Leader of the Free World - Performance Review Time

Quoted from Deb Riechmann, AP via Forbes.com: "President Bush worked nearly three hours at his Texas ranch on Thursday to design a new U.S. policy in Iraq, then emerged to say that he and his advisers need more time to craft the plan he'll announce in the new year."

Clearly these guys don't know what needs to be done with a Priority One Problem? You know in most professional capacities, the responsible parties would need to work 24/7 until the solution was in the process of being implemented, if not completed and proven successful. Hmmm.... On the other hand we have here the Leader of the Free World... and after half a decade of bumbling about, we stage a three hour meeting, [drumroll here], then the readout goes something like "Gee this is a tough one...er...we don't know quite what to do...uh can we get back to you on that..."

I don't know about yours but most companies would have long ago terminated them for non-performance... Wake up America...

peAce...
topbop!

Appendix - Setting Priorities In Problem Solving

[.. the following, excerpted from Implementing Problem Management Processes at the Helpdesk Using the Business Process Method by By John M. Kundtz, ISSC Networking Consulting...]

Priority indicates how urgent it is that a problem be fixed. Priorities along with severity are the basis for determining what problems are worked on what sequence with what level of resource.

Four priority levels can be established based on the urgency to resolve the situation.

Priority 1 Work on continuously until resolved. There is a willingness to devote extra resource to ensure the quickest possible resolution time. Priority 1 is usually only used for severity 1 situations, but can be used if there are multiple severity 2s or significant exposure as a result of the problem. A target time for completion should be set, typically this is around 2 hours.
Priority 2 Actively work on until resolved. The target for resolution time should be defined and documented in a table of severity and priorities. Priority 2 should typically be used for severity 2 situations, plus severity 1s which have adequate redundancy and recovery which will hold for an interim time, plus severity 3s which are occurring with some frequency or which have exceeded their expected resolution time. Generally, a priority 2 resolution target should be one day or less.
Priority 3 This is reserved for problems which must be fixed within a reasonable time pre-set for the type of problem, but which can be handled routinely. This usually might be a component down or procedure unusable but with alternatives available. Default resolution target time might be 4 days. Failure to meet the goal would result in upgrading to priority 2.
Priority 4 Problems in this category are typically going to be worked on when resources are available. Deferred maintenance is expected, alternatives are routinely available, and there is minimal exposure. A target resolution default might be 7 days, but in many cases the expected resolution will be set in the future.