Re: Conversion of data & associated logic from ISAM to RDB

In article <58amj3F2fva6gU1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
Pete Dashwood <dashwood@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

[snip]

But, and this is
the important point, there are also people in corner offices who are doing
the very best they can. There are people who are the first to arrive and the
last to leave, dedicated company people who put heart and soul into their
jobs and are defined by the work they do. (No, I don't think this is
healthy, but I'm certainly not going to denigrate these people or tar them
with the same brush as COIs.)

Mr Dashwood, I waited a bit to respond to this... and I'll try to be as
plain as possible about it.

My views may be tainted by my position, after putting in my mandatory 'two
years' I fell/lied my way into a consulting/contracting/hired gun job...
and I've held those for the decades since. I'm hired - usually - to do a
job and not much else.

Likewise... if the precept is, almost Hippocratically, 'First, Do Your
Job' then it doesn't matter if the people are 'doing the very best they
can' or 'first to arrive and the last to leave, dedicated company people
who put their heart and soul into their jobs'; what matters is, quite
simply, Can They Do Their Jobs?

If they cannot then there might be many reasons for this... one is 'they
are incapable of doing their jobs'. If that is the case then to present
themselves as capable and to collect a salary for a job they cannot do is,
to my eyes, fraud and theft... in the same way as if I were to represent
myself as skilled in Java and .NET and other stuff I don't know.

Yes, I exaggerated my skills for a short while a few decades back... and I
got away with it and the statute of limitations for such has, I believe,
expired. A difference in quantity, however, may make for a difference in
quality - drop a pennyweight from waist-height onto someone's foot and
things more-or-less keep going on as they did, drop a rock weighing a few
stone in a similar manner and someone might be crippled for life - and for
someone to go to work year after year, decade after decade, being able
only to 'do their best' or 'show up first/leave last' when their job is
the allocation, co-ordination and motivation of personnel and resources
towards the accomplishment of a stated Executive goal means that (by this
definition) they are not capable of doing a Manager's job.

To expect consistent and repetitive fraud and theft to be met with the
kind of tolerance, generosity and openness-of-spirit you seem to be
espousing just might be, perhaps, beyond the capabilities of many folks...
myself, maybe, included.

Can you Do Your Job? Good... then do it. Are you incapable of Doing The
Job that you have been assigned? Do not accept the assignment... I've
turned down contracts many times with 'Sorry, my skill-set doesn't include
that', no shame involved. If you must accept the assignment - and I don't
know of too many folks who get told 'be a manager or you'll be fired' then
let it be known, loud and clear, in writing that your skill-set does not
include what is needed to accomplish the task.

Of course... in my experience it doesn't work that way. The variant of
Sturgeon's Law that I apply to folks in *any* job - butcher, baker,
candlestick-maker, doctor, lawyer, cook from New Dehli - is that 10% of
the folks doing that job have what I call 'the touch'... an instinctive,
intuitive grasp of what needs to be done and a delight in Doing It
Right... and the other 90% are busy praying '*Please* don't let me get
found out'... and, at times, busy making sure that nobody around them is
competent enough to see what frauds they are; I believe I've mentioned a
sort of 'Gresham's Law of Management' previously.

I'm not really sure how to wind this up in a memorable fashion... decades
on back I did my Basic Training for the United States Air Force Reserves
in the 3701st Basic Military Training Squadron at Lackland Air Force Base
in San Antonio, Texas, USA... got a tattoo on the one day they allowed us
a Town Pass, but that's another story... anyhow, the motto of our squadron
was a simple 'Lead, Follow or Get Out Of The Way'.

Can one allocate, co-ordinate and motivate (etc, see above)? Good, then
be a Manager.

Can't do that? Stand back, then, and be allocated and co-ordinated...
motivate yourself by the quality of your work.

Can't do either? Don't hinder folks who are just trying to Do Their Jobs.

Lead, Follow or Get Out Of The Way.

DD

.

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