The proverbial guy who steals the show at the end of the project 8

[Plasmech]

Anybody deal with this one...

You're the head guy on a project. Maybe the only guy. You're busting your butt getting drawings done, stuff spec'd out, parts ordered, in on time, fabricated, basically everything that the machine is well...it "is" becauuse you exist and for no other reason. You get the thing up and running. Beta site customer shows up to take a look at it, he loves it. Oh wait...what's this, is it a bird...a plane, a ufo? No, it's the proverbial guy who shows up after all the real work is done to steal the show. He's not necessarily a sales/marketing guy. he might just be someone that's been there a long time. Firneds with the owner. Whatever. He might not even be an engineer. But now it's beta site time, the fun stuff (more fun that drawings all day long anyway). Now show stealer is well, seemingly running the show. He's sending out status emails, reporting to the owner. You get mad, really mad. So mad you don't want to be there anymore. But...what do you do?

Anyone experience this type of thing?

(In the interest of not being sexist, one may replace the word "guy" with "gal" in this post if he/she choses)


-Plasmech

Mechanical Engineer, Plastics Industry

 

[MikeHalloran]

I have the t-shirt.

If you don't want to be there, don't be there. Take a vacation. You can't be productive until your attitude recovers.

There is some risk; the scene- stealer may have your job when you return.

So, you might want to make it a 'working' vacation, as in working a while for someone else to see if a different snakepit is more to your liking.

My experience has been that snakepits are all pretty much the same, and are all full of snakes.







Mike Halloran
Pembroke Pines, FL, USA

 

[CorBlimeyLimey]

What is 'The proverbial guy who steals the show at the end of the project' (TPGWSTSATEOTP) ... (lets's call him PG), what is his official position in the company. Is he just a colleague, supervisor, upper level manager? His position does make a difference.

Does PG have a working knowledge of what makes the machine do what it does and why? If not the lack of detailed knowledge can easily be shown up at the most opportune of times ... but might have consequences.

Where is PG getting his info from? What is to stop you from pre-empting his reports with your own more detailed versions?

 

[KENAT]

You can learn one thing from this, don't do the same thing. I try to be very careful to give credit where credit is due.

KENAT, probably the least qualified checker you'll ever meet...

 

[Senselessticker]

I didn't know it worked any other way...

 

[Plasmech]

The T-Shirt? Not sure I understand your reply 100% Mike...

-Plasmech

Mechanical Engineer, Plastics Industry

 

[davidbeach]

Reference to "Been there, done that, got the T-Shirt".

 

[zdas04]

Before you run off for a month in the sun, ask yourself "do you want his job?" and "can he do your job?". If the answer to both is "HELL NO" then what is the problem. People that can handle the details should. People that excel in the politics are much better off there than in front of a CAD station. Not getting credit hurts, but not nearly as much as not getting the kind of jobs you love doing.

David

David Simpson, PE
MuleShoe Engineering

http://www.muleshoe-eng.com

Please see FAQ731-376 for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips Fora.

The harder I work, the luckier I seem

 

[Plasmech]

Sorry if I am dense or something but I do not "get" the references to the vacations...can someone please explain? Thanks.

-Plasmech

Mechanical Engineer, Plastics Industry

 

[KENAT]

It's in Mikes post.

Basically take a break away from it and then come back with a clear head. May just be the 'count to 10' but on a larger scale.


KENAT, probably the least qualified checker you'll ever meet...

 

[ksy2k]

When I worked at a Power Station we had a similar thing...at the end of the shutdown all the people who had nothing to do with the work suddenly appeared and took the glory and went to the free food events...we called it the "Medals for the non-participants" scenario

 

[Plasmech]

In my opinion it really is beyond just annoying. It's infuriating, and it can bring out he worst in people. But, as was stated above, one can always find another snake pit to work in.


-Plasmech

Mechanical Engineer, Plastics Industry

 

[graybeach]

I once went to a ribbon cutting for a bridge I worked on. It was major engineering accomplishment, and we were all very proud of our work. We asked a newspaper photographer if he wanted to take a photo of the design team. Answer: Go as that guy over there...

 

[jmw]

Where do we get the "T" shirts?....

Yes, having been given a task and done it well I put together a report which I circulated for comment before submission to he who pays the salary. Before that happened we had a meeting with the boss and this brown-noser started in with a verbal report based on my written report but as if it was his own.

What did I do?
Nothing but learn from it. Like they say, experience is a good teacher but sends big bills.
What were my options?
Most of them would make me look like a jerk and the rest would get me jailed.

By the way, the holiday option has a practical side to it.
While you're away he has to run the show on his own. So ok, if he is the brown-nose type, any mistakes will be latent defects caused by you, so who said life was fair?

JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[cvg]

If you are the "head guy" on the project (the project manager) than you are truly in charge of it. You should have the authority to staff the project the way you want to. You get the glory if it goes well and take the beating if it doesn't. You decide who will do the marketing, beta testing, whatever. If you are not truly in control of the entire show, it sounds like you aren't really the head guy... That being said, you should still get kudos from your boss for the task that you completed and did a good job with. If you are not being appreciated for the good work you do, you should be asking why.

 

[Plasmech]

ummm...what? I have trouble understanding some of these replies. I must be stupid!


-Plasmech

Mechanical Engineer, Plastics Industry

 

[patdaly]

Plasmech:

You are not stupid, perhaps you are not in the USA?

What they are trying to tell you is this:

1.)It happens in every company.
2.)It infuriates each of us it happens to.
3.)It generally is best to cool off before killing the SOB.
4.)It is the reason that I work alone....... because I have never believed in #3 above.

Only you can determine if you can follow steps 1-3 above.

 

[btrueblood]

A star for your first post, Kenat. Usually I let my lead technician do the honors of starting up the machine, or test, or whatever...while I stand well back (out of range of any bits that may come off at high speed .

No, really, I try and let the tech's. have the moment. It shuts up the PG, and reminds everyone that the credit can be spread around quite a bit. It's best to hide the start button, too, or "forget" to reset the kill/e-stop switch, in case the PG tries to steal the moment.

If it was a bridge opening...I'd be sitting in a piece of mobile equipment on the un-open side of the ribbon, with a few of my hand-picked crew...and fire up the motor and drive across as "firsties" while the speechifiers were still blah-blahing...then off to the pub.

 

[Gymmeh]

We had a really big job for one of the major race car companies in the US, which I did almost all the work for. I was asked last month by the head of installation crew (which know how much I was involved) of another company if it was invited to the dinner for the completion of the job, I found out another guy from my company went, even though he did little for the job.

What can you do…

 

[ivymike]

I'm not really one to worry about this sort of thing - but there's one particular case that comes to mind that rankled me a bit. I'd led a project with a small team and over the course of 6months we came up with an improved process design for a particular process within the company. We documented the heck out of it, and the boss of my boss trotted us out to various other managers for show-and-tell on a number of occasions. Many people seemed suitably impressed.

Soon enough I got a call from a guy in another part of the company who wanted a very similar process and was just starting to put a team together. He'd heard my name through the grapevine, and wanted to know if I could help. I volunteered, and provided all of my material from the previous project as background. No more phone calls, etc., for a while. 2 or 3 weeks later I was in an all-employee meeting where this guy got on stage to reveal the results of his project. His presentation was the slide pack I'd sent over, except that the names on the team slide had been changed so that it now showed his team instead of mine (I wasn't on there, nor any of my members). A higher-level manager was very quick to congratulate him on his rapid progress and brilliant leadership, blah blah blah. I clapped along with the rest of them, and nervously looked around the room to see whether I was going to have to mend bridges with anyone on my team. Anyway, the guy came to find me a couple weeks later to thank me for my help and ask if I wanted to participate in the next phase of his project. I didn't mention the meeting, and I volunteered to participate on that team too. It was also a successful project, and we got pretty good exposure with some higher-level managers.