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Espresso Roma!
I’ve just discovered a wonderful tradition; the caffè sospeso, or suspended espresso.

In Naples when a customer is particularly happy with their espresso they will pay for two; the second being the suspended espresso.

Then when somebody who is homeless, or down on their luck comes to the cafe they can ask if there are any coffees in suspense; and then have a coffee courtesy of the first customer. What a lovely idea.

Seth Godin has another great post on his blog today entitled How to Answer the Phone in which he states:

The only reason to answer the phone when a customer calls is to make the customer happy.

He goes on to say

If you’re not doing this or you are unable to do this, do not answer the phone. There is no middle ground on this discussion. There are no half measures. Saving 50 cents a call with a complicated phone tree is a false savings. Think of all the money you’ll save if you just stop answering altogether. Think of all the money you’ll make if you just make people happy.

I couldn’t agree more.

My heart sinks whenever I call a company and find myself in an off-shore call centre. If a company has “off-shored” their call centres it means two things: that they don’t care about you the customer and the service they deliver to you, and that they care more about their profits.

When a company sees it’s customers as a cost rather than a benefit they have a BIG problem.

My friend Simon Collison recently shared the wonderful eulogy he wrote about his Father who passed away earlier this year.

Inspired by this I thought I’d share with you the short passage I wrote for my Nana’s funeral last year. Much of it will probably mean little to you as it was of course quite personal, but I wanted to archive it and also celebrate my memory of a wonderful Nana.

A Day in the Life

Woken in the morning with a cup of tea and biscuit.

The sound of a teaspoon “tinkling” against Grandpa’s cup as Nana carries in his morning tea with her shaky hand.

Down the long, long hall to the smell of toast toasting, and just occasionally the sound of the dark bits being scraped into the sink.

After breakfast the morning might hold a trip to the digger, to the spinney or maybe Mowsbury Park.

At the weekends, if the tree on the green told us there was enough wind, we might drive to Grafham Water to sail.

Lunch, hopefully Nana’s stew, was always followed by a question or two; so often in fact, that in the end we kept the dictionary to hand.

I learnt so much at that kitchen table; from how to make a plasticine snake, to the rules of cricket and, in afternoon games of Bezique that my Nana was a pretty mean card player.

In the evening I would be allowed to stay up late and watch Starsky and Hutch – in colour no less.

I never did see the end, but instead I would be woken in the morning with a cup of tea and a biscuit.

Whilst perusing Delicious earlier today I came across a really interesting post Introverts and Extraverts : Can’t We Just Get Along which in turn led me to another post by the same author The Introverts Strike Back.

I agree with the author’s basic premise that an introvert cannot or at least is very unlikely to become and extravert and vice versa; these are core, even defining, parts of our personality and as such pretty much hard wired. I also share the authors frustration in many people’s belief that being an extravert is somehow better than being an introvert.

However, I don’t have such a binary view of whether a person is an introvert or extravert; I think people have a tendency towards a type but there are many, many shades of introvert and extravert personality between the two extremes.

Reading the articles it would seem initially that I tend towards introversion but there are many occasions where actively want to be with others not least my wife and children. One possible difference between the introvert and extrovert, based on this article, is that an extrovert just needs people whereas I, the alleged introvert, only want to be with a certain and select set of people.

I also found the description of an extrovert’s desire to be with people bordering on insensitive rather interesting. You see, I work best with music (I’m listening to Stanley Clarke live as I type this) as it blocks out distractions and helps me to concentrate. As such, I often listen to my iPhone at work but this seems to act as an extrovert lure; I can go hours without interruption if not listening to it but the moment my earphones go in somebody just has to speak to me – without fail.

A slight aside, but it brings to mind the wonderful Stephen Fry describing the telephone as the rudest invention created. He suggests that calling somebody on the phone is like walking up to their desk and shouting “talk to me now! talk to me now!” until they do. Brilliant.

Where was I? Oh yes introversion… I agree with the author that you cannot change your basic personality type and that “how to become an extrovert” type articles are ridiculous, and I’m sure written by bloody extroverts.

It’s funny, typing this post and suggesting that I am perhaps more introverted does seem slightly contradictory – is blogging an extrovert or introvert activity? Ahhh the wonders of the human personality…