"We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills...but never, shall we surrender"

Stirring as this is, apparently Sir Winston was not talking about the fifth Z/Yen versus charities sports match. We fought Barnardo’s on the cricket pitch, twice – and they thrashed us. We fought The Children’s Society in the bowling alleys, twice – and they thrashed us. It was looking like the hills when Z/Yen won The Children’s Society challenge on the tennis courts! At our victory roast, the innocent victims were ... forced to ... watch us gloat. A good time was had by all the winners, and some of the victims who enjoyed some of our particularly sadistic IT trivia games. Sadly, cricket season is soon upon us.

Reflective Repast

A few weeks ago on the Lady Daphne, Z/Yen and a dozen or so distinguished guests debated the proposition that "The UK has more to gain as the Hong Kong to Europe than as the Manhattan to Europe", courtesy of Sir William Purves. When we first met him, Willie was relieved to hear that we preferred a puzzle or koan to an after dinner speech. Willie went at the problem with the gusto of a former rugby player who gained a DSO in Korea.

You may remember Willie as the former Chairman of HSBC and a director to companies such as Shell, however, from 1986 to 1993, he was a member of the Executive Council, Hong Kong's highest policy-making body.

The assembled group wrestled with Willie’s poser for over two hours. The general tone of the evening appears to have been that the great opportunity for the UK, and London in particular, is to progress with Europe, but keep a definable, separate and commonsense regulatory system for the financial markets.

Despite grappling with one of the world’s major problems before the port and brandy, our assembled crew happily made ports and brandies the morrow’s major problem. We didn’t close our final, final, final discussions (and a few other averted world crises) until midnight. Our next challenge is to find a puzzle-poser and chair as engaging as Willie and a few remaining global problems in need of resolution.

Come Together, Right Now, Over Me...

It’s not quite all play and no work. A large NGO asked us to help provide direction for further integration of their facilities management, property, support services, information technology, networks and data entry departments. Our work involved over 100 staff in a large number of functions.

Without John Lennon’s ghost we did help the key managers to Imagine a new way of working and agree to develop a new management system to be implemented over the next few months. So now we know Michael as "old flattop, he come grooving up slowly" (I thought we called him "old egghead" – Joo-Joo Eyeball)

Dotting I’s And Crossing T’s

Just over a year ago, a government body contracted with an IT outsourcing supplier for a fixed price service, but volumes reduced drastically and both parties are deep in negotiation. Z/Yen was brought in to do a quick appraisal of the basis and rigour of the accounting as well as to comment on the likely resolution. We now have every reason to hope that both parties can resolve their differences without recourse to the courts.

E@dot.com

No, this is not another IPO or net flotation on the way – tempting though isn’t it? Actually, Z/Yen is soon moving web sites, from our four-year old CompuServe site to a new and updated www.zyen.com and www.zyen.co.uk. More news to follow in the next issue of Now & Z/Yen – Episode 1 – The Spam Wars. Right now we’re off to dance through the meadows with Bottom and Puck – sing hey, nonny nonny, ho!