Starting again - it's a marathon, not a sprint

I have written in a previous blog about my knee operation in January. I am pleased to say that I am making a good recovery, so much so that I am now able to start exercising again (I damaged the knee in the first place through a combination of over enthusiastic activity in the gym, followed by a long run).

In the last couple of weeks I have managed only a handful of runs – short, slow and more of a well intentioned shuffle – but runs nevertheless. The original knee damage had taken some time to diagnose properly, and then there was a wait for theatre time through the Christmas holiday, so I have not run for nearly 6 months. Boy, was it hard going starting all over again, but I already feel better for making the effort. I found that after the first couple of sessions I had to revisit the basics in order to make progress. This may sound odd, because running is what comes naturally isn't it ? Well, not quite – you see I had to remember to stretch a bit (but not too much) beforehand, and then again at the end; start slow and then build up ; and run to the heart rate monitor, not to a pace per mile. The average speed was a good minute or so per mile slower than I had been used too 6 months ago, but each run felt progressively better as I re-learned the things that had proven beneficial before the injury (and might, in hindsight, have prevented the injury if I had done them every session).

This voyage of re-discovery got me thinking about outsourcing practices. How often do we ignore the basics and blindly charge ahead…and not take corrective until there is a significant loss of business value ? How often do we suffer during a contract and have to re-learn the basics at times of crisis ? Could we avoid loss of business value by having a relationship health check ? …by going back to the training manuals or even going to an external advisor ?

My message this time is short and simple:

For Customers: Could we avoid the service received being percieved poorly (or even better, loss of face in a management review) by having a relationship health check with our Service Provider? Could we have a better conversation (more fact based; more collaborative) with our SP when we are not under pressure to deliver some remedial action plan than when we are subject to close scrutiny by our peers ?

For Service Providers: Can we improve/maintain our margins through getting some customer responsibility actions agreed in order to help us deliver better service ? Would we get a better hearing if we addressed some of the softer measures of performance (satisfaction survey results ; business outcome issues) rather than just those that carry service credit penalties ?

Conclusion: Both parties should conduct some kind of “post investment review” rather than wait until the deal performance is escalated out of the hands of the front line account executives to the senior executives of both companies.

...and for me, it won't be the Stratford Half Marathon this year....but maybe a couple of local 10K's ?