This was a very trying week, principally because of all the nonsense that goes on in an organization that's "spirally" managed. That is, top-level decision-makers go 'round and 'round, moving as far away from making a (lasting, impactful, forward-moving) decision as possible.
A friend of mine insists she's becoming "dumber". I insist no, she's just becoming more discerning -- learning how to separate the wheat from the chaff, how to recognize and reject b.s. I wish I could say it's a product of age, but alas, it isn't. It's more a product of perspective.
For example, this week --
1) Home office in Bethesda, MD accidentally knocked down our website (that they manage) and lost all our data. Somebody has to pay for all the work that will go into reconstructing it, even though the projects will only last another year and a half. USAID maintains that even though it approved our project having its own logo, that's actually a no-no (as it was 3 years ago when I was in Rwanda, but go figure) so all our business cards and signage (in 3 countries) have to be re-done. That's a lot of staff time and financial resources on re-dos, and someone has to pay. That someone would be...well, you.
2) Our USAID contract refers to us as a "partner", though the common usage is that we're a "project". I was asked to issue a directive on what word we should use and when. I did. I was told, no, our chief USAID liaison told us something different. I changed the directive to what I was told he said. I was told I was wrong. Similar on the business cards -- and I won't even go into all the details of that two-month-long redo. No logo. Okay, I scrapped the artist's designs and worked on one just using typeface and colors. Chief USAID liaison (whose title is actually an acronym of something so silly it doesn't bear repeating here) said no colors, too much like a logo -- better stick with black and white. I re-did it. Was told it was "unappealing" and I should use colors. I forwarded the e-mail in which the USAID guy said "use black and white" and was told...no, in a separate conversation, to which I was not privy, he said colors were okay.
3) I write a lot of stories and edit my staff's stories. Then it goes to my boss who distributes it to two other members of senior management who return it to him who returns it to me. So obviously, when it comes back it's full of track changes and "comments" and barely resembles what we started with (and researched and wrote and had vetted by the "technical:" staff). Now, in a spiral management setting, "comments" are more opportunities to expound, than to correct or even clarify. They're things like "I wonder if we should say this..."; "Are we really doing this...?" and "What if someone thinks...." Sorry, I can't know how to answer those questions. Process aborted.
4) I need to know the exact dates, times and locations of two workshops being held in Kumasi, Ghana, the same week in January, as I plan to go there to provide communications staff support. I ask the technical staff members responsible for those activities for that information, and for the Scope of Work they've prepared that explains what they plan to do, and what they hope to accomplish by doing it. But instead of just TELLING me where/when their workshops are being held, and sending me the SOW, one ignores my two requests and the other tells me "Venancious knows". Venancious reports to me; he sits at a desk across from me. If he HAD the information he would have told me in the first place. Is this cultural? I ask him and our other staffer, Felix. No, they assure me, it's just ridiculous. We start to laugh, and then we roar, imagining me starting at the airport in Kumasi, going around town asking, "Do you know of a poultry workshop here?" Who IS that crazy white woman??
5) A round-and-around meeting on how to proceed on a particular communications proposal ended up exactly where I'd suggested it should go, but of course we had to go through:
- Give us your opinion.
- I just did.
- Wait, let me give you the background.
- Okay. (Background/history/rationale provided)
- What do you think?
- The same thing I said earlier.
- Well, what about doing it this way...?
- Why? What does that accomplish?
- Well, if you don't agree, just say so.
- I just did.
- So what do you think?
- I just told you.
And then there was:
- Do you have this information on your copy of the document?
- I don't know, let me see it and compare.
- (Third person) No, don't use that (pulls it aside). It's not the version we're going to use.
- How can I answer (2nd person's) question if I don't look at it?
- (Second person) I'm just asking if this item is on your version?
- I don't know. (Third person) told me not to look at it.
- (Second person) I just want to be sure they're the same...
- GIVE ME THAT PAPER!
And the clincher...
- This proposal is a strategy and the strategy is the deliverable. So you don't really have to worry about the implementation.
- Huh?
xooxox Love, Grammy
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