Can I Irritate an Engineer?

“An engineer can only be in one of two conditions” an engineer friend once told me, “Approximately right or absolutely wrong.” He was a retired aerospace engineer who had started with a slide rule and ended up doing CADCAM. Expounding further, he stated, “The ones with the courage to be approximately right are rare. The ones who can only be absolutely wrong are common, and only good for padding a ‘cost plus’ contract.” Harsh word, to be sure.

In my late twenties, I had the good fortune to work for a weird, off the wall, engineer who was also a Harvard MBA. No slack allowed.

He was fired from an aircraft maker for a project gone wrong. He devised a system, using compressed air, to fire fowl at aircraft windscreens. His system worked, but was a public relations disaster, as he used live fowl.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SphwjDru8Fw&NR=1

The Russians may not have cared.

He wasn‘t tightly wrapped. Allegedly, at home, he liked to watch television with a unloaded revolver at hand. When there was a gun fight on TV, he would dry fire at the screen. He would use binoculars to examine cracks in his ceiling. He bought a house based on the location of the sun during his commute. Salesmen calling on us would be worn down but the unending questions he could generate. He was also very familiar with distilled spirits.

Many people who worked for him were not happy campers. We got along. I’ve always believed that every day I put my job on the line. He liked that. I gave him accurate information. Often the information was negative. Not all projects were successes and our business was high risk construction. There would be yelling, then decisions made, and we would go forward. I learned many valuable business lessons from him, especially diligent planning. He also gave me near impossible assignments. One was collecting accounts receivables from those lying sacks of shit at Boeing. Another was finding month to month renters for our excess warehouse space. We ended up storing parts for the Unlimited Boat Teams based in Seattle, PACCAR (Kenworth Trucks), and the LSofSs at mother _______ Boeing. Some of my more extreme collection methods were discussed behind close doors and greatly modified.

He might rip me in private but he always backed me publicly. When he and the new stockholders got sideways, I soon followed him out the door.

His replacement was an engineer of the second type. After bankrupting the company in less than two years, he went on to greater glory by screwing up the propulsion program for a new class of state ferries.

There are six steps to a project.

1. Initial enthusiasm.
2. Disillusionment.
3. Panic
4. Search for the guilty.
5. Punishment of the innocent.
6. Praise and honors for the non participants.

Today, my part time job involves working for several engineers. From where I sit, little has changed. You just wait them out as they get tired from running their mental hamster wheels. The good part is the general manager has the courage to be approximately right.

Despite all the barbs, I have a lot of respect for engineers. Takes brains and dedication just to get through the schools. Way smarter people than me. Their problem in dealing with me was decision making. I would make more decisions in the first two hours of a day than they would in two days. As an example, we were vacuum forming a different plastic than usual. The exhaust from the vacuum tank was in the center of the vacuum tank and was distorting the plastic. While they were standing there discussing the problem (at $37 per minute), I grabbed an electrical double wall box, placed it over the vent, and viola!, no more problem. I must have spent at least ten minutes on that. Onward we went, on a six figure project, that, By Gawd, stayed on schedule.

The engineer quoted at the start of the posting taught me a painful lesson. I didn’t want to take the time to learn computer stuff, DOS, whatever. He created a one of a kind program, just for me, that I could use without brain damage. Using that program for preparing bids, we went from apparent low bidder 32% of the time to apparent low bidder 78% of the time. Smack me with a 2x4!

For an endeavor to succeed, all types need to contribute (even bean counters and lawyers). I most admire those individuals whose leadership can blend it all together. They, if not hobbled by the absolutely wrong rules enforcers, can make this country grow and prosper.

During one of the many construction slumps, I started selling cars. The intention was to do that until business conditions improved. Guess they didn’t improve again for the next twenty five years. What I learned from my MBA Engineer boss was to plan, keep records, measure results, and plan again with better data. Worked for me, even thought I did it (and still do) with the willing grace of a pig on ice skates.