The Celebrated Mr. H.

Buck 99 continued to believe himself to be subject to the laws of nature, unaware that those laws were defined by a program being executed on a doomed spacecraft. The program enforced each law regardless of whether Buck knew about it. Ignorance of the law was no defense against its enforcement. For example, if Buck were to somehow be unaware of the laws of gravity and go stepping off of a high ledge, a loud, painful splat would quickly educate him. Thus were the laws of the program learnable.

Buck was gradually becoming familiar with the laws as they were applied in the Cubopolis milieu. For example, he understood well the natural consequences of foolishly promising to deliver a specific piece of work by a specific date and time. Making such a promise is a common rookie mistake. The promised time comes and goes, and much stress and worry ensues. Eventually, after having repeatedly experienced these negative stimuli, one tries to avoid them by becoming more vague when making such promises. Instead of promising 5:00 PM, for example, one will try to employ acronyms such as “COB” or “EOD.” Unfortunately these do not help since they only guarantee that one will have to finish the work from home and forfeit the right to kick back and unwind. One must be vaguer than that, expressing one’s intentions in terms of weeks or months, but sooner or later the client will inevitably hold his ground and try to corner the victim.

“The key,” wrote the authoritative Buck as if advising an imaginary young protégé wearing a flimsy silk negligee, “is to think of it as a negotiation in multiple dimensions. When they try to pin you on when, that’s when you switch the topic to what. Sure, go ahead and promise a specific date and time if you must, but make sure you get something in return like scope concessions or obfuscation of the details around whatever it is you have to deliver. If possible, become increasingly vague about what content will be included in a given version of a deliverable even as the dates are becoming more solidified.”

Sometimes Buck’s awesome skills as a professional procrastinator astounded even himself, and he paused for a moment to admire his own brilliance. His euphoria was short lived, however, once the Fraud Complex filter through which he viewed himself brought the context of his procrastination into sharper focus. Was it possible to rid himself of FCD (Fraud Complex Disorder) so he could procrastinate at the office to his heart’s content for the remainder of his career, completely guilt free? His gut said no because the FCD was needed to ensure that enough quality work got done to keep him gainfully employed. As he pondered this dilemma he became acutely aware that he’d covered much of this ground already in this same blog. Only two weeks in and he was already starving for material. He was treading on dangerous ground. Nobody was going to try to get him to endorse their products if he established himself as a washed up hack regurgitating the same tired material week after week. He needed a new topic, and he needed it fast.

He glanced over at his client and watched him draw a diagram on the whiteboard. His client was a native of a distant land, and not one of those vastly overpopulated countries that foreigners in the American workplace typically come from. His client, who Buck shall hereafter refer to as Mr. H., came from a very exotic destination, and one which Buck aspired to one day visit. In recent weeks, Mr. H. had come to trust Buck as someone who could guide him through various aspects of American culture. For example, Mr. H. worried about being suddenly and randomly fired by the powers that be within Cubopolis, an event perhaps common in his homeland but much rarer here. This fear would be understandable if Mr. H.’s papers were not in order, but he had a green card and was well on his way to citizenship. He owned a house and had a wife and kids, one of which attended one of the county’s schools for the gifted. By all accounts Mr. H. strove to ensure that the exterior of his house and yard were well maintained to present proper appearances consistent with high suburban standards. He was a top performer in the workplace, and his superiors had rightly entrusted him with a great deal of responsibility. He was very conscientious about every moment he spent at the office, unlike his consultant. Buck believed that guys like this don’t just get fired without cause. They get laid off, sure, but they receive decent severance packages, especially from this particular instance of Cubopolis. He tried to reassure Mr. H. about this, but Mr. H. remained unconvinced. Perhaps Buck was naïve.

In general, though, Mr. H. utilized Buck’s consulting services beyond the scope of the contract. Just the previous morning, in fact, Mr. H. had asked Buck for advice on finding a trustworthy general contractor to repair some recent and extensive damage done to his deck by a violent storm. He was being careful to balance the need to quickly remediate the eye-sore that his deck was inflicting upon his neighbors with the caution that was necessary to avoid being victimized by a crooked and/or incompetent general contractor. Buck would be the first to admit that if left to his own devices, he himself would end up being victimized under similar circumstances. He was nearly certain that he had been cheated many times over the years by various and sundry automobile mechanics. This time was different, though. This time it was a client, and one he was coming to regard as a friend.

Buck quickly sprang into action, applying the time-honored tools of the consultant: technology and personal network. A quick call to Mrs. 99 on her mobile phone set the wheels in motion. She agreed to poll her peers at a social club engagement later that same evening, and also to touch base with two of their neighbors who had recently had significant work of the same sort done. Buck would have good answers for Mr. H. in a very aggressive timeframe, further solidifying the relationship with his client. This could prove very useful if his client ever found out about the blog.