreated the band Radiohead's song 'Nude' using nothing but redundant hardware. Instead of Thom Yorke and his entourage, James' line up was as follows: Sinclair ZX Spectrum - Guitars (rhythm & lead) Epson LX-81 Dot Matrix Printer - Drums HP Scanjet 3c - Bass Guitar Hard Drive array - Act as a collection of bad speakers - Vocals & FX Wondering what I'm on about? Take a look here (bear with it, it doesn't kick in until about 1 minute 30 seconds). If you're unfamiliar with the original you can hear that here - Even if you're not fond of the band you have to appreciate the time it must have taken James' to accomplish this. Ciao. Finally for today from the Products Team is Darren: Products have been running along without Rich, Luke and Maria today (Peace at last) and the remaining three of us have been plodding along with our daily tasks. I've been working on Hardware forecasting and data requests. Ian's been here, there....... well he's been everywhere, he's been attending meeting after meeting on mobile broadband and Churn, working on tasks and having lots of discussion on a New Product tool. And that's all for this week, time just for a cheap plug to my latest blog and there's no rest for the wicked as I'm already working on the next. Although won't be long now until hometime. Have a good weekend and we'll be back in just 72 hours...