The last few weeks have been quite a doosy for me as I was covering a few project management duties for the head-fellow as he was on vacation. Usually, as a consultant, I’d need better pointers than what I am as a constructor. I have friends who can vouch for my skill yet they’d tell you that socially I’d need an entire training centre. Especially with what was said, by me, to a client who isn’t sharing our uncontrollable parameters. Or patience.
A few weeks ago, I opened an email regarding a update that was needed. Then, I noticed that there was a duplicate email, saying the same EXACT SAME THING AS THE FIRST.
- Same request.
- Same wording.
- Same email.
- Different timing, though. 1 hour apart, if I do remember.
Alright. Hoping to resolve my own patience, I started the search for any mail-daemon text. Usually, it’s that “email not found and bouncing back” stuff. Well… I didn’t see any. NONE. The client would have got this and, out of the moment, would have sent the email back to the correct address. No, he was able to get my email address right the first time. The second time, too. Odd.
Now, I checked out a similar email. This being the third. Pretty much the same. The timing was slightly younger than the first few. I also noticed that these were happening at times where I would be either shut down, or returning from a night of debauchery.Of course, two was not much of a problem, but consider this: what if it wasn’t just 3 emails. More fuel to the fire: what if it was not just one client? Sifting through several letters, all meaning the same thing. For the client – sure. Just being thorough. For me, though: a waste of time. There’s forgiveness and then there’s that WTF moment. Lines do need to be drawn in some sort of Crayola since there is no tidy way to break them. If the client
Don't Drink And Code
threw up a “To Review” or “To Follow Up”, I would have turned the other cheek. Waiting a couple hours during business hours and with some sort of *due date would have sufficed.
* I don’t understand ASAP, or Yesterday, from clients at all. It’s a different language completely. You can’t EVEN tell me “DUE YESTERDAY MORNING” and hope that I didn’t blank out, thinking that you were speaking Markham Cantonese. I’d break out the popcorn and expect subtitles.
So, I decided to be vocal and as diplomatic as I, and whatever my old College Writing course, could possibly allow me. Somehow, I thought that I was well in the paint with my response. I didn’t say anything abrasive. I just pointed out that it would be difficult to meet a standard so high. Especially when my thoughts were not with my body.
Of course, there was a discussion about what I wrote. Which was pretty much a pat on the back. Even to this very day, as glorious or curt as it was. And of course, as I heard in a classic Smart Guy episode will paraphrase it: I was not sorry about what I wrote, but I would gracefully apologize about the way I said it. There has to be limits to what’s acceptable as good communication from clients and from the providers. Multiple emails, that only repeat to-dos in hours, isn’t solidifying the ever-warring relationship any further. Pro-Tip.
