I work on a project that I love. I really like all the people I work with. I like the science and I really like our client. All in all, it is a great project. Too bad my task has completed and I am hanging on for consulting on a somewhat regular basis per my project manager’s request.
Lately another task has moved to the spotlight. This one is run by my coworker who bears an uncanny resemblance to Sean Connery, seriously. However, unlike the sophisticated, refined Connery, my coworker acts like a whiny two year old. He is a few years from retiring and while I really do like him, is probably the most grumpy, stuck in his ways scientist I have ever met.
As the spotlight has shifted from my task, which was transitioned to one of the clients plants and is now undergoing negotiations for licensing, it has moved to Sean Connery’s task. The biggest problem is that Sean Connery does not, under any circumstance, feel that he owes any explanation to anyone, that he is the scientist who knows all, and suggestions from the client on how to pursue the problems are viewed as a personal affront to his credibility. For the last 3-4 months, we all have heard him say “I quit” nearly every week at teleconference.
My project manager (an amiable amiable – imagine my polar opposite on the people scale) is in his back up mode daily when he walks into each internal meeting lately with his hackles bristled up. This morning he and I were waiting for others to arrive and he tells me that he raised his sons (currently in their early teens) to not quit. If they start something, they finish it. I was raised the same way. I remember quitting a Wil E. Coyote latch hook rug and my mom being disappointed in me for quitting, and so consequently I was disappointed in myself. Whenever I think of quitting, I remember that stupid latch hook rug.
He goes on to tell me how it just grates on him when Sean Connery says flippantly, “I quit”. It’s obvious it grates on him, his face turns red, his neck throbs and he raises his voice. Internal meetings and our teleconferences have become an exhibition sport for me and two other team members as we observe the volley of words and the seething glares, all the while trying to muffle our giggles at the ridiculous spectacle they are making acting like two year olds. My project manager stoops to Sean Connery’s level, when we all just really want him to say “You quit? Fine then, leave.”
Today Sean Connery announced that he will work on his task up until September 17th. At which point he will be taking a little vacation and returning to work on a different project. He can no longer take the client and our project manager “cutting down his credibility as a scientist”. This is obviously not true. But fine. Frankly, as much as I like Sean Connery, I am glad to see his era on this project coming to an end. I adore the guy really and I respect him as a scientist. And there is only a little selfishness in my anticipation of his departure… having to do with my likely return to this project to fill some awfully big shoes. I realized today, the real reason the past few months that my project manager has requested that I stay as involved as possible in this project and particularly Sean Connery’s task. I get to be the next 007.
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