Can being a pain in the bum work?

I note that students who will, or already are, starting their degree courses may experience problems over their grants, due to delays. The student loans company has taken over this responsibility, and there are a number of complaints about such delays.

I am reminded of a similar problem when student loans were first introduced. One year there was a delay in getting the loans to many students. Miraculously, things seemed to improve when somehow the private office number of the CEO got into the public domain. Largely, I do think pressure groups should play by the rules, but occasionally being a complete pain in the backside can also work. I am not proposing a similar approach in this case, but use it merely to highlight a historical example of where sometimes personally annoying decision makers can bring results, where rational discussion may not.

Whilst on the whole I would support rational persuasion, sometimes a more practical approach is required. The trick, I guess, is knowing when to do this, as such 'going nuclear' approaches rarely work more than once or twice. Over reliance on this tactic, in the long run will ruin an organisations' reputation in the policy and decision making community in which they seek to operate.