Stunned Silence

[mowens]

Yesterday we had a big Teams meeting, basically a big conference call with graphics. The meeting was about scheduling for the two AFP machines we have. Essentially, it is a giant fustercluck. The robot is way overloaded with engineers jockeying for a spot to get their projects on the machine. There are several versions of schedule floating, all of which don't mean anything because they always underestimate how much time they'll need on the machine. Not really on purpose, it's just that everything that runs on here is usually the first time the part has been made. The name of my group is Composite Prototypes.

Apparently it got bad enough that it reached our 2nd level manager, so, he sat in on the meeting.
After hearing him speak for a few minutes it was clear he had absolutely no idea how these machines work. The things he was suggesting were outrageous. Assuming some of the components have a completely different purpose to what they are actually for. There were about 20 on the call, mostly engineers with projects. It's not like this guy is new. He's been around this machine, though not directly worked it, as long as I've worked here. He's been our 2nd level for several years now.
After one particularly egregious statement, there was just stunned silence, for several seconds.

I swear, it reminded me of the senator who asked if an island got too heavy wouldn't if flip over and sink.

He must have realized he'd said something stupid because he started talking about the schedule and how to fix it.

Looking back, it was so funny. I could just imagine the look on everyone else's face. It takes a lot to get that many engineers to shut up for that long.

[YoDoug]

I was in a sales meeting once with a seasoned Okuma distributor salesman and a team of Engineers and managers from the customer. The salesman was making his sales pitch and when he was trying to talk about how fast the machine was he repeatedly said our machine has 1 gigabyte acceleration. The customer engineer sitting next to me looked at me like, is this guy serious. I just sat in silence. We lost that sale. From that point forward "gigabyte" became one of that salesman's nicknames.

[CNCAppsJames]

No schedule survives the first project.

Everything takes longer than we think it should without fail.

[Incogneeto]

No schedule survives the first project.

Everything takes longer than we think it should without fail.

LOL!! My Boss hands out a Folder for the Job that has been sitting on his desk for two weeks.

Tells me about it on 4/25 and expects it on 5/3

He forgets about the weekends.

2 week run time.

LOL!!!

[JParis]

Stuff like this is why I laugh at them when they want a project in a week and there's 5-7 days of programming just to get it ready....nevermind tooling and fixturing being bought and/or made

[mkd]

'Designed by clowns...supervised by monkeys:'

it's a feature, not a bug.

[CNCAppsJames]

'Designed by clowns...supervised by monkeys:'

it's a feature, not a bug.

Your quotes are now my quotes.

[gcode]

I have a bad habit of injecting a dose of reality into quote and planning meetings.
That earned me the nickname, "Mr Negative".
That did not dissuade me, but the problem has been solved.
I am no longer invited to quote and planning meetings. 

[Zoffen]

They should require a test for all management at monthly(weekly?) intervals to make sure they know what the f they are managing. Hell even just a test of the names of the people they manage and what they do would probably work for most places. This has to be done in a group setting so everyone can see how inept they are.

Its like a struggle session but for middle management.

[CNCAppsJames]

I have a bad habit of injecting a dose of reality into quote and planning meetings.
That earned me the nickname, "Mr Negative".
That did not dissuade me, but the problem has been solved.
I am no longer invited to quote and planning meetings. 

Win-Win. 

They have their fairy tales and you aren't letting them take time from your life you'll never get back.

[CADCAM396]

I have a bad habit of injecting a dose of reality into quote and planning meetings.
That earned me the nickname, "Mr Negative".
That did not dissuade me, but the problem has been solved.
I am no longer invited to quote and planning meetings. 

I have tendancy to do this in all meetings. they then proceeded to not invite me to all there meetings. I soon found the door. it was not planning for success it was planning for there next promotion meeting. scramble to the top of the bottom team. good plan.

[mowens]

Just had a conversation with a young engineer.

Him: "Can you open a .prt file with Catia?"

Me "No, that's an NX file. Catia won't open it"

Him: "Well, how do you open a Catia file?"

Me, trying not have the "are you serious" expression: "I go to Catia and hit file open".

Him: "Will Catia convert the .prt file"

Me: "Not the configuration we have"

Him: "Don't you load the model from Vericut into Catia?"

Me: "No."

In the words of Lilly Von Stupp:

I'm tired.

[CNCAppsJames]

Wow. Just. WOW...

Probably a degreed engineer too.

When I was teachign Mastercam I spent a couple hours on file types and extensions. What can "generally" open what.

Pity to pay close to $100k for an engineering degree and hove no clue about CAD interoperability.

[RobertELee]

Pity to pay close to $100k for an engineering degree and hove no clue about CAD interoperability.

To be fair, it was in the textbooks. However the professor thought it best use of their time to discuss their pronouns and how the white man was holding them down.

[ghuns]

...Pity to pay close to $100k for an engineering degree and hove no clue about CAD interoperability.

Pity to pay close to $100K for a Catia seat and not have the .prt translator included.