Following Z/Yen's excellent showing in the London Marathon, a team of dedicated runners took part in this year's JP Morgan Corporate Challenge. Jeremy, Michael, Mary, Giles and Laura took part with much support from Francesca "hopalong" Birch. In celebration of another competitive cost comparison survey being launched, the team all sported specially printed Z/Yen T shirts with "We Rank the Banks" emblazoned across their chests. Giles excelled himself by a) being the first Z/Yenite to finish but also b) in managing to hold a client meeting on the way. Following the run, the team bonded over beer, hamburgers and cornish pasties - as recommended by Runners Monthly (I don't recall them recommending eight pints though! - Ed).

ChoiceNet - A Networking Community for Better Decisions

Increasingly Z/Yen has been asked to deploy its community-building expertise. Since the launch of Taskforce 2000 back in 1996, a number of our marketing and NGO projects have involved intellectual projects on how to build healthy communities that in turn led to some nitty-gritty projects pulling communities together. For instance, we've been building a community for charities interested in taking insurance matters into their own hands, developing a conceptual national initiative involving television and government, working at creating a supporters' club for a high-profile charity and thinking with a government agency how to fix a dysfunctional community. Being Z/Yen, we've even put some preliminary thoughts down in "Risk/Reward in Virtual Financial Communities". Now we are launching a new community in conjunction with the Strategic Planning Society - ChoiceNet. ChoiceNet is a membership group that helps members make better decisions through a series of learning experiences and networking events. ChoiceNet helps members reach the right conclusions by building analytic, motivational, influencing and network skills through fun, half-day simulations such as Z/Yen's Boating Bourse, OligopoLuedo and Smuggler's Choice. Anyone interested in joining the ChoiceNet community is welcome to contact Linda Cook at Z/Yen for further information. Remember it's not just "what you now" and "who you know", but "how you figure out what to do".

Ageing (dis)gracefully

Ian Harris might leap around the cricket field like a spring chicken, (who wrote this rubbish? - Ed) (who'd'ya think? - ILH) but eventually the years catch up with all of us and we start thinking about retirement. Perhaps that is why Ian has accepted the invitation to sit on the Charity Finance Directors' Group (CFDG) Pensions Task Force. The current pensions crisis is pertinent to many charities, especially those in the care sector where defined benefits pensions have been the norm. The CFDG is hoping that Z/Yen's risk/reward thinking might provide some useful ideas to help solve the thorny problems. The Task Force expects to report in the first half of 2004 (long time frames on anything to do with pensions). Now & Z/Yen is not sure whether this appointment is a great honour for Z/Yen or a poisoned chalice that might prove some problems to be truly insurmountable. So, if Now & Z/Yen readers have any good examples or bright ideas (commercial and public sector wisdom equally applicable), please get in touch with poor old Ian before we put him out to graze.

Prize or Perish

After years of scribbling with little feedback, Z/Yen sometimes wonders if anyone out there, other than our friends, can still read. Imagine our surprise when Michael was awarded an unsolicited "Highly Commended" award by the Emerald Literati Club for his article "Industrial Strengths: Operational Risk and Banks" which appeared in the journal Balance Sheet, Volume 10, Number 3 in August 2002. After two books (with Ian) and 75 articles, some Z/Yen wags suggested the Literati Club were worn down by quantity; others wondered at the 250 anonymous emails of support mysteriously found in Michael's day file. Seriously, congratulations to Michael. We expect nothing less than a Booker Prize next time.