A couple of weeks ago, I was directed to a story in the Irish Times and elsewhere about the sad end of the Thomas Cook branch in Grafton Street, Dublin. Actually, from what I can gather,it was he end of that company in that country completely, but it was that main branch closure that was of particular interest to me.
Recent economic difficulties had pushed the company to bring forward the already planned closure. They just shut the place down with virtually no notice. The staff, understandably, were not amused and locked themselves in. The dispute seems to have mostly boiled down to one over redundancy payments - how much they should get for each year of service. They put video clips up on Yoochoob and were eventually arrested by the Garda (Irish police) who turned up in seemingly excessive numbers to evict the staff.
None of that is what this post is about.
I'm not going to try to go into the rights and wrongs; I'm too far removed and it's really none of my business. I just wish them all well.
I just found the whole episode extremely sad. You see (many may already know), I had some of the best, and some of the toughest, days of my working life in that office.
This is the story of the 1976 Irish Bank Strike.
I had heard stories of the previous bank strike in Ireland six years earlier but by the time of the 1976 one, I was working in London as part of a small group of Foreign Exchange Cashiers who, in between developing and installing primitive (though, then, state of the art) computer systems, were sometimes made available as "emergency reliefs". We'd covered a flu epidemic in Glasgow, a mass suspension of staff at the London flagship branch (all but one later vindicated), and so on.
When the bank staff went home in Ireland, early in the Summer, they caused enormous disruption to everyday life; no way to get money out, nobody would take a check, nowhere for people like the bus company to get or deposit the vast amounts of small change they handled, no way to pay wages.....you can imagine, I'm sure.
One of the, truth be told, minor disruptions was that, at the start of the summer vacation season, there was nowhere, nowhere in the whole country, to change money. Well, there was ONE place. Under the law at the time, only the banks were allowed to sell foreign currency. There was ONE exception. You've guessed; the FE Dept of Thomas Cook, Grafton Street, Dublin.
If you were visiting Ireland and needed to change money, there were, in theory, a few other places you could go. Trouble was, there was nowhere THEY could go. This handful of jewellers shops,exchange bureaux etc. were in the habit of taking all the currency they bought to their bank. Oops. We got all that too.
Well, the four staff in the little FE cage were, as you can imagine, swamped. Two more staff from the Traveller's Cheque distribution centre upstairs were available to help (their customers were all banks!) and three of us Brits from London went over to try and help out.
7 to 9 people in a box built for 4, in Summer with no air conditioning. Sacks of money on the floor behind us because there was nowhere else to put them. Customers started arriving early in the morning and lining up outside. When the manager's wife Maeve (bless her) let the first ones in at 9am, the queue was already 4 hours long and never got any shorter.
Maeve would manage the queue all day, spelled from time to time by one of the travel agency staff whose customers couldn't get to them anyway. We could hope to serve the last one about 9.30pm, having blocked the end of the queue at 5pm. More business transacted in August alone than in the whole of the previous year - and that had been a record.
Besides the "real" FE stuff, we had to do other things just to "oil the wheels" - ours and everybody elses. CIE, the bus company, would send trucks round with all the change they had taken in bus fares - 100 Pounds per bag, mixed silver. We needed that for the tills but somebody needed to break it down into manageable bags and count it all. Bring on the travel staff again - they'd do this all evening. In exchange for the coin, we would pay the wages to the bus drivers and conductors. They would come in with their pay slips, we'd stamp them and pay them out of all the money people were spending on Spanish Pesetas et al.
Farmers and all sorts from the other end of the country would send their family members to Dublin on the train - an overnight trip for many - just to line up at Cook's all day, change the money for their family trip and go back again. For some, it was their first ever trip to Dublin.
It went on for about 10 weeks. I was lucky; I rotated in and out, doing three spells of two weeks, then back home to London to recuperate. The "regulars" were just stuck there. But for all the sweat and crazy conditions, I remember it as one of the happiest times of my working life - a real high spot.
I went back to Dublin to work, in more regular circumstances, several times and always loved it. From 1979 to the mid 80's, I considered it my second home. I doubt it would have been the same were it not for the experiences and friends made through adversity of the '76 bank strike.
So it was sad to see the old place shut down in such an ugly fashion.I could have just said that. I suppose, but then I like to tell stories.
If anyone knows where any of the following folks are - please let me know, or point them at this blog. I always think dedications are a bit hokey, but this entry is dedicated to:
Tommy Tobin (deceased),Maeve Tobin,Dave Adams,David Lalor, Paul O'Malley, Bob Beatty, Richard Brennan, Pat Byrne, Brian Latham and Malcolm Wing. Oh yes, and to Derry Troddyn (deceased) who sent me.
Showing posts with label Foreign Exchange. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Foreign Exchange. Show all posts
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Friday, January 4, 2008
At last, a waeguk answers a question!
It's taken more time than there is any excuse for but, here finally, is my attempt at an answer to the first question this blogger received. Simon, late of England, now in New York, has a professional background similar to mine; a career in foreign exchange which includes vault work in multiple countries, a variety retail operations at a variety of levels. The main difference between us is that Simon is substantially younger than I so, while I look back on 37 years finished, he is still doing it and looking as much forward as back. His question, reflects that. He asks:-
"I was wondering how you would cope with being who you are now, but back in Berkeley St (our mutual company's HQ in London until the 90s, D) in the 70's, and having to do your job of that time, but with the knowledge and experience you have now? Do you think you would fall back into the old routines or would your 21st century experience change your views and methods? Would you try and move things forward for them or let them work it out for themselves? Would you take advantage of your advanced knowledge and aim for promotions and praise or sit back and have an easy life?
In an attempt to prevent this from being either a) as dry as old bones to any unfortunate reader not versed in all the same things we are or b) turning in to an old dinosaur's rant about the good old/bad new days, I will try to couch the answer in the most general terms possible.
A number of things changed in the 37 years I was in that business and most of them seem to have changed elsewhere too
1. Systems. In 1970, the word never came up. There was one computer and only the white-coated specialists were allowed in its hermetically sealed room. It took up most of a floor of the building and only did two things. For about half the time, it processed the serial numbers of traveller's cheques, changing their status from "ordered" to "printed", "shipped", "in central stock", "in transit to agent", "in agent's stock", "issued", "lost or stolen", "paid" and, the demon of the bunch "PWA" (Paid Without Advice). The other half of the time, it processed payroll. It was not connected to anything anywhere, got it's data from punch cards and huge rolls of tape and churned out huge reports on "music paper". In contrast, the desk I just retired from housed four computers, each many times more powerful than the 1970 mainframe and connected, quite literally, to the entire world. Each could run several applications at once, even the simplest of which - a dinosaur VAX system some 20 years old - would have been beyond the grasp of any system, except possibly one run by NASA, in 1970.
2. Promotion/Recruitment policy. In 1970, and for some years after, in order to be promoted to a higher position, even at very lofty levels, you were expected to understand EVERYTHING your underlings did. You didn't need any fancy qualifications. There were a handful of chartered accountants in the Finance department, a few engineers in "EDP" (that's Electronic Data Processing, or IT as we know it today) and possibly some other professionals I didn't know about but, in general, you came in with "O" levels, occasionally an "A" level, started as a trainee cashier and went as far as you could or wanted, learning as you went. Progressively, down the years, the MBA's, PHD's and various stripes of accountants took hold and made most of the senior positions their own. Never mind that they couldn't tell a Franc from a Dong, thought a "hedge" was something you clipped at the weekend and "forward" was a position in football. They knew BUSINESS! "Business is business", they had been taught. "Don't get bogged down in the detail", they had learned. And boy did they know how to mess things up.
3. The 80/20 rule. I first heard this described sometime in the late 1970's by a new kind of professional called a "business analyst". I became one for a time and, as callings go, it's fun. What the 80/20 rule says, in a nutshell, is that, in any project, 80% of the job is completed with 20% of the resources (time, money, equipment, whatever). It's the other 20%, that messy list of exceptions, oddities, manual bits of awkwardness, that swallow up the big bucks/hours/kit. As an observation, this was wonderful and right on the money; I've seen it proven 100 times over. BUT, the fussbudgets got hold of it and tried to argue that we should therefore only do 80% of the project, thereby saving 80% of the money. At this stage, nobody had really caught on (and many still haven't) to the downside of #2 above; to wit, in a labour market dominated by qualified professionals, they can all work anywhere. Under the old regime, my experience and knowledge might be of some use to a handful of companies similar to my own but no oil company, drug store chain or truck manufacturer was going to want me. I was most valuable where I was so I had a vested interest in making sure that any new systems would work, even in the messy 20% bits, even if I myself moved on in the organization. These new guys, though, the pros, were like elected politicians. As long as they could look good long enough to get the next job, which would be elsewhere, they really cared not a jot if the whole house of cards collapsed after they'd gone. "Stay Within The Budget" was all that mattered. The result has been a succession of iterations of the 80/20 rule, each one doing 80% of what the last one did so that, eventually, the LATEST system only does 80% of 80% of 80% of 80%........ of the whole job (that's "not very much" in old money). I shouldn't complain, that's what kept me valuable through the last years - I was the guy who knew how it all REALLY worked.
So, what's the answer to Simon's question?
I would NOT use my knowledge to climb the ladder and take an easy life - I don't like rarified atmospheres and don't think it would work anyway.
I WOULD have a lot to say about systems. How not to paint yourself into corners, get stuck with non standard formats, etc.
I would know the trends of the future, of course, and many of them I would be powerless against. I would therefore just have to be prepared, recognise the demons at the gate when they appeared and do my best for myself and my colleagues.
I would buy more of the rare and odd notes and coins that came my way and live off them now. Better than any pension. I would also keep my savings in Swiss Francs.
I would be better able to "not sweat the small stuff". Many of the crises I and others faced down the years felt, at the time, as if they were the end of everything. Clearly, they weren't. The Sun still rose, the paycheck still came, the lunatics still took over the asylum and, guess what, I'm still here.
Otherwise (and I've had lots of time to think about this), I wouldn't do it very differently. I would know better who to trust and who not, and that would lead to some changes but, by and large, I'd do it all again. I would get different breaks, I guess. Probably would not end up in Canada this time because that was a fluke that isn't likely to happen twice. But I would travel, take all the relief jobs, the overseas assignments, experience life as it came along.
People don't tend to think of "Foreign Exchange Cashier", if they think of it at all, as a career that lets you see the world. It took me all over the UK and Ireland and to France, Spain, Luxembourg, Germany, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Portugal, Italy, Greece, Egypt, Hong Kong, Singapore, Macao, Australia, lots of bits of the USA, Canada, Mexico, and I've probably missed a few. If I tried to change the past by reliving it, I think I'd fail. I would use what widom I could, but, mostly, I like how it went the first time.
Simon, I don't suppose that's the kind of answer you expected, or possibly even wanted, but I had more time to think about it than I should have and, really, that's it. When I was happy in my working life, it was because I was being ME. When I tried to live in someone else's world (like my brief trip into "upper management", I wasn't me and I wasn't happy. So, I'd be me, and that hasn't changed much (sepfer the grey and the wrinkles).
"I was wondering how you would cope with being who you are now, but back in Berkeley St (our mutual company's HQ in London until the 90s, D) in the 70's, and having to do your job of that time, but with the knowledge and experience you have now? Do you think you would fall back into the old routines or would your 21st century experience change your views and methods? Would you try and move things forward for them or let them work it out for themselves? Would you take advantage of your advanced knowledge and aim for promotions and praise or sit back and have an easy life?
In an attempt to prevent this from being either a) as dry as old bones to any unfortunate reader not versed in all the same things we are or b) turning in to an old dinosaur's rant about the good old/bad new days, I will try to couch the answer in the most general terms possible.
A number of things changed in the 37 years I was in that business and most of them seem to have changed elsewhere too
1. Systems. In 1970, the word never came up. There was one computer and only the white-coated specialists were allowed in its hermetically sealed room. It took up most of a floor of the building and only did two things. For about half the time, it processed the serial numbers of traveller's cheques, changing their status from "ordered" to "printed", "shipped", "in central stock", "in transit to agent", "in agent's stock", "issued", "lost or stolen", "paid" and, the demon of the bunch "PWA" (Paid Without Advice). The other half of the time, it processed payroll. It was not connected to anything anywhere, got it's data from punch cards and huge rolls of tape and churned out huge reports on "music paper". In contrast, the desk I just retired from housed four computers, each many times more powerful than the 1970 mainframe and connected, quite literally, to the entire world. Each could run several applications at once, even the simplest of which - a dinosaur VAX system some 20 years old - would have been beyond the grasp of any system, except possibly one run by NASA, in 1970.
2. Promotion/Recruitment policy. In 1970, and for some years after, in order to be promoted to a higher position, even at very lofty levels, you were expected to understand EVERYTHING your underlings did. You didn't need any fancy qualifications. There were a handful of chartered accountants in the Finance department, a few engineers in "EDP" (that's Electronic Data Processing, or IT as we know it today) and possibly some other professionals I didn't know about but, in general, you came in with "O" levels, occasionally an "A" level, started as a trainee cashier and went as far as you could or wanted, learning as you went. Progressively, down the years, the MBA's, PHD's and various stripes of accountants took hold and made most of the senior positions their own. Never mind that they couldn't tell a Franc from a Dong, thought a "hedge" was something you clipped at the weekend and "forward" was a position in football. They knew BUSINESS! "Business is business", they had been taught. "Don't get bogged down in the detail", they had learned. And boy did they know how to mess things up.
3. The 80/20 rule. I first heard this described sometime in the late 1970's by a new kind of professional called a "business analyst". I became one for a time and, as callings go, it's fun. What the 80/20 rule says, in a nutshell, is that, in any project, 80% of the job is completed with 20% of the resources (time, money, equipment, whatever). It's the other 20%, that messy list of exceptions, oddities, manual bits of awkwardness, that swallow up the big bucks/hours/kit. As an observation, this was wonderful and right on the money; I've seen it proven 100 times over. BUT, the fussbudgets got hold of it and tried to argue that we should therefore only do 80% of the project, thereby saving 80% of the money. At this stage, nobody had really caught on (and many still haven't) to the downside of #2 above; to wit, in a labour market dominated by qualified professionals, they can all work anywhere. Under the old regime, my experience and knowledge might be of some use to a handful of companies similar to my own but no oil company, drug store chain or truck manufacturer was going to want me. I was most valuable where I was so I had a vested interest in making sure that any new systems would work, even in the messy 20% bits, even if I myself moved on in the organization. These new guys, though, the pros, were like elected politicians. As long as they could look good long enough to get the next job, which would be elsewhere, they really cared not a jot if the whole house of cards collapsed after they'd gone. "Stay Within The Budget" was all that mattered. The result has been a succession of iterations of the 80/20 rule, each one doing 80% of what the last one did so that, eventually, the LATEST system only does 80% of 80% of 80% of 80%........ of the whole job (that's "not very much" in old money). I shouldn't complain, that's what kept me valuable through the last years - I was the guy who knew how it all REALLY worked.
So, what's the answer to Simon's question?
I would NOT use my knowledge to climb the ladder and take an easy life - I don't like rarified atmospheres and don't think it would work anyway.
I WOULD have a lot to say about systems. How not to paint yourself into corners, get stuck with non standard formats, etc.
I would know the trends of the future, of course, and many of them I would be powerless against. I would therefore just have to be prepared, recognise the demons at the gate when they appeared and do my best for myself and my colleagues.
I would buy more of the rare and odd notes and coins that came my way and live off them now. Better than any pension. I would also keep my savings in Swiss Francs.
I would be better able to "not sweat the small stuff". Many of the crises I and others faced down the years felt, at the time, as if they were the end of everything. Clearly, they weren't. The Sun still rose, the paycheck still came, the lunatics still took over the asylum and, guess what, I'm still here.
Otherwise (and I've had lots of time to think about this), I wouldn't do it very differently. I would know better who to trust and who not, and that would lead to some changes but, by and large, I'd do it all again. I would get different breaks, I guess. Probably would not end up in Canada this time because that was a fluke that isn't likely to happen twice. But I would travel, take all the relief jobs, the overseas assignments, experience life as it came along.
People don't tend to think of "Foreign Exchange Cashier", if they think of it at all, as a career that lets you see the world. It took me all over the UK and Ireland and to France, Spain, Luxembourg, Germany, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Portugal, Italy, Greece, Egypt, Hong Kong, Singapore, Macao, Australia, lots of bits of the USA, Canada, Mexico, and I've probably missed a few. If I tried to change the past by reliving it, I think I'd fail. I would use what widom I could, but, mostly, I like how it went the first time.
Simon, I don't suppose that's the kind of answer you expected, or possibly even wanted, but I had more time to think about it than I should have and, really, that's it. When I was happy in my working life, it was because I was being ME. When I tried to live in someone else's world (like my brief trip into "upper management", I wasn't me and I wasn't happy. So, I'd be me, and that hasn't changed much (sepfer the grey and the wrinkles).
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
