Finished review

Now I can breathe. The review is done. What that also means is that now I better get my butt onto the work that I have been conveniently putting off in favor of my good projects review. Ugh.

The jist out of the review:
My presentation went really well. It took about 1 hour and 15 minutes. Oops. There were lots of comments and questions and suggestions. The client seemed happy and made some suggestions mostly of things they can do to enable me to achieve the results we need. We are pretty much there really. We just need refinement and confirmation of our most recent positive results on the full scale.

Alan's presentation went equally well. He worked at speeding it up since I had covered a lot of the gory details and his job was to cover the full scale experiments. I wanted a recorder there to note the number of times he mentioned me as being "the smart one". LOL!

We finished and lunch came and I worked to stay awake for the last 3 presentations.

Then the nitty gritty... the big boss from the client delved into his take on it all. He is about one step below the CEO. He said that industry interest in this technology is waning due to lack of progress. This is a double-edged sword here. It is good that there is lack of progress and that we do have progress, this could bode well for us. HOWEVER, since there is lack of progress, clients could be skeptical, or just plain not interested because they have found work arounds to the problems. Consequently, we need to finish up my project this year and essentially, that's it for the project. Whether or not they will fund the other project another year or offer us a new issue to solve is up in the air. If so, I would likely lead a new project, but I am not counting on it.

In the meantime I am fine with this albeit a little sad. I would love to continue on with this research, but at the same time I have a new and larger (next FY) role in an LDRD project that where I once estimated taking 25% of my time, I am now looking at probably 30-40% time. Then if my big proposal gets funded, which it looks good so far, that is 2FTE's. I planned for 50% time for myself on it, but it could easily balloon up to 75% of my time.

If this project ends and I have:
-Increased my network to some really wonderful coworkers and
-Proven myself to some higher ups, and
-Originated and taken the lead on a patent that is likely to be licensed by the client, as well as
-Been involved in a large "whole process" patent, and
-Worked myself back into the semiconductor industry and have knowledge of the latest and greatest in the industry...
Then what more could I ask for? None of my other projects have yielded anything in this scope.

Speaking of my other projects... I got an e-mail that I was a collaborator on an IP submission out of my least desired project. It will get patented. I was just shocked I was listed since evidence of my working on this project barely exists, yet I did play a big role. When talk of filing the IP was mentioned a year or so ago I figured I would be left off and mentioned it to Hans. Recently he said I should find out if it had been submitted and make a stink about being left off. Well I am just not a big stink maker. ;-) Now it appears I was not left off. I did figure out why though... my pissy project manager was not the one who submitted it, my good friend Justin did. He would have *never* thought to leave me off. So something new to add to my fact sheet!

Got my three names sent off to my manager this morning for input on my staff development. I was very careful with my choices and hope that it helps to yield a promotion. I have a meeting on Friday with my very absent manager to hopefully bolster my chances.

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In other news, the Leifer is doing great. He is walking a lot at daycare. And last night he walked across the dining room, then turned and walked across the dining room! Wow! All without provoking. He is such a little person, I hate to admit.

Hans' car died on the way home last night and it is at the shop. Ugh. On the way home he started having electrical problems, odometer and tachometer were freaking out, then clutch problems, then he lost his power steering and the car died. Sounds like an electrical problem. We went back to tow it to the shop and it started and he drove it to the shop. Hans, my ever-optimitic husband, is sure it is probably just a short that got bad in the heat that will take very little to fix. I am normally not a pessimist, but alas, my pessimistic nature has set in here.