Sometimes the little people do win
Published: Wed, 01/17/18
The financial collapse of Carrillion has certainly been dominating the news for the past few days. I don’t know all the details or how it will work out but it certainly sounds like an ugly business. The Vikings certainly missed a trick in that they actually had to sail across from Scandinavia to another country. Once there they and actually steal stuff from people who must have fought back sometimes. Then they had to get home again. These days you just set up a big company, get huge government contracts, contract little businesses to do all the work, pocket the money and go bankrupt. It sounds like the insolvency service may claw back some bonuses which have been paid recently, good luck to them on that. My guess is that the big money will have been squirreled safely away a long time ago.
It isn’t as though the whole sorry business wasn’t fairly predictable. Carrillion had been exploiting small businesses for years with late payments, unfair contracts and not paying at all when they could get away with it. Does the law support small creditors in situations like this? They are just told to take their place behind the banks and the tax man, there is not going to be anything left once those two have finished picking over what has not been stolen.
All very sad but I was heartened by the lady who was interviewed on Radio 4 yesterday evening. I didn’t catch her name but she ran a flooring company which had done contract work for Carrillion before they got out a year or two ago. This lady explained that many small companies which get involved with corporations like Carrillion keep working for them because they know that they will never get paid for their last job. If the corporation is never going to use you again then why should they bother to pay you? In this case the flooring company decided this was going to be their last job with Carrillion. Apparently they had been putting the flooring down for a new hospital ward. The last thing that needed doing was the reception area and then Carrillion could sign the job off and get paid. So the flooring company demanded a meeting and insisted on being paid all that was owed up to that point before they would finish the final area.
Carrillion were not best pleased but the job was so close to completion that they agreed and a full payment was made. At that point the flooring company walked away never worked with Carrillion again. No doubt another business was happy to fill the gap at the time, a choice the replacement business would no doubt come to regret.
I think that there are some interesting lessons here. Firstly, if you would really be independent do not become dependent upon just one customer. In the short term devoting your business to just one client might seem to make life simpler but you are actually incredibly vulnerable. Even if the client is perfectly ethical and decent they can still run into problems of all kinds and have to cease doing business at short notice.
Secondly, in the Havamal verse 81 there is advice not to trust what has not been tested. If a new client asked you to work for them then state your terms, do the job and if you are not paid promptly then walk away. Also, ask around, if you are treated badly it will never be just you, usually someone will be able to warn you off.
Thirdly, no matter how apparently powerful your adversary, there will always be a point in the web of time and space which can be exploited to your advantage. The moment will be fleeting and you will need to see your opportunity but at some point it will be there. The lady on the radio saw her chance and certainly took it.
The value in martial training is not always about physical self-defence. Much more valuable is learning strategies as taught in the five principles of Stav, using AIM so that you can coordinate action, intention and movement and being able to look out for chaos point opportunities as described above.
I have just updated the training page with courses on the 10th of February and the 10th of March http://www.iceandfire.org.uk/train.html If you come we will explore these principles.
regards
Graham
PS The Foundation course is started and I am looking forward to the seminar on the 24th of March when the nine distance learning modules will be complete. I still have one place left, but you will have to be quick as the second module goes out on Monday http://www.iceandfire.org.uk/foundation.html
PPS I did send a message on Monday, if you did not get it but would like to see what I wrote you can find it here http://archive.aweber.com/iceandfire/FT2nC/t/Four_percent_gone_already_.htm