September 14, 2006

Barcelona Bound

Yesterday a friend wrote and noted in a very polite manner that I haven’t posted in over 2 weeks. He couldn’t believe that in 2 weeks I had absolutely nothing to say/report/exggerate. In truth, I really don’t have anything to say. At least not important enough to come home after working late in order to spend a few more hours in front of the computer. I do that all day, usually 8 solid hours, but since I’m leaving tomorrow for Barcelona, I’ve been spending more time in front of the computer in order to tidy my projects so any one in the office could take over, should anything pressing happen in the week I’ll be gone. It’s a lot of work, actually, getting things ready for another. What frustrates me is that I’m not actually making progress on the project, just typing memos and attaching sticky notes to files so they can be located while I'm on the beach. Located, as opposed to re-invented, because architects are lazy and don’t like to search for existing files. No amount of effort will be spared in starting over, however. Can you imagine any other business surviving and and making a profit when the following is a typical converstation in architecture firms the world over?

Lazy Employee: I can’t find that spread sheet.
Lazy Boss: Did you look in the files?
LE: Kind of.
LB: Good enough for me. Just start a new one.
LE: But I don’t know any of the figures, or how to create that type of chart.
LB: You’ll learn. Give it a stab and when you think you have everything, let me check it over.
LE: Okay…
6 hours later
LB: This is all wrong! What the hell have you been doing all day? (thinks to self: last time I hire from that school)
LE: Well, I did the best I could, like you said,
LB: Why didn’t you ask Jones, he’s a genius at these things?! (If you want something done…)
LE: But you never told me…
LB: Give it here, I’ll fix it. (mutters to self as walks away: Honestly, am I the only one that can do things correctly?)
12 hours later
LE: I found that file, do you want it?
LB: No, I’ve finished it. These figures don’t match. Go figure out which one is correct. I’ll see you tomorrow.

Honestly, that is no way to run a business and yet, if I don’t stamp every document I’ve created, they’ll start from scratch, assuming I’ve not begun. And all the figures will be different. It’s frustrating. An entire week of work dedicated to what amounts to learning proper filing techniques. Sigh… I should give seminars.

3 comments:

F John said...

Have a fun trip!

I am familar with your "recreate from scratch" problem. But in the military we have the opposite problem. People spend hours looking for an old copy, and then plagurizing it. They then fail to take all the old references, making for an erroneous product. That passes for work in our world.

D-Vaz said...

Tell me about it. It seems that I have to file for everyone in my studio because they are too lazy to do it themselves. Then when they need a certain file, instead of looking at the contents list which would direct them to the exact folder, they bark orders at me because they can't find it. And since I'm the one who filed it, I'm the one who lost it or I'm the one who has to look for it since I touched it last. Everything can be solved by hiring trained helper monkeys to do all the filing. Then you reward them with a banana and a cigarette and they are happy. And I bet things would run a lot smoother.

B said...

Great, now I want a helper monkey and an office pony.