2013-04-12 Fri

Retired

I'm still retired; retired from the Sales and Marketing aspect of business. But business is still Business Solutions, so when a spontaneous enquiry arrives I consider it.

I received an email with a suggestion of a four-to-six month contract downtown. That would suit me fine, both in location and duration.

But how do they (or their client) know it is 4-6 months? That suggests that the client feels they have a good definition of the solution, to be able to assign a completion time to it, and that suggests that they have an even better grip on the problem. So where is the problem specification? And their preferred solution specification?

I will sit with the client, listen to their introduction, then ask the question "What is your goal?".

If they don't have a goal (that they can slide across the table in writing on a piece of paper), how can they have a solution? And if they don't have a solution, how can they cost a solution?

If they do have a goal, then stating a cost suggests that they have mapped out a path to reach that goal, and that, a solution, suggests that they have a understanding of the problem, in which case, why don't they slide the problem across the table to me?

Usually I find that someone would like the project to be completed within 4-6 months, based on what they've seen in the past, what they've done it the past, their level of skills (not great!) and their myopic view of computers through the user-interface.

Clear Thinking

So around ten to four the alarms sound in Lillian Smith branch of TPL; not to worry, says the PA, it is a false alarm. But we know the fire trucks will be here.

I have a book to return, so I decide to return it before anyone changes their minds and forces us all outside; I don't want to lug the book home.

From the second-floor window overlooking College Street I see an eastbound streetcar, and I hear the fire truck sirens. A small domestic station wagon moves forward, I assume to get out of the way of the curbside trucks, but the streetcar is also moving forwards.

The car glances off the streetcar, the driver brakes partway into the intersection. It is a low-speed collision, surely no-one is hurt.

But it strikes me that excepting for a head-on collision, the streetcar can never be in the wrong. Because it is constrained to run on rails!

No one seems flustered, but the streetcar driver unloads all the passengers.

I feel sorry for the driver; by the time I descend to street level, the fire crew are asking the four-wheeler to move forwards because the fire crew have another call further down the street.

I hand my card to the streetcar driver, and write my name against the phone number.

I feel sorry for the streetcar driver. Through no fault of his own, he will be saddled with a ton of paperwork, have a mark on his record, be late home, and surely a whole lot of other stuff.

I don't feel sorry for the four-wheeler idiot.

As I walk home (to Bay street from pretty well Spadina) I pass several streetcar stops with anxious customers peering westward, wondering whether the car will soon be here to take them home or to daycare or to their classes or to their next appointment.

One small piece of distracted driving is causing misery for hundreds of people right now.