Rantings of a Black Polemicist

Solve for x

Thursday, January 6th, 2005 | Personal | 3 Comments

Our status meetings here at work are really just managers gathering the development team together in a conference room, interrogating us and trying not to look panicked.

Maybe it’s a cross between an interrogation room and my seventh-grade math class. Being interrogated about the status of my tasks feels like being called to the board to work an algebra problem in front of the entire class. Hell, math was easy compared to this. In algebra, there’s only one right answer and everyone agrees on it. Here there’s a correct approach to solving a particular problem, but that’s rarely the right answer to give in a meeting. It’s very tricky trying to figure out what each individual manager needs to hear in order to get that warm, fuzzy feeling inside.

Manager A thinks the best way to cut down a tree is to use a stainless steel butterknife because that’s the tool he’s comfortable using. Manager B agrees because he’s fond of the word “butter” even more than “steak”. If I mention a chainsaw, both of them question the idea: “Wouldn’t a powertool be overkill?”.

Then there would be no warm fuzzies. We can’t have that, can we?

Return receipt

Monday, January 3rd, 2005 | Personal | 2 Comments

I don’t understand why Manager-in-Training Goon requests a return receipt on every single email he sends out. He just sent an “urgent” message to the entire 22-person development staff and wants to get a notification the moment each one of us opens his message. What brand of micro-managing, self-important nitwit does this?

And he copies himself on his own messages. Manager-in-Training Goon wants to see proof that he reads his own messages to himself.

Time to jump ship

Saturday, January 1st, 2005 | Personal | 1 Comment

I’ve signed two 3-month contracts with my employer since July 1 but I wasn’t able to get my boss, Big Manager, to commit to another 3 months on paper. He’s only sure about being able to keep me on through the end of February. He’s “asked for more funding” and is “waiting to hear back”. I’ll play it safe and start hunting for my next gig on Monday.

A wise consultant once told me to only believe what I can get in writing.

Work has become thoroughly entertaining. On my project, there are 4 consultants and 3 full-time employees, including the “technical” manager. Big Manager is going to give the consultants the boot in February, leaving those three employees to carry the project accross the finish line.

I’m the only one who knows how everything works. I’ve configured everything, designed and implemented a new architecture and mastered a new technology in just weeks. I’m the only one who’s actually deployed the application to the production environment. These 3 goons haven’t even been able to set up the application on their laptops in 2 months. And they honestly think they can take over development and maintenence once I’m out of the picture?

That’s too hilarious for words.

I don’t expect that they’ll realize that they need me before I’m gone. I just long to be a fly on the wall the very moment that they do.