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WHAT's NewS Issue 8 August/September 1997
info exchange
5
willing as long as the finer points,
fcpecifically fiscal structures, are not
publicized. It's a shame, because that's
what makes them interesting to read. We
- the editorial team - have discussed how
to improve this situation and what we
will do in the future is include direct
contact numbers for people who want to
know more, not only on deals, but also
on all other subjects that may be of
interest.
'This point came up quite frequently from
our international respondents, while
Dutch colleagues also want more on how
strategy is being translated into concrete
action. In fact, you may have noticed
we're running features on various
business plans at the moment - we started
with health care. F&A is in this current
issue and we'11 be doing international
corporates next issue. Another suggestion
was to include budgets and financial
positions. We've also adopted that idea
(see the July issue) and we will keep it on
our ongoing editorial content list. A few
people asked for more on IT, while a
further group proposed an overview of
fcproducts. If you can wait for next
month's issue, you'11 see that we've
combined the two. And for your info,
there is a dedicated IT publication which
is available from Cees van Rest on
Rest C.I'.M. van@int-fod@cbh-int
'The international comment came from
an international office; the Dutch remark
-from Utrecht. We feel there is too much
Pocus on the Netherlands - this is partly
because information here is easier for us
to access. We bump into people in
corridors, see people at lunch. That is
why I'd like to reiterate the need for
proactivity from the network - if you
have anything worth reporting to the rest
of RI, don't hesitate to contact us. We
can't guarantee everything you send in
will make it into print, but it would help
us balance the content by including items
from all around the world. To do that, we
have to have the info in the first place.
And by the way, in the survey you also
said the Dutch texts were superfluous, so
we have eliminated them.
'Who are our competitors? I would
suggest that there are both too many and
too few (given our F&A focus). And too
disparate geographically. I think too much
is happening in our own organization to
dedicate pages to the competition. The
opposite applies for clients - the more,
the better. Our aim is to speak to at least
one cliënt every month - until now, most
have been Dutch. We're constantly trying
to get to interview corporates outside the
Netherlands - again, this is where our
correspondents, but also relationship
managers around the world, can help. If
you have a cliënt who may be willing to
do an interview based on the concept that
he/she will be critical and try to explain
how we can improve our service to them,
then we will do all we can to arrange
that.
'This raises the same problem as reporting
the ins and outs of structured deals. While
we want to be a platform for info
exchange, again our magazine falls into
the hands of outsiders too often. Do you
really want the competition to know
exactly what and - more importantly -
exactly how we've structured an
innovative new product?
'The suggestions noted above were
sometimes made by ten or more people
But we also had a lot of ideas from a
single source. These included a
kind of internal job market idea
which we will pass to human
resources. Launching a
reader's forum was another.
To my mind, a reader's forum
could perhaps best be
organized via a bulletin
board on the net. But we're
not yet that far, we'11 keep
you informed. Other
suggestions have been
added to our future
content lists.
'A lot of people appreciate the office
specials - and that's not just from those
offices which have had their names in the
paper. Many respondents said they would
also like to know a bit more about the
country, so from our next special,
Guernsey in the September issue, we'11 be
trying a new formula - hope you think it's
an improvement. On the social side, when
What's NewS was launched, we made a
very clear decision not to do the
wedding/birthday kind of reporting. Too
much is happening in an organization
with a few thousand people. Where do
you locate the cut-off point? Do we do
births, engagements - what about the
people with 'significant others' rather
than husbands and wives? Better to leave
that side to the offices themselves.
'Of course there's gossip, of course there
is the odd scandal - fortunately, this was
a suggestion made by only one person, so
we don't feel obliged to turn What's
NewS into a tabloid... Certainly we want
to introducé people around the world,
certainly we want to put their pictures in
the paper so that you can match a face to
a voice or e-mailer. Certainly we want to
be critical so that we are all continually
pursuing a learning curve. The idea of
reporting our failures is a viable option,
but only if we can learn from it. The
small group of people who make the
magazine for you every month also learn
with every issue. And without wanting to
sound trite or hackneyed, our aim is to
continue to improve it. All that remains
is: thanks for reading us, thanks for
taking the time to help us do a better job.
We are also dependent on the
network.'
