In Dire Need of Vaccination Plan, Seniors Hungry for a Miracle
No stinking plan?
Let me get this straight. Oh, wait. Good morning. I missed yesterday, but if it’s one thing you can count on with the elderly, it’s that their memory ain’t always so good. Today I’m going to talk about planning, or the lack of it, with the vaccine rollout.
In business, if you see that you’re going to need something in six months, the first thing you do is set up a plan to achieve your goal. You begin working on it long before it’s due, because you understand what it takes to implement it, or you find out what gotchas exist that you have to plan for.
And yet, we hear the other day that a county in Florida was coming up with a plan to distribute, in January, the vaccines that they’ve known were coming for how long now? Maybe not the exact timeline, but why would you wait? You have disaster preparedness plans in place long before any disaster happens.
And lo and behold, the plan failed. And not in just that county, but county after county. Websites crashed. Phone lines jammed. As Homer would say, “Do’h!”
The Way to Distribute was Clear
Seems to me that it was clear how they should have set up distribution. And there were multiple ways to accomplish it, using regular billing information. They could have included a flyer in utility bills, phone bills, or even a notice from the DMV, which would know how old you are.
And that notice could have said, “Please call this number on one of these days (and give them maybe an entire week to call) to schedule your vaccine.” They could have spaced out those days so not everyone would try calling on one day. They could have included a website to schedule, like some doctor’s do, but I’d hazard a guess more people have phones than computers.
A Planning Story
Reminds me of the time the little ones came rushing in to play a game.
“Grandpa, can you play this game with me?” the boy said.
“No, Grandpa, I want to play a game with you,” the girl said. “You said we could play today.”
“I asked first,” the boy whined.
“I asked yesterday, remember?” the girl said.
She must not have known about that thing about memory with older people. Not to say my memory is gone, or even fading, I’m not saying that at all.
“Okay, listen,” I said. “Maybe what we need here is a plan. Do either of you have a calendar?”
“I’ll have to get my phone,” the little boy said.
“No,” I said. “I mean a paper calendar. Something we can write on so we can see who’s game gets to be played on what date. We need a plan!”