This is Hooovahh

[AeroSoul]

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@crossrulz wrote: One of my professors taught us to always double your estimates.  I learned quickly at my first engineering position to double it again (4x now) because management would almost guaranteed to cut my estimate in half.  This saved my rear end more than once.

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I learned this pretty quickly on my first job. 

Got asked by a customer how long the job would take and i said "One month or so....". The boss looks me sideways and says "3 months....".

The job ended up taking well over a year because the customer kept piling on features they wanted me to include.

So now, whenever i'm asked on the timeline i quadruple it... and it's usually hauntingly accurate.

[JW-JnJ]

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@crossrulz wrote:

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@jcarmody wrote:

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@JÞB wrote:

Qr:We have a unique problem

Me: howso?

Qr: well, nobody has ever provided a proven solution to this problem 

Me: so, what you are asking for is a novel solution?

Qr: No , we want a solution that has a history of solving this new problem. 

OK

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Qr: Also, how long will it take to do something that's never been done before?

Me: ???

Qr: I don't need engineers that can't provide estimates.

Me: (later, after long analysis at my desk) Here's my plan; it could take eight weeks.  If everything goes our way, I estimate six weeks.

Qr: We plan for success, not failure.  Six weeks is the target.

Me: Fine, as long as nothing pulls me away from this project and I can work on it full-time.

Qr: No.  You still have to support the production lines.  If you get pulled away from this project you can work nights & weekends to catch up.  I don't need engineers that can't keep their promises.

Me: ...

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One of my professors taught us to always double your estimates.  I learned quickly at my first engineering position to double it again (4x now) because management would almost guaranteed to cut my estimate in half.  This saved my rear end more than once.

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Hah, this. I still remember meticulously planning out a schedule for a program with my manager. We sent the quote and schedule up the chain for bidding. We were told that schedule was no good and several months were cut out of it. Guess who's schedule was right within +/-1 week when the project was completed? (kind of impressive for schedule that was made for bidding).

I really think engineers are solution makers and therefore green-light schedule thinkers. So unless you're a test engineer and have seen the horrors of test, engineers tend to think testing will go great.

[Hooovahh]

Couple of quick ones I've heard:

"If they want to pay me to investigate, and perform a study that proves ohms law I’ll do it."

"We measure our success with the number of meetings we have each day.  I had 6 meetings today, instead of getting any work done.  Woo hoo!  Do you want me to do work, or talk about doing work?"

"The test plan went this way, the plan went like this, and everything passed.  Why do we need to have a meeting on this?  I gave you the reports.  What do you want me to do?  Read the report to you?"

"It was Joe's meeting but Joe didn't come.  James was supposed to run the meeting but didn't know anything so every question as met with dead air followed by 'James are you still there?'"

"My boss wants to know what our headcount plan is for the next 10 years.  10 Years!  What’s our sales projections for then?  Do we know how many builds we will be in then?  Well at least they think we’ll still be around in 10 years.  I don’t even know what the headcount projections for this year look like.”

[Hooovahh]

Reply All

<Mass email to 200+ people>

"We are conducting a survey asking for feedback on the usage of our legacy software XYZ.  If you use this software please reply with your account name, what you use this software for, and how frequently you use it."

This was then followed up by a few dozen people using the Reply All function sending emails to everyone.  Then someone sent:

“Hey can we just reply to the sender instead of reply all?”

So I did a Reply All saying “Thanks that is great advice.”

I then got an email saying “Did you just reply all, to an email asking to stop reply all’ing?  Good Job!”

[crossrulz]

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@Hooovahh wrote:

"We measure our success with the number of meetings we have each day.  I had 6 meetings today, instead of getting any work done.  Woo hoo!  Do you want me to do work, or talk about doing work?"

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In the middle of a production run, I had not been home much.  I flat out told people I was going home and not coming back until the morning to actually see my family.  2 hours later, I'm getting texts and calls demanding I come into the office.  The reason: we couldn't afford a single hour of schedule loss.  In the status meeting the next morning, we came to a decision to do something, so I just said "ok" and left the meeting to do the thing (the meeting was maybe 1/2 over).  When being yelled at for that, I just replied "I just saved you an hour of schedule."  Ok, I was still very mad, so I probably said it pretty snarkily.

[JÞB]

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@AeroSoul wrote:

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@crossrulz wrote: One of my professors taught us to always double your estimates.  I learned quickly at my first engineering position to double it again (4x now) because management would almost guaranteed to cut my estimate in half.  This saved my rear end more than once.

---

I learned this pretty quickly on my first job. 

Got asked by a customer how long the job would take and i said "One month or so....". The boss looks me sideways and says "3 months....".

The job ended up taking well over a year because the customer kept piling on features they wanted me to include.

So now, whenever i'm asked on the timeline i quadruple it... and it's usually hauntingly accurate.

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PI = 4

It's been tried before.

[JÞB]

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@JW-JnJ wrote:

I really think engineers are solution makers and therefore green-light schedule thinkers. So unless you're a test engineer and have seen the horrors of test, engineers tend to think testing will go great.

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Engineers are my "natural prey"

The null hypothesis of any end of line test is "some engineer somewhere somehow failed to produce product from raw materials "

If I can't provide evidence to support that hypothesis..dang! The product should be sold for a profit!

[JÞB]

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@Hooovahh wrote:

Reply All

<Mass email to 200+ people>

"We are conducting a survey asking for feedback on the usage of our legacy software XYZ.  If you use this software please reply with your account name, what you use this software for, and how frequently you use it."

This was then followed up by a few dozen people using the Reply All function sending emails to everyone.  Then someone sent:

“Hey can we just reply to the sender instead of reply all?”

So I did a Reply All saying “Thanks that is great advice.”

I then got an email saying “Did you just reply all, to an email asking to stop reply all’ing?  Good Job!”

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Please, provide a  " not safe for work " warning..  do you know how hard it is to clean coffee snort off my touch screen?

[Hooovahh]

Who is watching the watchmen?

Due to a new policy, anything that can be stolen needs to be locked up in our cabinets every night.  Laptops, thumb drives, papers, cables, SD cards, computers, etc.  Regardless if the drives are empty (which they often were).  IT was then tasked with walking around once in a while and making sure all things are locked up so employees can’t steal things.  They sent out the security checklist that IT needed to follow.  At the end of the checklist there was a “Cautions for Inspectors” section which stated: 

“Do not steal personal belongings in the office during the security inspection.”  

The security checklist, which is supposed to ensure people aren’t stealing things from the company, has to have a line reminding those enforcing this rule...to not steal things.  Which got me thinking, who is making sure those enforcing the rules of not stealing, aren’t stealing?

[Hooovahh]

Manager Tunnel Vision

I was working with another group within the company assisting in a time critical task.  I started discussing the task with the manager of that group who had a reputation of not planning for issues.

Manager: “I’ve asked <Employee1> to get our widget working with the system. Hooovahh, do you have everything you need to get it working after <Employee1> is done?”

Hooovahh:  “No, I have nothing I need.”

Manager: “Well <Employee1> will get it working. I gave him a deadline of Tuesday at noon.”

Hooovahh: “What do you mean?  What happens if we don't meet that deadline?”

Manager: “What do you mean?”

Hooovahh: “Well what happens on Wednesday if <Employee1> can’t finish?”

Manager: “Well we will just figure out a way to do it manually instead.”

Hooovahh: “Has anyone done this manually?”

Manager: “I’m not sure.”

Hooovahh: “So no?”

Manager: “Well I'm sure we can do it manually with <OutsideVendor1> helping us.”

Hooovahh: “Aren't they on holiday Thursday and Friday?” (it was Wednesday)

Manager: “Yes.”

Hooovahh: “And aren't we on holiday Monday?”

Manager: “... Oh I guess so.”