🚀 go-pugleaf

On 2018-07-19, Dan Espen <dan1...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Charles Richmond <nume...@aquaporin4.com> writes:
>
>> Mr. Espen, even you can get tired of people with stupid
>> questions... people who waste your time and talents because they are
>> too lazy (or not really interested enough) to do a *little* work and
>> look things up themselves.
>
> I suppose, but I remember one co-worker that could not be made to
> understand MVS JCL's "not cataloged 2" message.  Tried every way
> I could think of to explain it.  Eventually left her with working
> JCL and never yelled at her.  Perhaps because I spent years as
> a consultant I learned to treat co-workers as customers and
> adopted the attitude that the customer is always right.

Sometimes the only way I can deal with such situations is to view
the customers as living in a separate reality (thanks, Carlos
Castaneda, for the book of that title).  My job is to serve as
a bridge between the two realities.  Coming up with a mapping
between them is a challenge.

On the other hand, I left one job when I got tired of bridging
the yawning chasm between the Real World and salesmen's fantasies.

> Honestly can't remember losing patience for those with less
> ability.  If I spent a lot of time with someone and thought
> they might be learning, I'd try to broach the subject of how
> valuable reading manuals is.  Something like:
>
> Gee, you know so much, thanks for your help.
> You're welcome.  You can learn even more by reading manual X.
>
> (Yeah, I'm perfect.)
>
> :)

Sometimes, when you encounter a User from Hell who won't understand
however many times you explain, and won't use the quick and easy
tools you designed to let them do the job effortlessly, you just
have to answer their questions for the nth time, send them away,
and pray that it'll be a while before they (inevitably) come back
with the same questions the n+1th time.

-- 
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