Human Neglect

Pictures shown here are the result of human neglect. Centuries-old mangroves in Barangay Salog in Catbalogan, Samar are dead because of human neglect. The cost of doing nothing. A construction company dumped chemicals around the mangrove while working on a river rehabilitation program. After the heavy rains, water and the deadly chemicals were trapped instantly killing the trees.

The following story, which I borrowed from John Fischer, tells us the cost of doing nothing and doing something silly instead.

In a quality-poor community, the mechanic told the car owner, who coolly agreed to the solution: ‘I couldn’t repair your brakes so I made your horn louder.’

In that community, you can just imagine people honking and making loud noises to tell others that they are passing by, or, if passersby don’t listen at all, you can envision twisted metals and lives lost. It becomes a society racing out of control.

It is a foolish way to solve a problem. But don’t we live our lives a lot like this? Our brakes go out so we speed up, blowing our horns until we run into something.

When companies implement quality programs, say a total quality management system, people talk about the cost of quality. The experts conduct cost-benefit analysis and use sophisticated ratio analyses to justify the investment in quality programs. Rarely do they analyze the cost of not doing quality programs. The absence of quality programs remain an impression.

That is similar to the cost of doing things. Experts worry a lot about the cost of the work to be done or activity costs. But they do not analyze the cost of doing nothing or the cost of idle time. Idle time is hidden in the cost of doing things.

When we talk about the cost of keeping customers, we rarely talk about the cost of losing them or even the cost of replacing them. For some industries today, like the telecommunication and the service industry, the cost of acquiring customers is substantially more than the cost of keeping them. This is a universal trend. Yet we invest more in acquiring customers than in keeping them. Thus, the average cost per customer is higher than what is should be.

We talk about quality products and services. What about life, quality of life? What is the cost of not investing in the quality of life? I have a feeling that it is immense, including economic, environmental and social costs.

(For comments, email to abfontanilla@yahoo.com or nick.fontanilla@gmail.com)