Work has been stupendously busy for the last five or six weeks. It has been something of a marathon for me. Let me recap:
New workspace project - because I'm a perfectionist, I had to manage every detail.
Having the good fortune to need to build a lot of gear, more than ever before in one month I think.
While collapsing operations into about 2/3 of the normal space
And managing the project above
With the real crunch coming last week during our warm spell
With the air conditioning out all week long.
But now all that is done. And we achieved our lofty sales and production goals, and fixed some sticky problems along the way. And tomorrow we can start moving operations into the new space, because that project is done too. And I got kudos from my boss for all the hard work.
I ran it and, essentially, I won. Wow, I'm tired.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Procrastination 101
Step 1 - Promise yourself that you will update your blog TODAY.
Step 2 - Wait about a week to allow something blogworthy (Firefox thinks that is misspelled) to happen.
Step 3 - Actually forget that you "maintain" a blog because you are so friggin busy.
Step 4 - Update your Facebook status.
Step 5 - DR. TRAN!
Step 6 - Come up with a hilarious post.
Step 7 - ???????
Step 8 - PROFIT!
Step 2 - Wait about a week to allow something blogworthy (Firefox thinks that is misspelled) to happen.
Step 3 - Actually forget that you "maintain" a blog because you are so friggin busy.
Step 4 - Update your Facebook status.
Step 5 - DR. TRAN!
Step 6 - Come up with a hilarious post.
Step 7 - ???????
Step 8 - PROFIT!
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Because busy is hot
Work has been bonkers.
We have the construction project that is making the new manufacturing area - my area. So I designed the space, and drew up the plan that the architect created the plan from, and I gave all of the information to all of the sub-contractors and the general contractor, and I negotiated the original schedule and all but one of the revisions and figured out how to get us back onto the original schedule after the start date was pushed out a week by the one revision I didn't do. And I worked with the contractor and subs all Saturday while all the major demolition was happening and reconfigured cubicle walls and moved refrigerators and moved and reconnected alarm lines. I mediated between the HVAC subcontractor and the repair and maintenance contractor after the sub screwed up and cut the control line that gives us heat in the building. I found and pointed out the missing electrical drops and the window framing the framers missed. I have worked my butt off on this project. In two weeks or so, we get to occupy the space. There are a few hundred more details for that part yet to go.
And we are experiencing record sales for the month of March, including FOUR copies of an instrument that we had planned to build ZERO of as late as one month ago. This just happens to be the instrument that is the most challenging to make, and that is supposed to have undergone a few MAJOR CHANGES that make it easier to make by now, but hasn't yet. And we are running out of the parts that we stopped buying because the design was being superseded by the MAJOR CHANGES that haven't happened yet because they were supposed to happen NEXT MONTH, after we had a month in which we didn't need to make any of them.
And I have just taken over the Field Service function and the pressure to make it work perfectly and at a profit is increasing, except I mostly get indirect micromanagement instead of goals and strategies.
And the project to make everything in one product line on one pretty pretty platform is a bit off the rails due to technical snags. It's a rather messy project. Ugh.
So work days are long these days.
We have the construction project that is making the new manufacturing area - my area. So I designed the space, and drew up the plan that the architect created the plan from, and I gave all of the information to all of the sub-contractors and the general contractor, and I negotiated the original schedule and all but one of the revisions and figured out how to get us back onto the original schedule after the start date was pushed out a week by the one revision I didn't do. And I worked with the contractor and subs all Saturday while all the major demolition was happening and reconfigured cubicle walls and moved refrigerators and moved and reconnected alarm lines. I mediated between the HVAC subcontractor and the repair and maintenance contractor after the sub screwed up and cut the control line that gives us heat in the building. I found and pointed out the missing electrical drops and the window framing the framers missed. I have worked my butt off on this project. In two weeks or so, we get to occupy the space. There are a few hundred more details for that part yet to go.
And we are experiencing record sales for the month of March, including FOUR copies of an instrument that we had planned to build ZERO of as late as one month ago. This just happens to be the instrument that is the most challenging to make, and that is supposed to have undergone a few MAJOR CHANGES that make it easier to make by now, but hasn't yet. And we are running out of the parts that we stopped buying because the design was being superseded by the MAJOR CHANGES that haven't happened yet because they were supposed to happen NEXT MONTH, after we had a month in which we didn't need to make any of them.
And I have just taken over the Field Service function and the pressure to make it work perfectly and at a profit is increasing, except I mostly get indirect micromanagement instead of goals and strategies.
And the project to make everything in one product line on one pretty pretty platform is a bit off the rails due to technical snags. It's a rather messy project. Ugh.
So work days are long these days.
Thursday, March 04, 2010
Hack
No so much coughing now - I had to pause to cough just then - as before. I apparently still hate being sick.
We had one of those cleanup days round here on Monday. That's where the garbage collection company allows you to put out just about anything short of a herd of expired rhinos and they'll haul it all off. We put out a couple of decrepit bikes, a few bundles of half rotted fence boards, a bunch of particle board shelving unit that had been cut up, a few cans of trash of various sorts, an old lounger frame, etc..
It looked like the garbage dump had burped up a whole load of stuff onto our curbside. I thought for sure they would leave some of it behind as not allowed or too much. Nope. When I came home it was ALL GONE like magical laborers had taken it away. It was awesome.
We had one of those cleanup days round here on Monday. That's where the garbage collection company allows you to put out just about anything short of a herd of expired rhinos and they'll haul it all off. We put out a couple of decrepit bikes, a few bundles of half rotted fence boards, a bunch of particle board shelving unit that had been cut up, a few cans of trash of various sorts, an old lounger frame, etc..
It looked like the garbage dump had burped up a whole load of stuff onto our curbside. I thought for sure they would leave some of it behind as not allowed or too much. Nope. When I came home it was ALL GONE like magical laborers had taken it away. It was awesome.
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