“Being perceived by others as an insular service”????
S/he is describing an insular service. They don’t know what or who to report to. They believe their own perception of their competence. They are convinced of their ability to work without the involvement and input of others.
In Ofsted school inspections, teams were (covertly) steered at one stage to avoid failing institutions, because it involved much more time & thus reduced profits for the consultancy businesses commissioned to carry out inspections. This report has the same ring to it.You basically spell out that is crap, but let them off the hook by saying they are implementing improvements. 😦 😦 😦 😦
Ulysses? Wasn’t he, of the sneaky tricks Wooden Horse fame? Pretending to be a gift to the Trojans when in fact it caused their destruction? Interesting choice of name for a reporting system…
Ulysses – hero to some, “villainous falsifier” to others, according to Wikipaedia.
Inspections in my area (education) were a very stressful farce. All about the paperwork, designed to show we met targets, the management were wonderful, the students irrelevant. Not a matter of life and death, though. Systems got better and better, the service to those on the receiving end didn’t.
Somebody was acting far above their ability here. Whole report betrays a hopeless, clueless, care-less lack of analytical, critical thought. Hell, they couldn’t even proof-read it adequately. That ‘accidents and incidents identified as Ulysses’ is a proper ‘Wanted: piano for lady with square legs’ blooper. And ‘donates’ for ‘denotes’. (Tip for writers of reports, or indeed of any documents: don’t use words and sentence constructions that you don’t understand. You may fear that using short words and simple sentences will lead people to suspect that you are a fool; but when you misuse long andor complex ones, you give them proof positive of their suspicions).
Taking a phrase at random: ‘Service believes they are (sic) competent’. Why? On what grounds? Are those grounds open to challenge? Do you, as the author, agree or disagree with the service’s beliefs? What are your reasons for taking the view you do? If you have not been able to form a view, why not, and what do you need to do to confirm or refute the reasonable basis of the service’s belief?
Just about every sentence could be similarly taken to pieces. There is not ONE single USEFUL fact in this extract.
It’s not just the author who’s an unqualified failure here, though – the people to whom the report was presented should have damned well ripped it to shreds as well. How could the report’s recipients not notice, or ignore, the obvious: that this was nothing but hearsay, flannel and hot air, and dangerously complacent hot air at that?
I don’t want to weep, so much as vomit. Utterly, utterly sickening.
And they fail to grasp that all incidents should be reported on their reporting system even near misses where nothing untoward happens. This is a basic requirement of a system to identify trends and emerging problems.
mydaftlife 
Even then it was all about ‘improving perceptions’ rather than improving care. Words fail me x
“Being perceived by others as an insular service”????
S/he is describing an insular service. They don’t know what or who to report to. They believe their own perception of their competence. They are convinced of their ability to work without the involvement and input of others.
In Ofsted school inspections, teams were (covertly) steered at one stage to avoid failing institutions, because it involved much more time & thus reduced profits for the consultancy businesses commissioned to carry out inspections. This report has the same ring to it.You basically spell out that is crap, but let them off the hook by saying they are implementing improvements. 😦 😦 😦 😦
Weeping with you.
Not ok. None of it ok.
Ulysses? Wasn’t he, of the sneaky tricks Wooden Horse fame? Pretending to be a gift to the Trojans when in fact it caused their destruction? Interesting choice of name for a reporting system…
Ulysses – hero to some, “villainous falsifier” to others, according to Wikipaedia.
Inspections in my area (education) were a very stressful farce. All about the paperwork, designed to show we met targets, the management were wonderful, the students irrelevant. Not a matter of life and death, though. Systems got better and better, the service to those on the receiving end didn’t.
Somebody was acting far above their ability here. Whole report betrays a hopeless, clueless, care-less lack of analytical, critical thought. Hell, they couldn’t even proof-read it adequately. That ‘accidents and incidents identified as Ulysses’ is a proper ‘Wanted: piano for lady with square legs’ blooper. And ‘donates’ for ‘denotes’. (Tip for writers of reports, or indeed of any documents: don’t use words and sentence constructions that you don’t understand. You may fear that using short words and simple sentences will lead people to suspect that you are a fool; but when you misuse long andor complex ones, you give them proof positive of their suspicions).
Taking a phrase at random: ‘Service believes they are (sic) competent’. Why? On what grounds? Are those grounds open to challenge? Do you, as the author, agree or disagree with the service’s beliefs? What are your reasons for taking the view you do? If you have not been able to form a view, why not, and what do you need to do to confirm or refute the reasonable basis of the service’s belief?
Just about every sentence could be similarly taken to pieces. There is not ONE single USEFUL fact in this extract.
It’s not just the author who’s an unqualified failure here, though – the people to whom the report was presented should have damned well ripped it to shreds as well. How could the report’s recipients not notice, or ignore, the obvious: that this was nothing but hearsay, flannel and hot air, and dangerously complacent hot air at that?
I don’t want to weep, so much as vomit. Utterly, utterly sickening.
And they fail to grasp that all incidents should be reported on their reporting system even near misses where nothing untoward happens. This is a basic requirement of a system to identify trends and emerging problems.
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