Even the Idlelord takes a break so here’s one from the archives. Taken from “It’s Only A Game” my inside story on how I contributed to the fall from grace of Barclays Bank plc. So far I have not heard from their legal team.
Training And Development; Getting Pissed On The Bank
Most large organisations spend fortunes on training but I cannot remember many courses where I actually came away feeling I had learnt much or done anything other than get pissed most nights to alleviate the boredom of the next day.
My training was meant to prepare me for the evils of selling personal finance via the motor trade. In comparable terms I am not sure the Mafia bother training their staff.
Early in my career I came back from a course bitterly disappointed feeling these were simply a complete waste of time. When I made this point to my boss he just leant back in his chair, smiled, blew on his cigar and said “It’s only a game son.”.
Training was often at a grand old country house called Appletons, close to Slough which is actually a bigger dump than Bradford; home sweet home then.
The most obvious reasons for locating us all here were that it was cheap and stuck in the middle of nowhere, ensuring we could not get up to much out of hours, even if we had managed to climb the barbed wire. You try partying in Slough!
Marooned, we were saved by Doreen, the canteen lady at Appletons, who produced the most wonderful grub I think I have ever had so I blame her for the daily destruction of my attention span, which started an hour before lunch and never returned.
Afternoons were a complete waste of time as we lent back in unison to quietly fart, allow stomachs to rumble and slowly doze off as some poor sod shoehorned into Training Dept – usually after failing miserably at sales – would fight a losing battle.
Steeped in tradition, Appletons was a glorious old house with an outdoor swimming pool (they always sent us there in November) and a pitch and putt golf course.
There was always a competition to see who could drive over the old house; strangely, several company cars developed post-Appletons dents over the years. We blamed the conkers and our superiors seemed happy to accept as they were often co-conspirators.
Numerous photo albums of groups of new and not so new recruits adorned the break-out areas. Everybody began at Appletons with a photo on the terrace outside the training rooms, to be placed into the annals of history.
Trawling through these was often the bright spot of the day.
Needless to say the days were long and there’s only so many times you can stare at the same tree hoping that it might do something unexpected like decide to crash into the training room and take out the course tutor leaving Doreen’s puddings unscathed.
Sadly, I understand that many years ago Appletons was flattened and the grounds redeveloped, doubtless uncovering many a stray golf ball.
Bernie’s Day On The Sofa
Evenings were spent at a local pub and we engaged in a very competitive series of challenges, the highlight being races across the road, around a tree and back again…naked.
Hangovers the following day were punctuated by picking tarmac from the soles of our feet.
There was one golden rule understood by all. No matter how hard you had partied the night before, it was simply unacceptable not to make the classroom the next day. After all, where better to sleep it off?
Famously, there was a great tale about a wonderful colleague of mine. Bernie was not a big drinker at all but must have had a very big night because the following morning he was in no state.
So his colleagues ensured his attendance – if not entirely in class – by hauling him in fully suited, having been dressed as he lay unconscious on his hotel bed and deposited onto one of the sofas outside the classroom.
And there he slept all day; apparently the tutor did not make an issue of this simply because at least he had got there.
Real Life
After the theory came the brutal reality of life on the road. Nothing in any training manual could have prepared me for selling finance to the motor trade but in Bernie I had a skilled and respected mentor; I remain indebted to him for those early days.
He was famously described by a colleague as “sharper than a cracked piss-pot” which I believe was a compliment.
The new guy in the office always got the “Sticks” run which was a fortnightly trek across the moors from Bradford heading first to the outskirts of East Lancashire at a Vauxhall dealer in a grim old mill town called Colne.
This was all down to the insistence of the Sales Manager – a prickly character called Mike – that he deal with Bradford and not our local Preston office. We simply assumed he was a Burnley supporter and therefore hated all things Preston.
The fact that we hardly got any business did not bother me as the trips over Haworth Moor were a delight in those days, before mobile phones savaged a travelling man’s peace and quiet. Terry Wogan was never the same again.
Al Qaeda Target Settle
The Sticks run detoured further out and headed to Settle, a small town on the outskirts of the Yorkshire Dales. At a Land Rover dealer called Ribblesdale Motors time really had stood still and computers were still a world away.
A gentle giant of a man called Roy was Managing Director here and again we got bugger all business.
One day I was sat opposite Roy extolling the benefits of our products as he casually assaulted his bacon and egg triple decker with barely disguised indifference to Payment Protection Insurance, when there was a sudden mighty roar above.
It sounded like we were being bombed although I doubt if Settle is high on the Al Qaeda target list; instinctively I dived under the table.
A few seconds later, I peered up at Roy’s disbelieving eyes. Clearly we Townies were not used to the roar of the odd RAF jet; I’m not sure I ever established credibility again after mopping up the puddle.
The final leg of the run was homeward bound with a drop in at the least productive call of all – if you could distinguish between the three – but it was my favourite. The two brothers that ran it did so in total fear of their father.
The old man was still making daily visits approaching the age of 120, scaring them witless and threatening to sack his own kids if the sales figures were crap, which they invariably were.
Keeping the peace amongst the daily bickering was the Sales Manager John, not that he had anybody to manage.
John was a really nice guy and grateful that in all the years I visited we never tried to discuss motor finance and insurance products, preferring to muse on life itself.
In the winter months he treated me to a warming soup with the sandwich Nirvana of Chubbs on Oak Lane back in Bradford now within striking distance.
For almost two years I did this circular route, pumped out some carbon and did sod all business.
The Sinclair C5 Rally
I was also given other credit hot-spots such as Ilkley and Otley, affluent towns notable for a greying market and a population not in obvious need of a bit of chukky or strap as we called it.
It is fair to say my young career was hardly going anywhere fast.
On the outskirts of Ilkley was a caravan dealership where we were the preferred provider, unless the sales lads could get more golf balls from the opposition.
Technically, we had first shout because we provided an overdraft which was secured on the stock. Many of these were negotiated directly with the customer by the Branch Manager and were hardly an exact science especially if it was lunchtime.
To control our security the local rep had to do monthly stock checks often involving long walks around fields of caravans. One day I woke up with a stinking hangover and an audit ahead of me.
It had snowed so heavily the night before that I had had to crawl on all fours back from the local cricket club although that may have been the effects of a 25p a shot Pernod promotion. Why we had this on a Tuesday nobody ever figured out.
As I did not possess a pair of wellies, I asked my mum if I could borrow my dad’s pair. And so it was that I rolled up with two over-sized, left-footed wellies.
They had an enormous showroom and on another quiet day I arrived to find that the lads had acquired a used Sinclair C5 electric car unbelievably as part-exchange for a caravan!
Anybody old enough will remember these as a pioneering attempt at assisted suicide; driving one on the open road, you could be assured of being flattened by a truck within half an hour. Much cheaper than flying to Switzerland.
As it was a slow day – and with the option of discussing PPI with the lads and why they were crap at it – we decided to stage the first and only Ilkley Sinclair C5 Time Trial.
The challenge was to drive as fast as we could around a hastily created course in the showroom without damaging several brand new caravans or crashing into carefully arranged desks and chairs thereby attracting a time penalty.
It was a wonderful afternoon of madness, thankfully uninterrupted by customers and anything remotely business oriented.
The Best Of Times
You might wonder why we maintained these connections, why they employed me and how I survived another twenty-five years .
Some franchises we operated for the manufacturers – Peugeot, Citroen, Porsche (sadly all too briefly) and ABI Caravans – these demanded a presence nationally no matter what the size of dealer.
Other relationships were maintained if not for economic reasons then more tradition and sentiment. And as long as nobody at the top cottoned on then life was sweet indeed.
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