Your Disaster is My Picnic
I've been dealing with some users in London, and while I haven't worked with them in the past, I hadn't expected what I received either - near paralyzing panic towards any change. It was almost funny, if it weren't so sad, and they have the final sign-off on the deployment of the work I've been doing of late.
They want to think of themselves as "clued-in"... you know, aware of the ins and outs, the whys and wherefores, of everything that's going on. They are, after all, the users, the Big Cheese. You don't get much more important than that. But in reality, they are people, no more, no less, and have limited attention spans, and finite memories, and make just as many mistakes as the rest of us do.
So when one of the users doesn't like the price my injector is sending in, he calls it a "bug". Fair enough, he doesn't know it's acting exactly as it's supposed to - he sees something acting different from what he expects and it's a problem. So I explain it to him. I explain that there are rules that are followed, and why. I explain all this to him so that he understands that it's not a bug, it's a conscience decision. I feel that he may not be happy about the outcome, but at least he knows it's not a mistake.
Or so I thought...
Next he starts talking to other folks about the "bug" he's working on. Sigh... it's not a bug, I explain again, this time to a larger audience, it's a design choice made by the heads of the business, and not to be changed lightly. But it can be changed, if necessary. At this point, I think it's explained well... with examples and reasons for the individual rules.
Sigh...
I see it coming up again. Now I know this guy is not dumb... he's probably just not paying attention to the things I'm saying. Ignoring the details of my messages and just reading what he wants to read -- "You're not going to get it." From there, it's a simple "Oh yes I am!" and we're off to the races.
In other situations, this guy is probably a decent guy. But here and now, he's making me realize that I need to use smaller words, and treat him as I would a child. I have no desire to do this, but it's the only way to keep from wasting both our times. It's working the way it's meant to work, so it's not a "bug"... please stay with me, here, people.