Back bites

Sounding offSome of the soundbites from last week's Movement for Innovation Board meeting in Birmingham: we have one guy in the office who is change mad; it is a win-win-win situation; it has been a remarkably exciting day; the movement is literally buzzing with creativity; you have to pass on the enthusiasm, infect the rest of your people and create an epidemic.

Money talks

If there had been a prize for initiative at last week's Movement for Innovation conference it would have been won by a nameless Treasury civil servant. While the rest of the delegates swapped stories about delayed train journeys, or failures to find, or get a space in, the car park, he smugly announced he'd let the coach take the strain. And, to the delight of his bosses, it had only cost £10.

A fishy tale

When you're in full-time work at the age of 58, having faithfully promised the wife that you'd retire at 55, you reach the point when you simply must resolve the conflicting demands on your time of work and pleasure. Peter Birse has just done that. He's stood down from the position of executive chairman of Birse Group to non-executive chairman, a move designed to give him time to relax, time for his spirit to float free. But first things first. Within a month of making the move, the backlog of 'must-do' tasks about the house has resulted in a slimmed down Peter - he's already lost a stone in weight. "The last time we called him at home from head office he was in the fish tank," said one of the board this week who then faced a lengthy wait while Peter cleared off a heavy coating of black sludge. I bet that wasn't in the retirement manual.

Speaks volumes

What's the first thing you look for when hiring a site labourer these days? Two agency adverts in the London Evening Standard of 20 July make an eloquent comment on the contemporary scene. They read: "Labourers. Must speak good English."