Choppers And Champers

Z/Yen is delighted to announce that it now has its very own helicopter. You know a firm has truly arrived when it is able to meet its own basic needs such as helicopters and sailing barges. No senseless luxury this; the advent of the Z/Yen chopper will without question make it a great deal easier for us to get people into the Z/Yen boardroom for meetings. Actually, we are looking at ways of helping a British manufacturer called Snelflight (www.snelflight.co.uk) improve its marketing and felt compelled to buy this £200 flying model chopper for vital market research (ahem). We also tested flying it while drinking Linda’s birthday champagne, but it didn’t improve our performance!

Replacement Three Letter Acronym

Z/Yen began working nearly three years ago on replacing the member databases for the trades union, UNISON. At 1.3 million members, this is the UK’s largest membership system, so a number of people have contributed to the Replacement Membership System (RMS) project. Contributions have ranged from Keith Ellender, Marie Logan, Chris Webb and David Hogarth through to the ubiquitous Michael, however the key person has been Angela Greenfield. Despite the challenges of managing a project which extends to training 1,500 staff, installing 13 regional systems and over 1,200 branch systems, as well as controlling a budget of over £4 million, Angela’s most pressing problem has been finding a way to keep the RMS three letter acronym after the system has been ‘replaced’. The competition so far has come up with Record Management System, Redundant … A big bottle of bolly bubbly to readers who come up with something our team can use PDQ!

Z/Yen Employs A Person With A Life

Hello to Helen Griffiths who joined the Z/Yen head office team in mid July. Before August was through, Helen, a part time violinist with the All Souls Orchestra (ASO), was already on leave to go on tour to Northern Ireland. Shy, retiring Helen was too modest to tell us about the challenging works she played, but Now & Z/Yen has exclusively managed to obtain a transcript of the conductor’s interval team talk which was brief and revealing. "We’ve shafted Schoenberg and buggered Bartok, so now we might as well f-Orff", he said. Despite this, the ASO has now booked Helen to do another mini tour in September; this time to Bulgaria. Z/Yen’s holding a sweep on the next destination after that; Macedonia is the current favourite. Seriously, we extend a big warm welcome to Helen and look forward to her providing musical entertainment at Z/Yen events.

Duck Season? Rabbit Season? No - Conference Season

The 10th Annual Charity Accountants Conference takes place in Leicester on 17 to 19 September, where Ian Harris and Mary O’Callaghan will lead a session on the practicalities of implementing E-Procurement. Drawing on Z/Yen’s extensive experience and research in the area, the session promises charities large and small a practical guide to understanding E-Procurement. Another Z/Yen sweep is: "how often will Ian and Mary plug Z/Yen’s new book "Information Technology for the Not-for-Profit Sector" during the conference. Despite Mary’s disappointment that this event is taking place within the UK, both she and Ian are looking forward to a lively discussion. [If Mary wants foreign travel she should join an orchestra – Ed.] Meanwhile, Z/Yen is planning one or two conferences of its own this autumn, including one for not-for-profit sector organisations on ways they can provide evidence of their worth. Watch this space for further conference news.

Press Worthiness

August was a great month for Z/Yen press coverage. First, we had excellent coverage in Financial News and Financial Products for our work on investment banking costs. But many would conclude that the crowning achievement was some strikingly original coverage in The Economist of 18 August, "Fishy Maths", for our work in estimating the economic value added by environmental sustainability certification. However, rumours reach us that a mysterious "MM" of London, E1 is prouder of his letter on the etiquette of revolving doors in The Sunday Times Style section of 12 August. The ponderous letter inspired Mrs Mills to write "it was sapping me of the will to live". Anyone who has ever worked with Z/Yen’s MM will understand her sentiments entirely.