Market Doom Delayed?

Why haven't the (equity) markets crashed yet, and will they?  After being convinced that we are on the edge of the precipice for the markets, I no longer think that. I think the markets have probably six or more months of happy days ahead. 

From Worldometer.org 23/7/2020

Cases around the world are surging. Yesterday’s was the biggest jump in cases globally to date, with something like 280,000 new cases, up from 240,000 the day before. The global death rate is increasing again, after its earlier peak in April. The seven-day trend lines are not looking good. The US of Amerika continues to lead the world (“USA, #1, USA, #1” I can almost hear them chanting) with over 70,000 new cases, again. Not a record for the US, but still a strong showing. This from the country that was listed as the top, best, first in the world, ready to deal with a pandemic. I think it is time to acknowledge that decades of self-delusion about Amerika’s standing in the world rankings of almost anything other than money and bombs has been a fiction.

Still, back to the pandemic for a moment. Cases are surging, and the US count of 4 million cases, as horrible as that may be, is still ‘only’ ~1+% of the population. And if the numbers are “10x higher” as some are projecting, then that is still only ~10+%, out of a “herd immunity” requirement in the 60% - 70% minimum. So we are looking at a 6x in cases and deaths before the US reaches “herd immunity” (if this is even possible based on the potential weakening of antibody loads after a few months).

Now, the case mortality rate as measured by the ratio of deaths to resolved cases is falling, at least in the developed world, and that is a very good thing. It tells me two things; that there is better identification of cases, many of which will be ‘mild’, and that therapeutics and medical responses are improving as the virus is better understood. That’s the good news.

The UK is an interesting counterpoint to the US of Amerika. The total cases count is at about .3% of the population, officially based on testing. And the number of people tested is running at almost 20% of the population. So I suspect that we can rule out a 10x infected rate because it should have shown up pretty clearly by now.

Conversely, the US of Amerika, where Trump continues to say that “if there were fewer tests, there would be fewer cases”, the percentage of people tested is actually lower than in the UK. This suggests that the US infection rate is higher than the UK (a former #1 shit-show in the Covid stakes) regardless of the number of tests.

And if we accept the premise that case mortality rates are declining due to earlier identification and treatment, then any delays through lower testing rates will actually directly lead to higher mortality rates. Trump is saying that he would rather have more dead people and a lower number of identified cases.

Meanwhile, the US markets continue to coast along and even edge upward, defying fundamentals and any expectation that markets are actually engaging in meaningful ‘price discovery’.

In the past month, I have completely changed my mind. I no longer think there will be the market crash that I’ve (and not me alone by any stretch of the imagination) been predicting. Every morning I look at the markets from yesterday and look at the futures for the coming day. Nothing seems to hurt these markets.

So in changing my mind completely, I’m becoming more convinced and confident in my thinking that the markets will not go down. Certainly, there will be blips, but I think the Covid-Crash is behind us, and that markets will now continue to hover for some time to come.

The Amerikan, and therefore world, markets are bifurcated. There are the equity markets (and luxury goods and property), and there are the corner shop and coffee shop markets.

The equity markets are the place that the Fed induced inflation is happening, with too much money chasing too few goods and services (equities and luxury goods and property). The money that the Fed has created to purchase corporate bonds is not stimulating the economy, it is propping up share prices and balance sheets, most of which are sham constructs waiting for reality to arrive, however slowly.

Government unemployment benefits are propping up the ‘real’ economy and ensuring that rent can be paid (and even then the amount of unpaid rent is staggering), groceries and coffee bought, and the flow of consumer goods and services can continue. That stimulus is keeping enough new money in the system to avoid deflation due to too little money chasing too many goods and services. Supply and demand still rules, and when the stimulus ends, the supply of money in the ‘real’ economy will fall like a stone, and the bottom of the economy will see real price deflation.

But at the top of the economy, the ‘market’ economy, there will still be bucket-loads of money with no purpose and nothing to purchase. So inflation will continue at that end of the market. So as people begin to starve, the markets will stay high, and the Wall Street and Executive Suite bonuses will continue to flow – for some time anyway.

And the Fed will keep pumping. It has little choice. It has limited tools, and cannot tell companies to take the money and spend it on the ‘real’ economy; only the Federal Government can do that. And patience at the Federal Government level is wearing thin. So even if the stimulus continues, it will be at a reduced level, and that will start the process of deflation in the ‘real’ economy.

The rest, well, I’m guessing that the ‘market’ economy will do just fine. For another six months or so? Forever? Who knows? But I’m not betting on it falling any time soon.

Trump's strategy; childishly inane or cunningly evil?

I do not know what Trump’s strategy is, but it is either very childishly inane or cunningly evil. As he is surrounded by smart (but unethical) people, I’m worried about the cunningly evil option. Is the pivot to White Supremacism an intentional mechanism to retain a disillusioned base who would otherwise stay home? Is White Supremacy the natural backstop belief system for those who originally voted for (and still support) Trump with his "drain the swamp" message to the otherwise left behind?

When a belief system is undermined, it is natural to fall back on another. Why not capitalise on that, especially if it keeps the base voting?

The people around Trump are cynical enough to implement such a program. People like Kelly-Anne Conway, who is a very smart person, but seems devoid of any motivation that does not include self-aggrandisement and accumulation of power and through that a modicum of wealth.

She knows that she is lying and spinning half-truths, and she does it directly and with purpose. She knows very well that what she says will lead to people dying, but she does not care as long as it cements Trump’s hold on power. And through his hold on power, she continues to be in the public eye and retains or increases her access to power. Once Trump is ejected, something she certainly does not want but is ready for, she will pivot to making money as a pundit and former insider. She might even write a book.

If she does not write a book, she certainly will have positioned herself as indispensable to whoever dreams next of taking the White House (from the Republicans or the Extreme Right). Her ability to pick up the phone and ring anyone with money will make her a valued asset, and that will fill her bank account nicely. And who knows, maybe she will back another winner and be back on the White House lawn telling lies for someone else.

And that’s the way it works, for almost all of them. A few, a very few, believe that they are serving the best interests of the nation as they define those interests (that strangely always also seem to fit nicely with their own interests).

Across the rest of Amerika, schools are asking if and how they can open in the face of a pandemic that will not only endanger their students, it will endanger the teachers, and ultimately the virus will be taken home to un-infected families.

Another wonderful example is Kayleigh McEnany, Trump’s spokesperson since the end of April 2020. She quite openly and without the least hint of irony, told her first lie as spokesperson when in her first briefing, she said “I will never lie to you, you have my word on that” and then promptly started to do exactly that. This is the woman who, in July 2020 said “Science should not stand in the way of" opening schools. (Yes, she really said it. No, she wasn't taken out of context.)

So the White House has now said that even if scientists and epidemiologists are saying this is a bad idea, it should be done regardless. And in that one statement we have a summary of the entire Amerikan response to Covid-19; one ‘faction’ saying follow the science, and another saying that they do not care about the science, because this is a political decision and a political argument.

It is as if gravity was a political issue and not a scientific issue. We don’t believe that gravity holds us down, and if you believe that, then you must be supportive of abortion also. The linkages are extreme and pointless. Science is. Belief is different, and relies on a rejection (in some cases) of science.

Of course, this is an argument that humans have been having for millennia; probably as long as there has been any creature we can ‘human’. The earliest authorities were those who could convince others that the spirits spoke through them, or that they understood the will of the spirits. “Do as I command or you will be putting yourself against the God(s)”. And said with conviction, enough of the people will either believe, or will see an opportunity for themselves in supporting the spirit-speakers.

And throughout history, there has been a tug-of-war between the shamans and charlatans and those who look at the sky and see stars and not gods, and who let the trees talk to them instead of listening to what the shamans and charlatans say for the trees.

Science progress though, and with each passing century more was learned, more investigated and explores, and with the written word, more was passed from generation to generation. Eventually scientific ‘facts’ catch up with the shamans, whose continued defence of non-science becomes untenable.

In the case of Galileo, it took the Roman Catholic Church only 359 years to admit that he was right, and their suppression of these ideas was the suppression of scientific fact. In 1992 the Church finally admitted that he was right.

In 1633, the Inquisition of the Roman Catholic Church forced Galileo Galilei, one of the founders of modern science, to recant his theory that the Earth moves around the Sun. Under threat of torture, Galileo – seen facing his inquisitors – recanted. But as he left the courtroom, he is said to have muttered, ‘all the same, it moves’. (The New Scientist, 7 November 1992; https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg13618460-600-vatican-admits-galileo-was-right/)

In the case of the charlatans in the White House, it takes all of a few days or even a few minutes to know that they are telling lies, and that their attacks on science are baseless and political.

But these attacks were and are greeted approvingly by 35% of the Amerikan people; Trump’s loyal base. Even when they know that it is lies, they would rather support the liar than have to accept that there are other choices. It is taking an overwhelming level of deceit and duplicity by Trump and his apostles to eventually drive people away, even at the margins.

His 35% needs something to believe in. Before the pandemic, they needed to believe that there was someone “anti-Washington” and “anti-New York Finance” in charge, looking out for them. They needed to believe that they were not left behind. We can discuss all day if they were left behind, or if they took the easy path and left themselves behind, but that is a different discussion. What is clear is that they believed that Hilary and the Democrats were responsible for their being left behind, and nothing can shake that belief.

Mixed with that is the belief (for they must believe or there is nothing left for them) that Trump, for all his bling and worship of wealth, is actually looking after their interests in the swamp of Washington.

To actively un-believe is a difficult thing to do, especially when surrounded by those who, at least out loud, continue to believe. To un-believe requires reflection and acceptance that you were wrong. And in this case, it requires an acceptance that you supported a conman, and that you were conned. This is not easy. In fact is it probably one of the most difficult things that any of the un-believers will have had to go through; to accept that not only were they wrong, but that they and those they love and share common ideal with are also wrong, and that they too have been conned.

Anger and depression are probably the most common reactions, with anger taking the fore.

And much of that anger then spills over into a lashing out in a final attempt to prove that they were right all along, that they were not conned, and that their ideal and beliefs are indeed correct. That anger feeds off the anger of others like them, and it boils over.

Eventually, acceptance and reflection might happen. But only might.

More likely there will be retreating into a backup belief system, one that may be even more radical than the previous. White Supremacy is a good example. Take away the belief that Trump is actually representing the needs and wants of those left behind, and for many the next backup belief system is one of that supports their victimhood while affirming their individual worth.

So it is reasonable and logical that Trump is now all-but overtly supporting White Supremacy today. It is the logical refuge for his base who are un-believing in the “drain the swamp” narrative.

And here is the "cunning plan" part of the Trump program. If he (and his people) can see that one of the primary fall-back belief systems combines that victimhood of being left behind by Washington and the Democrats, and victimhood of a racial suppression (theirs, not other racial groups) then what better way to ensure that base remains engaged? Cater to their need for inclusion and to be 'heard', without too overtly supporting a philosophy of oppression; dog-whistle loudly and continually.

Confederate generals and monuments serve the purpose of confirming that Trump is indeed the protector of their alternative beliefs. Confederate symbols have little to do with the underlying values of actual of the confederate states. They are symbols now not of slave ownership and oppression, but symbols of a dis-association with the concept of Amerika. Therefore, promises to protect those symbols are equally a promise to uphold the cause of the rejected and the left behind.

He is never going to convert voters to his cause, so he needs to ensure that his existing base continues to be engaged. It really may be his only chance. 

And so all that we see and hear is about engaging that base, whatever it takes. It is a cunningly evil plan. 

Trumpists come in 3 types

It is becoming more and more difficult to remain detached in any way, so of course this morning I fought with Trumpists on the Panama Expats group on FB. I enjoy it because it is so easy. And honestly, it is fun. 

After all, not all Amerikans are now locked inside the Plague States of Amerika. Some became expats many years ago. Now the sit in countries that took them in, and they insult their host countries and praise Trump.

Watching Trumpists online, before I could be ill, I posted:

Continued support for Trump today is a sign of one of three things:

1. Wealth - he's great for you if you are rich,
2. You do not have the attention span to actually read what is happening, so you don't care that you've been conned.
3. Stupidity - you failed your IQ test, and he's conned you,

To see which applies, first check your wallet and bank account, then read something, and if you cannot or will not, then number three applies.

Those three options are how I actually feel about those who still support Trump. They've had plenty of time to see what he actually is and what he is actually doing. If they still support him, I can only put it down to one of those three.


I keep saying that I’m done with Trumpists, or at least done being nice to them. The level of delusion and demonstrated disregard for other humans is difficult to comprehend, unless there is a national psychosis of some kind. For so many years they have been taught that Amerika is the greatest, in everything. People Want to some to Amerika, because Amerika is the land for Freedom. They pledge allegiance to the Flag as if it is an icon in a church, all the while spouting rubbish about how Amerika is a “Christian” country. If Amerika is Christian, then it most certainly is not the Christian community described in the Acts of the Apostles. 

I knew people who supported Trump at the beginning of his presidency. Good people, I think, who firmly believed that he was different, and that the office of president would bring out the best (or better) in him. That his no-nonsense style would result in international agreements (especially with North Korea; remember how that turned out). I understand that, the desire to believe in something, and to believe that in the good that Amerika can be (and has been).

The Shining City on the Hill. 

But that was not to be, and Trump has turned everything he touched to mud or shit. He has destroyed Amerikan prestige in the world while he seeks to destroy Amerikan virtues at home, and is actively working to destroy hard-won gains in improving the environment.

And through all of that, there has been a core of believers who cannot and will not change their minds, no matter what he does. No matter what happens, only the greatness of Amerika remains in their vision. As it all turns to shit around them, as the death toll climbed to 50,000, and then to 100,000 ("a good result", yes, he said that) and when it reaches 150,000 sometime next week or the week after, they will still support this conman. 

As those that are in the US are locked into the country, because their arrogance would not allow them to be locked in their cities, let alone their homes for the good of all of them, each other, they still believe him. They still support him.

I can only hope that some of the Trumpists that unfriended me have changed their views, giving me some residual hope that they are the good people I thought I knew. 

But the Trumpists simple will not learn, and the only option is to tell them like it is, and I’m no longer worried or sorry to upset them. They are racists and ignorant. And yet, the “rich” ones do not care about anyone or anything else. 

I especially like being called a "Marxist". Or, if I accept that Amerika is not the Greatest and Trump the Greatest President Ever, then either I am a Marxist or have been indoctrinated by them. 

They do not care, they do not read, and they think that everything that has gone well for them was because of their personal greatness and hard work and because Jesus loves them. Everything that has gone wrong for anyone else is their own fault.

They live in Panama, they can see the starving children, the slums, and the poverty and pollution. They can see with their own eyes. But they protect themselves by falling back on the "its all their own fault" excuse. Maybe they (the Panamains) didn't work hard enough. Or maybe they don't love Jesus enough. Or maybe even worse, Jesus doesn't love them as much as Jesus Loves Amerika. 

This arrogance is why Amerika has the highest outbreak, and why Amerikans are now the laughing stock (when we are not looking on in horror) of the world. The arrogance of Amerikans (not all, of course not, but enough to tarnish the image of an entire country) is simply beyond the understanding of the rest of the world. I served in the US military, I “paid my debt” for growing up with an American passport. I support their, and everyone’s, right to say anything they want to. And yes, I think that is and should be a universal right, even though many countries do not see things that way. 

But I cannot and will not support Trump or any longer give refuge to Trumpists.

They are a blight on Amerika, and a festering sore on the world.

Gringos and Pandemic - not a good mix

Latin America as we know it today is the product of the Conquista and the conquistadors. In 1532 Pizarro and his band of conquistadors, with support from European diseases, destroyed the Incan Empire and imposed their rule, even though they represented but a tiny fraction of the population. In most of Latin America, it is just history, and today most of the "locals" actually have conquistador or subsequent Spanish (and lately Italian and other European) immigrant or slave blood. It is ancient history. 

But in Panama, there is a new conquistador, one that was (revisionist history) thrown out and national sovereignty regained with the 'return' of the Canal and the Zone to Panamanian control. Yet the new conquistadors continue to arrive, ever after most were thrown out (or more accurately, departed when the jobs for Gringos disappeared).

Panama, which seemed to do quite well early on in its fight against Covid-19, now seems to be ‘losing the plot’ with the number of cases jumping by close to 1000 daily, and hospitals becoming overloaded. I am so glad that we got Francoise out of there and home. While I did think it would be a reasonably ‘safe place’, that was predicated on a couple of factors, including her location in the countryside, and on the reactions of the community to the virus and Gringo/Panamanian relations. The second has negated any advantage from the first, and I fear that the entire Gringo community in the greater Mariato area and that coast will be in danger is this gets much worse. 

The “pitchforks and torches” may be a real threat down there, especially with the apparent history of the wealthy landowners being less than happy with the influx of Gringos who provide alternative employment for people who should be kept stupid and working manual labour on and for the rice plantations. About the only other endorsed employment (it seems, from the perspective of the landowners) being fishing and smallholdings farming for the local communities, and turning a blind eye to the drug runners who cruise the coast. 

The ‘word on the street’ is that wealthy families do not support more Gringos because they create competition. That increases the costs for the wealthy families and reduces their feudal authority. And when they lose the mayor that they bought/rented, then they need to either wait-out a less corrupt mayor, or find a way to corrupt the new mayor. Access to relative wealth and acceptance as a local authority is sometimes enough, especially if they can line their own pockets with the cash that drops off the central government trucks that should otherwise be building roads, bridges, schools, etc. 

Into this environment comes a mixed bag of Gringos, many with libertarian ideas of escape from authority and the ability to buy anything they want, including ‘freedom’ to do anything they want, including ignoring the local government and people, unless those local people are building their houses and providing incidental manual labour – cleaning, gardening, minor construction and repairs for example. 

These Gringos are truly foreigners, as there are very few Gringo on that side of the Azuero Peninsula who are married to Panamanians, and especially to countryside Panamanians. The nearest historical comparison that I can think of are the conquistadors in Peru in the 1530s, who grabbed large tracks of land and set up their haciendas, and lorded over the (in their view) frail, stupid, and exploitable Inca. Now I need to be clear, these Gringos did not conquer the land, nor defeat the indigenous people, the vast majority of whom are descended from European Spaniards intermixed with Native Mayans and their cousins. Nor are they an occupying army that has burned and raped its way through the country. That was done centuries ago by the Spanish.

The Panamanians, of course, have forgotten that ancient history, and the local propaganda machines now are making sure that everyone knows just who the invaders are; the Gringos from America who stole their land and canal, which only the hard-fought protests and deaths of martyrs reclaimed for the nation. The Canal Museum in Panama City drips with the struggle, and in rejection of the invader who stole the sovereign solid of beloved Panama, all the displays information is in Spanish only. The American invasion in 1989 didn't help.

Unfortunately though, some new Gringos ('new' in the past couple of decades, after the handover of the Canal and dismantling of the Zone) seem to share some of the conquistador attitudes.  "This is our land, we acquired it fairly and we can do what we want with it". We do not need to share with you, as you are inferior and lazy. And we will do what we want as a community within but excluding the surrounding community. We will even eat of Gringo owned establishments, even if they are slightly more expensive than local establishments, with food and service that is no better than what if produces and service by the local community.

An elite cannot remain forever in such a position without creating hostility, even if in good (or even moderate) economic times there is mutual acceptance of the boundaries. But as the situation deteriorates, the underlying animosity within the local communities can grow. Poor locals see people much like themselves, but rich and, in their eyes, just as lazy as they are, but with money and power. Where did this authority and money come from, and why is it not being shared. After all, these people (Gringos) are no different from us, as we see every day. Yet they are here, they are rich, and they deserve what they have no more than we deserve the benefits of wealth. And if they are the same as us, then why can we not have what they have?

In a land where income is defined literally by how hard physically a person works, the idea of intellectual capital or 'knowledge working' resulting in 'wealth' is simply incomprehensible. Manual labour pays $15/day (with the Gringos distorting the market at $20/day) while "brick work" (the local equivalent of a tradesman) goes for as much as $30 - $40/day, when they can find work. The amount you work and the amount you sweat defines how much you earn and what you are worth.

Covid-19 is a disease that impacts the poor disproportionally. They have less access to medicine and doctors, their underlying health is weaker (due to a number of factors, almost all economic), they live in tighter quarters without adequate ventilation, they must work or they will not eat and their families will not eat, and the lack of adequate education reduces their understanding of the impact of hygiene as a factor in combating disease. 

But they know that this disease did not spread from the poor to the poor and from the rich to the poor. They know very well that the rich brought this disease into their country, their city, then their region and town. They know that the rich travelled to Spain and Italy on holiday, something impossible for them, and brought this back with them. Now the rich blame the poor for inadequate hygiene and failing to “social distance” and quarantine. 

"Se imaginan a cuántas personas habrá contagiado?  Todos estos familiares a su vez tuvieron contacto con sus familias, amigos, compañeros de trabajo y de estudios!!😱" (Can you imagine how many people it will have infected? All these relatives in turn had contact with their families, friends, colleagues and students !! 😱)

This picture is from Ecuador, but the scenario is the same across Latin American, and certainly the same in Panama. One woman returns from Spain, and there is a large family gathering and party to welcome her home. She carries the Covid-19 virus in her. Soon the virus is running rampant. Servants catch the disease, and as servants rarely live in the employers home any longer, they take the virus back into their communities. 

It was the "rich" that brought the disease in from outside the country. 

And on the “Dark Side” as a friend calls the Mariato side of the Azuero Peninsula, they know that the rich Gringos around them will be taken care of if they get sick. But if you are poor, you might get some treatment in the local Saludo, and who knows, they might even take you to the big city to a real hospital to treat you, or you family member, who by the time they are taken to the city, will already have infected everyone else in the family, and probably other local families.

Meanwhile Gringos were surfing when all outdoor activity was banned. And when they were told to stop, they complained. They are special and not like Panamanians, and they own their beaches. They are different and the rules should not apply to them. 

There is too much opportunity for anger, and that will not end well. Especially when there is a wealthy elite who have a vested interest in limiting the impact of the Gringo influx into their area of the country.

I am worried.

Finishing the conquistador comparison – the Inca revolted and slaughtered the isolated conquistadors in their new haciendas, and marched on Cuzco. The revolt eventually was put down, though it did take a year, and required a re-conquest of the Inca territories. A revolt against Gringos would be put down, but it might take some time, and the isolated Gringo properties will be at risk for quite some time. 

It needs to be remembered that the Panamanians (some, not all) view the Gringos not fundamentally different from the Conquistadors, in that the Gringos occupied the Zone and for decades extracted the wealth of the country through control of the Canal and the revenues of the Canal. While there is a huge amount of nuance required in this, such as the rationale for the Zone, Panama’s acceptance of the ‘deal’ in exchange for independence from Bogata, and a US Congressional mandate that the Canal be run at break-even, there is in Panama today a nationalistic streak that is using the Canal as a prop in a revisionist history that centres around a betrayal of Panama. That revisionist history is used to explain why Panama is still poor and why it is someone else’s fault that they were occupied and exploited. 

That nationalism carries over to label Gringos invaders, who while they provide jobs (some, temporarily) and incomes to some, are still not of and never will be Panamanian. They will always be an elite that has imposed themselves. Foreigners are not welcome in Panama, no matter what is said and what you might see. They are foreigners. They are to be exploited for all that can be extracted before they realise that they are being robbed - then move on to the next Gringo if you can.

It is that revisionism, coupled I must say with the treatment of Panamanians as inferior by some Gringos, and of course with the introduction of Covid-19 by the rich, that will contribute to what may happen.

Oh, and one other minor historical note: the Incan conquest and subsequent revolt took place within the context of a multi-year pandemic that killed half or more of the Incan population.

Ecosystem View: One way to think about data

(A guest post from Andrew Brice. Data analytics and visualisation is Andrew's passion, turning data into insights. Enjoy some fascinating insights here: http://www.zyan.co.nz/)

The calls were stacking up. They weren’t meant to be, this was just a normal call centre day. Call agents were racing, management hearts were racing, but no one was quite sure where the finish line was. Or why there was even a race.

Afterward, the vast swathes of data collected by the call system was able to be analysed and it started to become clear as to what had occurred and why. The needle in the haystack was found.

The thing is, it was all preventable. The needle could have been tracked if only they had been analysing their own data, ideally with an ecosystem perspective. If only.

OK, so how would that have worked?

Example dashboard for call flow monitoring

Two parts of the organisation already knew this was not a normal call centre day. It was an end-of-year filing date for a subset of clients (yes, it’s a Government agency). Not a familiar filing date, but a statutory one for these clients. The business knew and so did the call centre. Every year, on the same date, a spike occurred. But the call centre didn’t analyse call patterns at a deep enough granularity so they hadn’t picked this up. They were busy with “real” call volumes… The data was collected but it was never sufficiently deployed through to analytics. Of course, you kind of hope the business might have reminded the call centre. Sigh.

As the calls arrived, the call notes were not being augmented with robust, pre-determined, keywords which would have enabled rapid and clear analysis of that entered text on a near-real-time basis. The same effect could be achieved by simply asking call agents what all the calls were about, but (to be fair), the call agents were rather busy.

That keyword data might have shown that the callers were all identifying as “Directors” and most were asking (in quite elongated conversations), about how to log-in to one of the organisation’s systems. Which, just about then, went splat. That’s a technical IT term which means it stopped working for no particular reason. Now the keyword flow changed from password issues to “the system won’t work” issues.

Luckily, the super-heroes in IT noticed a red-flashing light (I jest) and rebooted the server. The system returned. However, the rest of the morning it kept splatting, being rebooted, … You get the idea.

The data that IT had could have painted a pretty clear picture that this was going to happen. It’s just that they didn’t really care too much about that one little server, they had lots of other more important ones. But their data (for the naughty server) showed annual usage growing at around 4% a year over the last few years and that, at its peak (which oddly only seemed to occur once a year), last year was at 88%. Do the maths, the poor server was over-run. But each month, IT drew beautiful charts showing all the organisations’ servers were paragons of good health. Sometimes, they even shared these charts with the business (not the call centre though).

The final piece of the jigsaw was understanding why logging-in was proving such a problem for this subset of clients and this particular service. Connecting call data to client CRM data quickly showed that this was almost the only interaction these clients had with the organisation each year. The call records then showed that “remembering their password” or “knowing what data to enter” were the key tags to describe the clients’ issues. Eminently common issues and ones that can readily be addressed with better user interface design, education of agents and users, reminder communications, and perhaps adopting external user-validation processes. Of course, the next crisis arrived so these sorts of improvements never actually happened.

So, what lessons do we learn from this? It might be useful to use a simple graphic to show one way of contemplating how to think about getting good data that enables quality analytics.

Data has different owners who, traditionally, impose their own standards, definitions, segmentation, and so on. Adopting co-ordinated governance practices (just like for finance or risk) is a massive enabler of good data.

Data is moving from controlled source systems to all-over-the-place. And there’s so much more of it than there ever used to be. Active and consistent curation is needed to enforce (in a friendly way) an organisation’s data governance model.

Data now lives in many places. Collecting that data together in coherent and consistent ways matters. It’s also quite difficult. This isn’t about data marts, it’s about descriptors and licences and metadata and data packaging. Building confidence in the quality of the data being collected.

Data never seems to arrive in perfect shape. It always needs consolidating or averaging or building into new fields or any one of a myriad number of ways that data gets augmented. It might need to be assembled with other data (IT data and call centre data for example) or shaped a certain way for a particular visual. But there are pretty consistent augmentation requirements and there are pretty consistent ways of standardising and automating such augmentation. Done right, we can join a call with a CRM entry and associate them with a system and then to a server. Now we can see much of the ecosystem. And we can keep rerunning the analysis as we make improvements to see if those improvements really are working.

We also have an endless need to categorise data, to tag data. This is a phone call, it’s a happy person on the line, it’s about this system, it is from that person. These are all ways of adding tags to data. Tags are incredibly useful because that’s how we can start joining things up, clumping them together, showing how processes flow, visualising pathways to outcomes. Tags are exciting. But if we all invent our own tags then value is lost. Governance and curation are how tags are kept moderated.

And, finally, we get to the fun bit. Actually, deploying the data in ways that enable rapid, effective, and (hopefully), elegant visuals that communicate the story inherent in the combined data and which enable audiences to quickly understand and react to complex ecosystems. It might also be deploying into AI systems to read call agents’ notes in real-time and then to tag calls automagically.

Deployment is the real value proposition. But only if you do something about what you’ve learned.

(Andrew Brice works with New Zealand government agencies on the visualisation of business ecosystems using complex, multi-faceted, data.)

Respecting the Police is incompatible with NOT punishing bad cops

BLM seems to bring out some false either/or arguments. Either you respect and support the police, Or you want bad cops punished. That’s not an either/or; that must be a both. It is not possible to respect and support the police if they accept and protect bad cops. Rejecting bad cops, and demanding that bad cops face criminal investigation and are tried in court just like any other person is a sign of respect for the police.

I was a member of the Wellington Civil Defence Police Unit for about a year, when it was formed and until it died of lack of interest (from the police mainly). The unit was set up with the objective of creating a cadre of semi-trained individuals who would be able to man (person?) cordons in the case of an earthquake or other emergency. We were sworn constables, and took an oath to server her majesty Queen Elizabeth the Second of New Zealand. We were issued warrant cards, and in the event of the declaration of a civil defence emergency, we assumed the full powers and authorities of a police constable. Really, the idea could best be summed up with an image: a constable can control about 40 meters of frontage of a collapsed or damaged buildings, but with one CD Police constable under his/her supervision, suddenly that distance doubles. Crowd control and traffic management are critical in an emergency, and having sworn (and trained) constables available is critical.

As a member of the unit, I would spend on shift per month with active police. One time this included spending a Sunday evening with a couple of constables in a police car. Two young men, probably 25 – 30 years old. Mostly it was a boring evening, except for two events.

The first was a call over the radio saying that a gang needed to be shut down at x location. Now I do not remember the radio traffic, but sure enough, lights on and noise, and we rushed across downtown Wellington, to arrive at a side road off Tinakori Ave. There were three other police cars there, blue lights on but the sound off. There were a number of Polynesia street people who were being, shall we say, manhandled; shoved against walls, held up by their shirt fronts with backs to the wall, police faces inches from theirs. 

My gut feeling was that there were a whole lot of civil rights being violated. I kept my mouth shut.

Once the situation settled down, and the gang types dispersed, we got back in the squad car and off we went for a cup of coffee. 

I asked the “plods” what just happened.

“Well”, they said, “there are a few rival gangs in town; some Samoan, some Maori, others Tongan. They do not get on, and while the most they have are sticks and maybe a cricket bat, they do try to beat the snot out of each other. Their favourite trick is to have one of their young ladies stand on a street corner where they know the Maori boys will pass, and entice them to follow her. Once she has inveigled the victims into the alley, the rest of the gang comes out and beat the crap of the poor victim.”

The police had received a report from a civilian that it looked like they were up to their old game, and the police came down on them like a ton of bricks, to use the expression.

The two police I was with explained this all to me, and while I nodded, I have to say that I was a bit perturbed by it all. This was a pretty blatant disregard for their rights, and grabbing someone by their shirt-front and banging them against a wall can hardly be considered “community policing”. I kept my mouth shut.

About an hour later, we received a call to attend a burglary.

Off we went, and when we arrived, the burglary, of course, was not in progress but had been reported by the occupants on their return to the city after a weekend away.

The two police blokes (they most certainly were blokes) inspected the scene, took notes, and then sat down with the owners, and took all the details they could. The owners had been away, and returned earlier in the evening. Things did not seem right at home, and the more they looked, the clearer it was that they had been burgled. 

These two blokes were the picture of respect and compassion, with a fair amount of professional courtesy included. The victims, a lesbian couple, were distraught, yet trusted these two blokes who were there, as official representatives of the state and police forces.

I was taken aback. Not two hours earlier I had watched them as participants in what appeared to be a violation of civil rights (in the pursuit of avoiding a vicious attack and breaking up the plot early), and now they were the very picture of the sympathetic arm of justice doing what they could for victims.

There were too many nuances in that one shift for me. One lesson was clear, however:

We ask Police to be both the protectors of law, de-escalators, sympathetic to victims, yet also the visible and powerful arm of society in halting or avoiding violence. My respect for the police increased immeasurably that evening. These two blokes, that’s what they were, were Power Projected to stop violence from happening, and there will the soft-spoken, almost consoling voice of authority promising that they would do what they could to reduce the suffering of those wronged, a couple who were the antithesis of what they as good Kiwi Blokes has been taught to respect. 

I can and do have the highest respect for the police. Their job is full of contradictions and is terribly difficult. Yet I also have no place for those who have learned that there is pleasure in exercising their power to oppress. The difficulty is in seeing when one turns into the other. The first situation I witnessed could have spiralled out of control, but it didn’t through the professionalism of the police. There was a situation of direct threat to the public, and the stomped on it. Civil rights were, um, put to one side for the moment, because the police knew the pattern that was playing out, and they said: “not tonight”.

So, I respect and support the police. Yet that does not in any way reduce my expectation, no, demand, that police who betray the trust and their authority must be stamped out, and must face justice. I’ve seen how it can and should work. I respect and trust the police. I demand criminals be removed from the police force. There is no contradiction.