A Project's Last Wishes

The best time to think of new ideas is not near the end of a project, but at the beginning. I hold that truth to be self-evident. I'm pretty sure most business people would.

But HB (the Humming Bird), works with a different kind of logic. In her view, in the last days (even hours) before a project's deadline, that's when you want to try and cram as many ideas into the plan as possible. Once something is complete, that's it; you can't change it. It's dead, to her at least. (Most sane people look at the end of a project as a birth. To her, its almost a time of mourning.)

Because of her unique view of project management, she tries to show a project a good time before it dies the death of completion. The same way a man notified he has a day to live will spend his last hours sky diving, trying to sleep with a super model, and writing a novel, the HB will try to give a 95-percent-complete project three new features, a new marketing plan and perhaps a complete floor-to-ground re-design.

This drives me bat shit. I try to breath deeply and enter the Zen zone. I try to let her madness wash through me. I even try to get some of what she wants done, with mixed success at best. Sometimes, I actually can squeeze a little more into a product, though never everything. And sometimes I just plan can't do anything.

And that's the bit that makes me go insane, I hate saying I can't do something. I hate that months of good work, work that I want my goddamn pat on the back for, becomes tarnished because the litany of ideas she has at the end aren't somehow miraculously materialized.

Do yourself and your employees a big favor. Cram all the ideas into a project at the start. Be aggressive. Ask for too much. Go crazy. It's amazing how much you can accomplish if you push yourself 6 to 12 months before a deadline.

But at the end of a project, when most of it is at the printer and clients are waiting for it and advertising is hitting, just finish it. Finish it well. But finish it.

Annoying Management Technique 256: Insulting By Explaining The Obvious

A really clever way to insult one of your employees, without actually insulting him, is to explain the job in mind numbingly basic terms, repeatedly, even if that person has been doing the work for 20 years.

It's the perfect insult because the target can't complain to anyone, has no grounds for protest, and will sound like a whiner if he does. It's also a great way to take credit for an employee's work, because no matter how good a job he does, it will always be because you told him exactly what to do and how to do it. Remember, it's not about who did the work; it's about who gets the credit.

For instance, you're the chief of surgery, and a young hotshot with steady hands and steely eyes has been taking up a little too much of the hospital newsletter lately. He's about to start an open heart procedure and you scrub in to observe, and to remind him of his place without being boorish about it. You're one with the name on the parking space, not him.

Before he makes the first incision, tell him: "You're going to want to cut the chest open. Make a nice straight incision, then gently cut open the breast bone with the saw."

He'll give you a look as he's cutting, not sure whether to let you know that he does indeed know how to slice people open, that he's been doing it for 10 years now, that he still has $250,000 in school loans because all he ever wanted to do with his life is crack open chests. He doesn't want to be rude to the chief after all.

You should then say, after the chest is open, "You did scrub up well right? Can't take chances of staff infection during a surgery as delicate as this."

What he'll hear is an accusation: "You cut corners. You're lazy. You didn't wash your hands before you plunged them into some poor guys chest. I think you're an idiot."

He'll grow angry, but internalize it, swallowing his rage, feeling more insulted with each carefully chosen suggestion and direction. To the casual observer, your not doing anything but helping, giving advice, providing assurances that a delicate operation goes well.

He'll swallow his anger. His hands will shake. His rage will occasionally flash in his eyes, but you'll be the only one to see it. He'll struggle to think about the 100 things he needs to keep in mind to keep a soul alive, yet all he'll want to do is take his scalpel and ram it into your eye.

After a few weeks of "observing" his surgeries, he'll put in his notice and you'll be the golden boy again, back in your rightful place on the front page of the hospital newsletter. Congratulations.

The Hummingbird

I call my boss The Hummingbird. She's tiny, hyperactive, sleeps four hours a night and lives off of microwave popcorn. She has the attention span of a bird who has slurped the last bit of nectar from a flower and has another thousand flowers to get through before she can get in her SUV and go to yoga class.

Her highest priority is always the idea she had three minutes ago. Everything else must be dropped in order to make real this amazing new idea. Never mind that it will take months, thousands of dollars, careful planning, and delicate coordination with several other departments. She wants it done now and damn it, why didn't we think if it yesterday?

Well, because yesterday there was another burning priority, and the day before that yet another one, and the day before that another super nova idea of business genius, which flamed out as soon as she got to work the next day.

She's painfully bored with any current project ("Isn't that done yet? Can't we get this off our plate so we can get to this new thing?"), and can't tolerate actually executing and completing projects ("I don't care about all the details. Just get it done! I'm tired of hearing about it!").

She loves thinking of and starting projects, and her favorite meetings are brainstorm meetings, where she serves chips and coke and cup cakes like a second grade Valentine's Day party.

"There are no bad ideas in this room," she scolds us when someone mentions that a particular idea might be impractical or impossible without divine assistance.

The problem is that with her, there are no bad ideas outside of that room. If an idea is less than 48 hours old, it's still good, and will perch atop our priority list. Once past its "good idea" expiration date, it will fade away, dead before its time, before it might have come to fruition and actually benefited somebody.

But don't fret about the good ideas withering from inattention. There are plenty of new ideas to think of tomorrow.

All about the white collar warrior

I work for a big, successful corporation with a healthy stock price and no end of evil chaos happening within its glass walls. I am, as so many if us are, a white collar warrior.

As a mid-level manager, a soldier engaged in trench warfare on the front lines of the American economy, I fight for survival everyday. I fight for my company's survival against absolutely brutal competition.

And I fight for my survival, struggling to keep the hellish, soul-sucking job that pays me pretty well, keeps the mortgage up-to-date and the wife supplied with god-knows-what from Home Depot and Pier One.

I battle my bosses, my boss's bosses, the peers in my department, my peers in other departments, contractors, customers, and the poor few who have to answer to me. I have a winning record, for if I didn't I wouldn't be employed. I'd say I win my battles about 60% of the time, which seems to be a solid record in the game of corporate hard ball.

So, what I see this blog as is a way to vent a bit, maybe give myself some perspective by looking at the job with the cold, objective eye of a journalist. And if there are other white collar warriors out there who see something of themselves in my tales of woe, then that's a decent bonus.

It's Sunday night. Tomorrow at 8 a.m., the battle begins again.

First Post

Is this really going to work? Could it be this easy? If so, I'm buying Google stock as soon as I can.