|
|
| Subject | Author | hoytster
Global user
(5/22/00 8:02:55 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del All | The worst contractor you ever knew
I've known three.
One was a pleasant, competent fellow you could never find half-the-time, like he had a really serious cigarette habit. It turned out he had two full-time contracts going at the same time, situated a couple blocks apart, and he would buzz from one to the other and back. Billing 40 hours a week both places! When my agency found out, they fired him. I ran into him later, and he laughed about it: "I had another gig already; when they fired me, I just went to the other gig." I did appreciate his good humor about it.
Another case was sadder. I always came in early, and this guy would come in early too, and make a great deal of fuss about trying to locate our supervisor, who always came in later. "Tell her I was here, OK?" Then he'd be gone until late afternoon, when another loud "Have you seen her?" shoutfest would ensue so we all knew he was there. In his case, it turned out he was an alcoholic; he spent all day in a bar down the road. When the client found out, they made the contract agency reimburse all they'd paid the guy.
The third case was comical but infuriating, sort of. This contractor was 23 and looked 33, talked a very good game and knew very little, was acclaimed by the client but considered an idiot by the crew of knowledgeable contractors on the team. The very sharp contractor in the next cubby was in a terrible state of frustration for months and months, listening to this guy's moronic pronouncements and watching the client go "wow" each time. He wasn't stupid, just young and uneducated and gifted with an incredible talent for snowing the client. I bet he's doing fine nowadays (and did then, from every viewpoint except the application's).
Do you have any war stories along these lines?
- Hoytster
| tinyd
Global user
(5/22/00 8:41:49 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | There have been so many....
In fact, I used to tell the boss at a previous gig that every time they hired another contractor, it made me look like I walked on water.
My three are all bad girls.
There was the one who complained. Not just a little, but from the moment she arrived in the morning until the second she left. Every conversation with that woman was a bitchfest. If she couldn't find anyone to talk to (and she often couldn't, as they would be hiding), she'd call someone and bitch. Corpses would run away from this woman. She had a resume that would choke a horse, but a personality that matched a different part of the horse. Guess who was first to go when it was time to cut the head count? And imagine the sigh of relief that followed.
There was the one who was sent to a client site and so pissed off everyone there that the client insisted she not be allowed in the building ever again. I was hired to clean up the project she was supposed to do. The deal was that she was still doing it, but I was the front for the client. Wrong again. She did squat. She did it from home, where she didn't answer the phone whenever anyone called looking for deliverables. She lied like a rug, and finally claimed to have some illness that would prevent any further work. All told, I'd say she milked that project for a good two months without hitting a lick.
And there was the one who arivved in the office at unpredictable times, then disappeared for a few hours in the middle of the day. Once she showed up around 9:30, then asked if she could take lunch early. She disappeared immediately and was not seen again until after 4. She was a junkie. She met her dealer for her fix in the middle of the day.
Okay, one guy. Gig I was working on last year. He's supposed to write half of a five-day class for a field service audience. We divvy up the work at the kickoff meeting. I see him a week later, and he's printing out slide presentations from the corporate intranet. Lots of them. He mumbles something about studying the source material - trust me, it's not on those slides. Two weeks later, I'm on a visit to the client, and I take a look in the project directory to see how far he's got. Aha! There's a file in the directory. In the file, Mr. Brilliant has written the word "text" at the top of 50 pages. He got away with doing nothing for just 4 weeks before he was sent away.
| tracyb
Global user
(5/22/00 9:54:44 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Re: The worst contractor you ever knew
1) He talked a good game in the beginning, but never could deliver anything. Then he started disappearing for hours on end. No one could ever find him. We speculated that he was over at the local 'Barnes & Noble', leisurely sipping a Cappucino & reading "War & Peace". We never did discover what he was doing.
2) A sexist young 'know-it-all' from one of the big six. Spoke very condescendingly to all the women in the group. Once tried to show me how to use an access database that I had created! He volunteered to show me how to "cut-and-paste" into the database from Excel (perhaps I should have shown him how to import the data instead)! The very mention of his name still makes me steam!
There are probably more, but these two come to mind immediately.Edited by tracyb at: 5/22/00 9:54:44 pm
| 1Aussie1
Unregistered User
(5/22/00 11:05:09 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Boofhead Contractors I Have Known
An IMS DB fellow .... requirement is to read through an input trans (flat) file, and then call the relevant segment in the database. Flat file is in the same order as the database, on average only about half a dozen unwanted segments sequentially between each required segment. So you start with a Get Unique, and then do qualified Get Nexts, right ? Not this Sonny Jim. Nothing but Get Uniques. Which essentially takes you right back to the begining each time. Bloody program ran for about 12 hrs before it got canned. The contractor lasted about 3 months more. On the plus side, he could make Oliver Cromwell laugh, so despite the fact he was no contractor, we were sorry to see him get his marching orders.
We had one guy whose greatest joy in life was to progressively take everyone down at cards tricks, generally of the THREE card type. Only ever took one dollar off each individual, but still. Only four of us didn't get suckered in. Eventually the Head of Operations got him a beauty, cards-wise. The said contractor was not aware that the Ops guy could undo a cut one-handed.....
To raise the tone of this winge a bit, I'd say that the BEST contractor I ever knew, a little Yorkie fellow, was the most incredibly intuitive and downright most HELPFUL contractor I've ever seen. Seen it all, and debugged it all (which is a little variation on how some RSM's used to introduce young medical officers..."Men, I want you to meet Captain X, who's HAD it all, and CURED it all"). I think I learnt more off him Production-Support-wise in three months than I'd learnt in the whole previous three years put together. Including that little Prod Supp ditty that I'm sure most of you have heard :
"It's not my place to shovel coal,
Or make the whistle blow;
It's not my place to say just where
The train's supposed to go ;
It's not my place to blow off steam,
Or even clang the bell ;
But just let the dam thing jump the tracks
And see who catches hell!"
| CFMiller 
Local user
(5/23/00 10:11:27 am)
Reply | Edit | Del | Re: The worst contractor you ever knew
One of two with whom I shared an office (not at the same time, thank God!):
The first was a sociopath who spent most of his time trying to get people fired (for example, called the Governor of the state to demand the firing of the 3rd grade teacher who would not let his son eat candy in class) and plotting elaborate revenges against all who had wronged him (that would be you, me, and everyone else in the world). When he couldn't get me fired, he called my wife's boss and demanded that she be fired.
The second was just nasty: ANYTHING said or done by anyone else was stupid, only he and his Mommy understood that he's the smartest of all! Nothing was too petty, for example I once said to some friends on the team 'was in a bar last night drinking 'Sam Adams' and watching the game' when he interrupts 'That's wrong, you're stupid! there's NO SUCH THING as 'Sam Adams' beer. HOWEVER, there IS a beer named 'Samuel Adams'!'. Boy, did I ever feel dumb! (not!!) Shared an office with him for 4 months before demanding to be moved, and I then learned that there was an office pool on how long anyone sharing an office with him would last. The winner (closest guess) had guessed 2 weeks.
In a more perfect world, these two would be roomies.
| JMS
Unregistered User
(5/23/00 11:30:09 am)
Reply | Edit | Del | #1, #2, and honorable mention.
Let's see. honorable mention would go to the guy I knew in Chicago who was fired for stealing a case of coffee from the coffee room. Dude was making mid six figures as a gifted senior developer with all the overtime and was stealing coffee. Coffee was paid for at this gig by all the employee's and we contractors who paid $12 bucks a month apiece to buy the supplies. What a dope. But he only get's honorable mention on my list..
Let's see, there was the guy who tried to live in the parking lot of the office sight in his van. As bad as this sounds this wasn't the kicker. The kicker was he also had 9 cats living in his van with him. No joke, nice feral mean ass cats in cages in this dudes van. Dude would come in in the morning smelling of cat piss. Would stink up the entire floor. Several of us, curious contractors followed our noses right to his jacket after 5 minutes in the same building with him; So we knew he was living there for weeks before the boss. The boss, who's office wasn't on our hall, found out when security informed him about the sixth time they asked the contracter to remove his camp site from their parking lot. Although, I must say, this guy was a great guy. Salt of the earth, very friendly, and a good trustworthy man. I just wouldn't want him living in my parking lot. Story was he had a conflict with the IRS and the IRS was severly docking his pay to resolve the issue. That was his storry. This was his solution. Dude kept his job there for another year after that. Mostly living on the rest of our groups couches eventually getting an appartment of his own. This guy is number 2 on my list.
#1 on my list is my special friend I met at IBM back in the 80's. Dude was my office mate for 5 very interesting days. Seemed normal enough first day, except complained a lot that the building didn't have windows that openned. I didn't think it was too odd when he put an umbrulla in the offices air vent to keep the air from dirrectly hitting him. Takes all sorts. Didn't think it was odd the next day when he came into the casual work enviromnent wearing surgical pants. Ok it was odd when he came in the third day with the matching shirt and shoes and by the end of the day even the mask and cap too. He only got fired on the fifth day though when our manager found out he had been tripping women in the cafeteria and leaving the elevator. A woman he had tripped for the second time followed him back to our office and reported him to the manager. Seems my odd little budy liked to trip women and then laugh at them when they fell to the ground. Was one of those things you're not quite sure of what happened when it happened, and this jerk is standing over you laughing.. When it happenned for the second time to the same chick, she tracked him down. As security came into my office accompanied by our female manager, she did a double take as she saw this guy in his full surgical garb for the first time. She looked at me, and I gave a raised eyebrow, shoulder shrug. I thought I had seen it all, but he was unique.
| Farnorth
Global user
(5/23/00 11:53:38 am)
Reply | Edit | Del | The worst and two best in the same contract
The worst contractor I worked with was an aging aerospace contractor hired to do subject area content reviews of data to be inserted into a database I was designing. He was a nice guy, but couldn't concentrate on anything and couldn't shut his mouth. Unfortunately, I shared an office with him. By the end of the first six-month contract, no one on the team would talk to him. Not that we disliked him, but if we said ANYTHING at all to the man, we'd lose at least a half day's work listening to minutia.
The two best contractors I've ever had the pleasure of working with were on the same team. One was a data entry clerk who was the hardest worker I've ever seen. She could do mind-numbingly dull work for 8 hours, and the results were perfect, delivered on time and she was ALWAYS pleasant (in fact, she was always hysterically funny). She was one of the least punctual people I've ever met, but unfailingly honest. If she walked in at 9:10am, she left at 6:10pm. To the minute, she always delivered 8 hours of perfect work. I was in awe.
The other contractor was a programmer who was kind enough to share his skills with me. He routinely spent one morning a week of pure tutoring with me, and was always available when I had programming questions. Although we worked for different companies, he felt the time he spent with me strengthened the team (and our client agreed). By the time I finished the contract - which I started as a data analyst - I had such excellent SQL programming training from him I was able to move into DBA work. He has also been one of my best technical references. Everyone who has ever worked with the man raves about his skills, personality and professionalism.
I don't think it matters what type of work you do as a contractor, it's the quality and integrity of your work that is your legacy.
| Don Wallace
Moderator
(5/23/00 12:46:06 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | You guys/gals have me beat...
I only have employee horror stories... most of the contractors I've known have actually been saner than the natives.
Let's see. There was the mega defensive, redneck @$$hole high school dropout VB developer whom I heard almost pushed the group manager out a second story window. In the same orifice, there was the VB developer who lived in a van and had stories about using a big gulp cup as a porta potty of sorts in the van... Yeah, it must be about VB. :-)Email: realrates@donwallace.com
Consulting Profile: http://www.donwallace.com
| Anton
Local user
(5/23/00 2:01:52 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Here's a KICKER
I worked at a company once as a contractor - a BIG computer company that was purchased later by Compaq.
Anyways, I was the 3rd contractor. After several months, we had about 20 contractors. The first guy was older than the rest of us (late 30's). He knew HTML, but that was IT. He had survived by taking on all the stupid responsibilities that nobody else wanted - he was the guy responsible for backups. For copying code to the production servers. For being on call on weekends, etc. He was sort of the go-to guy for everything, even though he was terrible at web development. He was a real nit-picker - would read your source code and bitch about how your comments were not relevant, or how you had capitalized your HTML tags... it was bad. This guy used to play the politics game in a BIG way. ALWAYS jocking for position, always talking about EVERYONE. He was fun to be around, but then the next day you'd hear how he was talking about you again, etc.
Anyways, the FUNNY part of this story is when I was working on a big project and I decided to come in on a Saturday to finish it up. Nobody ever worked weekends there (except this guy), and I had not mentioned I was coming in - just decided to when I left on Friday.
I walk into our area on Saturday around 10am, and as I walk over to our common area (we had no cubes, just desks arranged in one big area) I notice that this guy it sitting at his desk, with PORN all over his screen, with his PANTS AND UNDERWEAR AROUND HIS ANKLES, "standing at attention" if you get my drift, and giving himself a little digital love (pun intended).
He stood up (ewwww), said he was just tucking in his shirt, swifly pulled up his underwear and pants, and kept making jokes all day like nothing had happened. It was all I could do all day not to die laughing, and I NEVER, EVER, EVER let this guy TOUCH my computer or my mouse 
God, I am laughing just thinking about it
| hoytster
Global user
(5/23/00 2:04:11 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | That one will not be topped
These are all variously amusing and incredible, but Mr. Shorts Around Ankles is untoppable. LOLOLOLOL
- Hoytster
| Don Wallace
Moderator
(5/23/00 2:06:08 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | And I'll bet...
You never borrowed HIS keyboard either...
| Cathar
Global user
(5/23/00 3:27:39 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | And I Bet You Used Styrofoam Coffee Cups Too
| Anton
Local user
(5/23/00 7:16:43 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Actually, just to add more embarassment.....
...I have observed that people who are caught in EXTREMELY embarassing situations often do things to cover for what they were caught doing. Even if their "covering" is VERY obvious and contrived. For example, the guy who passes wind in a public area, only to spend the next 5 minutes occasionally coughing - yeah, like maybe will be duped into thinking that rasping sound emanating from your ass was really just some sort of bizarre cough that reflected off your coworker to appear as if it came from your posterior. I digress...
What "Mr. Shorts Around Ankles" did for about 3 months after the incident, is that he would CONSTANTLY and VERY LOUDLY proclaim his frustration with always ending up at PORN sites whenever he did a web search for anything. He would turn his monitor to the center of the common area (usually with some lewd picture on his screen) and say something like "DAMMIT! LOOK AT THIS! I ALWAYS END UP AT THESE NASTY PORN SITES WHEN I AM JUST LOOKING FOR INFORMATION ON JAVASCRIPT". This is funny in-and-of itself, but the REALLY humorous aspect to it was that it was SO OBVIOUS that he was lying - ANYONE can avoid porn sites, and claiming that searching for computer terms resulted in being given a rash of porn sites was just plain dumb. This had the effect of me laughing my ass off everytime he did it (because I knew what he was REALLY doing, and no amount of covering was going to make me believe otherwise), and also the effect of making everyone else in this common area (which was about 20 contractors) think this guy was a real pervert, and a conspicuous one at that.
Ok, I'm done - I'm splitting at the sides!
| Catholic Lad
Unregistered User
(5/23/00 7:54:49 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Like you guys have never flogged the dolphin..
at work.
| hoytster
Global user
(5/23/00 8:12:54 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Torturing Dave
This has been a good topic! Thanks for all the responses.
I'm inspired to tell you about how evil I was, cruelly torturing the Dave the Bad Contractor. Dave was inclined to blame me for everything. I was in charge of the framework, so when something failed, he thought it must be my mistake. It got annoying. One day he terminally pissed me off by telling me it must be MY fault that his button moved each time he clicked it.
OK, show me your code, Dave. His code contained:
x = x + 1 // Count something
Dave was apparently unaware of the elementary PowerBuilder factoid that 'x' is an instance variable on every control; it determines the control's x-position... thus Dave's button moved a little with each click. MY fault. Grrrrr.
So I invented the unclickable button. It detected when the pointer was over it, and moved out from under the pointer. After a second, it would return to its starting position, daring you to try again. I built it into the application framework, so every button in the app offered the you-can't-click-me "feature".
The diabolical part was how I made it intermittant, temporary, and localized to Dave. I detected if the user was Dave, by examining the Windows logon ID. Then I called a random() number routine, so the 'agitate button' code was only invoked about 1% of the time that Dave tried to click a button. Then I would turn OFF the 'agitate' feature after ten seconds, returning the button to its original position.
It was hilarious. Dave would explode in his cubby. "Come look, come look, it's doing it again!" Of course, by the time anyone got there, the button was back in place, acting like an ordinary button. "Sure, right, Dave", looking at him like he's nuts. All the other contractors were in on the joke, so we would silently giggle at each outburst.
I'm still laughing. It was mean, though. If you're out there, Dave, I apologize.
Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned.
- Hoytster
| 1Aussie1
Unregistered User
(5/23/00 9:07:33 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Re : The worst contractor you ever knew
Back in the days before I became a proggie, I used to be an Industrial Chemist. I once worked for this small manufacturing company, where their in-house accountant was a member of the local amateur theatrical society. Early one morning, I'm standing around the local "pie-cart" with the factory lads, eating breakfast and waiting to bundy on, when behind me I hear the voice of the accountant saying "Excuse me". I turn around, and get the shock of me young life. The staid accountant was done up in what transpired to be the Dr Jekyll (or more correctly, Mr Hyde) outfit from some theatrical triumph of his many years ago. Evil-looking make-up, weird false teeth, and Victorian-era outfit, and all. But none of the factory hands seem the slightest bit put out. They all just said "Mornin', Les", and trailed off to bundy on at the timeclock.
Later in the Works Lab, I recounted this incident to the Head Chemist. "Oh, yeah," he said, "Les always adopts that disguise at this time of the year when he's doing the company's taxes. He says it increases his ingenuity……".
| tinyd
Global user
(5/23/00 9:11:16 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Rewards of flogging...
I knew of a fellow (FTE) at another company now owned by Compaq who did indeed practice the solitary sin of self-abuse during the work day. In his cube. With porn on the screen. Some people, um, noticed and remarked on this to management.
Mangement responded by moving him to an office with a DOOR.
| Regular
Unregistered User
(5/23/00 10:01:06 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Re: Rewards of flogging...
Well, I guess that's one way to get out of the cube farm and into your own office! Let's hope the idea doesn't catch on too widely!!!
| Visitor
Unregistered User
(5/23/00 10:32:27 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Strangest boss.
Well, I was working at this job, and the story is that this ultra-conservative boss would ( accidentally ) brush the legs and laps of all the MALE contractors he came into contact
with!!! I know for a fact that several of my buddies were pretty pissed off at this guy
after having had to sit with him for a discussion. Why do people do these dumb things?
| paul s
Unregistered User
(5/23/00 11:01:29 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | not as good as the pants down guy but...
A long time ago when I was a perm they hired this guy from China (this was his second job in the US). I saw his resume and he claimed to have 4 years of C/Unix exp but he was unable to compile code without assitance, or understand what was going on at all. He didn't even know what the unix man pages were. He never did anything yet always billed 10 hr days.
Once he was tasked to write some multitasking software and after I gave him a brief lesson he proceeded to write some code forking off tasks in an infinite loop. You would think that after he brought our server to its knees the first time he would of smartened up. No, he brought the server down 5 times that one day before he figured it out. Every time it happened I looked at his code and told him to take the damn fork call out of the loop. Each time he would nod and say ok but didn't do it.
We nicknamed him Dr. Fork.
He would always try and get the job of "helping" someone, then latch on to this poor sucker and contribute nothing but endless dumb questions. Then he would pretend he was running the show in front of the project lead and if you asked the lead a question he would repeat whatever answer was given as if he knew and could of answered for the lead. Sometimes he would actually laugh at your questions in front of the lead as though they were stupid. Oddly enough it took the lead about 3 weeks to figure out this guy was a moron.
After a short while I realized he was unable to read English as he asked me to read a few basic sentences out of a book for him once. My theory is that he was really a janitor in China but lied about his degree since he thought no one would check.
The sad part is that the client kept him around for 8 months.
| Cathar
Global user
(5/24/00 9:35:42 am)
Reply | Edit | Del | I Got A Blind Date For The Pants-Down Guy
I worked with a contractress who had somehow convinced herself of two faulty pieces of information - first that her breasts were too small, and second, that marijuana would help them grow.
She kept us updated with weekly reports. Despite intense scrutiny, I never saw any progress. However, she peed a whole rain forest on a scheduled urine test. She was escorted to the door, where she lifted her sweater to show the security guard the results of her experiments.
| hhhall
Local user
(5/24/00 6:37:48 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Re: The worst contractor you ever knew
Many years ago my manager hired a guy who we were to treat like a programming God....He had worked for 3 years on the Sabre system.......turned out he was a ticket agent.
| Webmaster Extraordinaire
Unregistered User
(5/24/00 9:50:08 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Pants around my ankles
An excellent title for an autobiography.
Not mine, of course.
| Webmaster Extraordinaire
Unregistered User
(5/24/00 9:53:01 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | and...
the domain name IS available.
| philipgw
Unregistered User
(5/25/00 4:36:17 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Not a consultant, but a mutual horror
I came in late one night to work on my code, swung around the corner and there was a computer operator hoisting his naked butt on the photocopying machine!
"I'm sorry," he gasped.
| wizodd
Unregistered User
(5/31/00 6:56:01 am)
Reply | Edit | Del | My worst pales beside these...
The worst guy I ever worked with was just incompetent.
I never did figure out how he got vetted by our borq (pimp), but it took me a month to get them to fire him.
He had 5 years of experiance, but knew nothing about how to use the machine. That was bad enough, but he couldn't restrain his ignorance in front of the client....
Additionally, he would ask the other contractors (and employees!) extremely basic questions, and then ARGUE with us about the answers! I quit answering him after a couple of days, but one of the other contracters (a real saint, and sharp as a atomic force microscope, would spend hours patiently explaining things to him.
| Dick Young
Local user
(5/31/00 11:29:55 am)
Reply | Edit | Del | Re: The worst contractor you ever knew
Perhaps not up to some "best of breed" mentions here - but definitely worth honorable mentions:
1) New client, bunch of us brought in to do accounting conversion. Been there just a couple of weeks. Came in one morning and found my cubemate and all the other contractors huddled in groups talking in low tones - BAAAD sign. It turns out that someone had been "keying" cars down in the undergound parking for several weeks - expensive cars, not picking on your everyday Taurus or Caprice. Security had finally got the guy on tape - IT contractor. This was early 90s when "downsizing" was all the rage and the guy had been axed after 15+ yrs at a local defense co. Best we could figure out he really had a case of the ass with people who still had FTE jobs. So he took it out on folks with fancy wheels. Client told him that he had to reimburse everyone whose car was damaged or they would press criminal charges. All the contractors collectively decided we would call everyone we knew in the business in this metro area and spread the word on this guy for self-protection. Once the client caught the guy, they were quite decent to the rest of the contractors and even called us all together to tell us they realized it was an abberation and that we were not under a collective cloud of suspicion, etc. Good client - wound up there 2 yrs and got my first opportunity to break into DBA work.
2) Another client, hordes of contractors constantly coming and going. Started out there working production support 8:00 PM to 8:00 AM four days per week. "Graduated" (survived?) to day shift after a few months. Got new levy of contractors on board. One guy from Houston seemed to have suitable credentials - decent references, etc. On his 3rd morning, our director stuck his head into our prod support room and found this guy fast asleep at a terminal around the corner from the rest of us. Turns out the guy was also working at a 3rd shift job stocking groceries. He apparently at one time had some kind of a low-level IT job and learned enought buzz words and/or where to find out plausible definitions of IT terminology. He kind of drifted from client to client and never lasted more than a week or so. Got a paycheck or two then got found out and pitched. Kind of ran out the string in Houston, then moved up here for a "fresh start".
Unfortunately, many clients were scared to give a reality-based reference - difficult to admit their screening stank and the guy was a member of a protected minority. Never ran into the guy again and hope he disappeared for good somewhere in the "crunch time" of 90-91 when even the real pros had a tough time finding a gig.
The unfortunate fall-out of many of these cases is that we all tend to get tarred with the same brush as the rotten apples.
| unix
Global user
(5/31/00 4:17:55 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Just plain incompetence
Nothing so interesting like in other posts, no loud fireworks and stuff...
Had one coworker who was bold, short, had a beard and was nicknamed Santa Claus. Was hired as a Unix SA but knew nothing about Unix. Took the client months to figure him out, mostly due to incompetence on client's side. Would work graveyard shifts, and drink coffee all night and check his email. I think he got hired by running enough buzzwords by the client and appearing somewhat knowledgeable, I think someone called him overqualified. 5 words per minute typing quickly put things in perspective...
Heard about a DBA who would crash databases on purpose, then clean log files up after himself and fix things and appear as a hero. Might have pulled it off once but got caught after not cleaning up the shell history files fully and correctly. Was escorted out of the building.
But nothing that could top some of the stories here!
| SASconsultant
Unregistered User
(6/1/00 3:31:48 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Dinosaur Consultant
Major NYC bank hired this SAS/mainframe consultant (let's call him David) around 1997 to assist me in creating ad-hoc reports for the department's analysts. When I met him, he seemed nice enough and knowledgeable in the field (buzz words were flying everywhere) but he had bad halitosis coupled with a very thick ethnic accent. He was very difficult to understand. On his second day, I knew something was wrong when he couldn't find the CTRL key and he didn't know how to insert a diskette into the a: drive. I immediately warned our manager that this is bad karma and this guy might be unproductive. Our manager didn't want to get rid of him and sure enough, it took David weeks to extract data from flat files and even longer to download them from the mainframe to Excel. Everyone started yelling at him because of untimely deliverables. I eventually left the bank and started working for another financial institution a few blocks from this bank. David took over the bulk of my work. He lasted three months before the manager decided he's had enough.
Well guess where David's next gig was going to be? In my new company and for the same manager I was reporting to. I was furious when I found this out. I met with my manager and warned him. It took my manager a week to decide that I was right. David was gone by the end of his first week.
| Mike Corbeil
Global user
(6/3/00 3:46:14 am)
Reply | Edit | Del | A jerk h1b from India. Won't get into details.
| Barney Gumbel
Unregistered User
(6/3/00 1:20:47 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Let me guess. He took your job, right?
| unix
Global user
(6/3/00 1:26:00 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Figuring out incompetence
A lot of clients really take their time when it comes to figuring out incompetence. The two stories, among others, illustrate that you don't need to know anything to be a consultant, and often a nice tie, shined shoes, professional manner is more important for the technically-naive and superficial managers. I have seen utter ignoramuses stick around for 3, 4, 5 and more months, who could not the basic tasks, just drunk coffee and checked their email their enitre shifts.. At some of these gigs, I really busted my @ss, and resented it when others didn't know or do anything. I don't, anymore. I think the client keeps
incompetents around for a reason - for a multitude of reasons, CYA reasons, scapegoat reasons, whatnot. I never knew one could make 10,000 in several months doing nothing all day.
| unix
Global user
(6/3/00 1:26:48 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Perhaps
What if he was a better contractor?
| hoytster
Global user
(6/5/00 7:00:57 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | A _couple_ took mine
They probably weren't H1Bs. This was 1992. Did the program exist then? Both of these guys were sporting newly-minted masters degrees in computer science from US colleges. I think there's a different program for such.
I had been pulling off miracles for my manager. The agency called me and told me I'd saved their a$$, making the manager happy after he'd fired my predecessor.
Then a different manager introduced me to these two nice young men from the subcontinent. "I want you to spend the next week showing them your code, getting them up to speed so they can take over the project." Uh, OK. When I got him alone, I asked whether there was some problem. "No, it's just that these two guys _together_ are cheaper than you, SIGNIFICANTLY cheaper." This is when my rate was $45/hour.
They were nice guys, well-spoken and respectful. I'm sure they'd earned their shiny new degrees. THEY KNEW SQUAT ABOUT C++. I spent the de-briefing week teaching these guys how to get through the edit-compile-link-execute cycle, use the debugger, basics about include files, etc. I don't know (or remember) what programming languages they used in graduate school, but they were C++ beginners.
They were willing to sleep in bunk beds, though, four to a room, sharing one car between eight guys in a two-bedroom apartment, just to have a chance to make some money and get some experience in the USA. I admired them for their attitude, and it helped me appreciate what an opportunity the USA represents for a lot of people.
Then I went and got another contract with a nice little bump in the rate... no harm done. I never heard how the project went.
- Hoytster
| Terry
Local user
(6/5/00 7:25:09 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | And three took mine...
They were willing to sleep in bunk beds, though, four to a room, sharing one car between eight guys in a
two-bedroom apartment, just to have a chance to make some money and get some experience in the USA.
Precisely! This is exactly what Amerikan biz is looking for - people to bunk together. To eat ramen noodles warmed in the microwave for dinner. To watch broadcast TV for their entertainment. They have a life? Not by our standards, but who gives a f**k?
They understand nothing about the US except what a great place it is to make bucks. Not to vote. Not to raise a family. Not to take part in government at all. To propel businesses comfortably esconced in the US of A and to put you out of work.
| California Guy
Unregistered User
(6/5/00 8:42:47 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Can't beat those, but...
Several of us were working out of the owner's garage,
but it was just me and the new 'sales' guy that
day. He asked me what time it was, so I pointed to the clock on the wall.
"I can't read analog", he said. Never saw him after
that day.
| fredwebster 
Global user
(6/5/00 9:01:52 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Re: A _couple_ took mine
"To eat ramen noodles"
I love ramen noodles!
| Jah Wren Ryel
Global user
(6/5/00 9:51:46 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | The sodium content will kill you
| Chuck Amuck
Unregistered User
(6/5/00 10:03:55 pm)
Reply | Edit | Del | Those conditions almost sound like
a WASP-staffed SiVal startup.
Minus the Nerf technology.
|
|
