The 0 record issue.

Keeping a log, a journal, a record of something is a good practice. It’s a tool to remind you of something. What’s that something? It can be

• Reminding you of what’s been done (e.g. tracking tasks)
• What’s been wrong (e.g. issues tracker)
• What’s happened (e.g. diary, a record)
• What’s left to do (e.g. a to-do list)

While this tool is usually beneficial, it can also turn into a detriment. It can be turn into a weapon and go against good intentions.

How? It’s surrounds the second point of “what’s been wrong”. By default, humans like to collect a history of wrongdoings before we go and resolve the issue. The annoying thing about this is, if you’re the only record or there’s no other people that have raised the same concern, the issue will likely persist and won’t get resolved. I think it’s fair to say everyone has have contacted a telecom company before (e.g. Bell, Rogers, Telus) and they say “there’s no reported issues in your area” = thanks for letting us know but we can’t fix your issue since there’s not enough people complaining about the same thing right now, so we won’t focus on fixing this until it’s exacerbated.

The “there’s no reported issues in your area” also applies to other situations too. It happens when someone says there’s an issue and there’s an initial disbelief. The “is it really”, “are you sure”, “but no one else raised it” is exactly how your telecom provider responds to you when you’re caller #1.

If you find them annoying, think about how annoying you are too when you are responding to someone else with that. If you hate that response when you hear it, then do something about it. Be reactive the next time when someone says it to you next time. Don’t play the blame game. It’s even better if you can be proactive and self reflect and improve on your own beat, but that’s not a skill everyone has. But everyone can be reactive when someone points it out. Don’t wait for a telephone book of issues to collect, do it when one arises. Like a whack-a-mole.