PM Woe

[James Barrow]

>Kirk Turner said:
>
>Boy is this a timely topic for me. I have been working for two years on a
massive >manual for a southern state, and all along the way, the PMs stated
dogmatically that >they wanted it to be a PDF. So I have created a type of
Web site from a PDF that is >really cool. 

This sounds very interesting.  Probably an email thread in itself.

>Enter the new PMs . . . After about fifteen minutes of getting, maybe, 5
percent up to >speed on the previous two years, they decide to scrap
everything, and save the PDF >to a raggedy Word HTML file and put it on the
web. So there goes two years of >exceptional work.

Did you plea bargain or go to trial for assault and battery? ;^)

>You know, what I have learned is that no matter how long you work for a
company >and no matter how great it is, sooner or later you run into what I
call "The >Department of Small Minds" Every company or corporation has one,
and it is only a >matter of time before you find them or they find you.

A friend of mine is having the same problem, only in a DBA sense.  His
response? "What's wrong with us?  Do we just attract pointy-haired idiots?"

>This is how you can tell that you have entered the Department of Small
Minds:
>
>1. A new PM enters the scene
>
>2. The new PM has no eye for quality work, and really doesn't care. The PM
wants >functionality, not style. The redwood picnic table in the kitchen
will do. 

Originally, these docs were created by an overpaid resource/friend of the
PMO.  The PM in question really blew up at her, but later apologized saying
that he had missed an acting audition.  Gee, I'm sorry that work got in the
way, Mr. Valentino.

>3. The new PM wants to control you completely, but they don't want that
fact to be >obvious, so they proceed in what they believe is a slick manner.
All the while their >intent is blindingly obvious.

I spent this weekend re-rewriting the document.  The PM's edits turned the
procedure into a lost book of the New Testament.  "And the Program Manager
saideth it was in the project plan.  So let it be written, so let it be
done."
4. The new PM says things such as "have you ever considered this," or "would
it better to do it this way?" These questions ALWAYS reference an idea that
has been disgarded long ago due to the idea's total weakness.

>After they were let go, my project management moved up a level to the
Governor's >people. It was only through time and experience that I learned
who signed off on the >project because a number of people had equal say in
theory, but practice proved the >players.

After many 12-hour days, luck, coincidence and using everything I've learned
to date, the Tech Pubs department has garnered a fair amount of respect and
clout (Sharon, you'd be proud).  I'd like to be able to show the PM that all
of this 'mother, may I?' and military-grade reporting is going to do nothing
more than cause us to produce documents that refer to 'Spot' and 'running'.

- Jim