My job doesn’t involve cats. Let’s get that clear. It’s the only certainty about my work.
I’ve been a quantum mechanic for most of this century. It could be X or Z years. The exact number is unclear. In this business, the pace of evolution eats experience for a snack. Few things have a stable plateau of maturity.
“Quantum” or “mechanic” is not in the job title. Job titles are meaningless. I work with clients in different universes. Some parallel to ours. Some not. Often it’s hard to say. Maybe both.
What matters is that I prevent things from going wrong. Or fix things when they do. Most of the time, I end up doing a mix of both. It’s hard to separate the two. The important thing is that catastrophe is averted. Clients get to focus on whatever they do. Ideally better at less cost. So they get more profits and pay their bill without a fuss.
A tricky part of the job is listening to understand. Finding what clients need in the fog what they say they want – two things that avoid each other. Irrespective of the universe the client comes from, it’s a comforting universal constant.
The next non-easy part is working out how to make what needs to get done happen. There’s a lot of careful email writing involved, which get things done. My boss says I should have gone into law. I have no idea what that means. That’s a universe I avoid. My writing involves getting people not to jump off cliffs with expensive untested parachutes. It’s a delicate process. You have to make people look good while making them realise that what they are trying to do is silly.
It’s not that they are dumb. On the contrary, many are “successful” in ways I’ll ever be. However, outside their universes, the story is different. They are lost, bewildered and prone to go off the cliff. So they need a quantum mechanic to make things right.
The ultimate way to make that happen is to earn their trust. Through a combination of listening, knowing what’s going on, being transparent when disagreements happen. All of which is hard to do in the fog of daily life. That’s the core of the job.
It’s oddly satisfying. I dare not admit that through. What’s the secret of your job?
Cerno 