Si is hanging on by his fingertips at Turnaround.com. The company is limping along, and all are doing whatever we can to keep it going. With all the angst in the building, it is tough to go to work every day. The younger engineers and marketing people have it the worst. Most are single and seem to tie their egos to the job and the company image. Old Si can relate, even he was young once.
It is different for us 'older' workers, or, I should say 'the' older worker....me. I work hard, of course, but leave the ego at home in the morning. I do good work, collect good pay, and on Friday, we are all even.
I take a lot of grief each day for being up there in the age range. "Hey! Why don't you Tweet? What? You never went to Cochella? Why do you drink Scotch? What about Tequila?"
Much of the grief us old guys take is deserved. The world changes rapidly, and keeping up is nearly a full time job. Lots of us do not keep up, and one day we are on the street with no place to go. Tough to keep up technically, even tougher socially without some help. I have a niece and nephew who are far to hip for their ages, so I do have a source of knowledge outside of work. At a BBQ last weekend, I was reminded NOT to tuck my shirt in, learned about the new RadioHead downloads, and found out why the Birds are Angry. Lots of it doesn't makes sense, but neither did Grateful Dead songs to my Uncle.
So, what 'value' is there in the organization for an old guy? Day to day, not much. Sometimes the experience in an obscure technology is needed, 'what is RS422?', or a contact at a customer from the distant past, the old drinking buddy now a VP of Supply Base, comes in handy. Not often enough. There is a skill many of us have from the VERY distance past that is invaluable when things are tough. The Hot Rod mentality.
Back in High School, nearly every family had just one car. Usually, the dads would car pool to work. Once every couple of weeks the family car would be free; we could drive it to school. Imagine, ol' Si could cruise in style into the Student Parking Lot, with the ratty Chevy station wagon. 'Have to do something to get my OWN car' was my thought. Not just ANY car, but the DREAM car. At lunch, the guys would debate THE car we would buy when we were rich... that is when we had a job. We all KNEW the best car and would argue our choices for the whole lunch hour. Hemi 'Cuda, 440 Challenger, Boss 302 Mustang, 454 SS Chevelle. But, it was more important to have A car rather than THE car. Hard to go out on a date with a bike, if we even had one. The last part of High School, most of us gear heads had a job in a gas station or repair shop. We worked hard, and made some money. Things would be slow Saturday night at the station, so the older guys at the gas station would work on their own cars. We all learned by watching.
With some cash saved, we hit the classified ads, check out the street corners, and talk to anyone we knew. "Looking for a car, cheap!" Need something to work on and to get all those girls to the beach in! Finally, one friend would score a car. We would all show up with our ragged set of tools on a Saturday to see the baby. "Well, it has one whole fender not crunched, the driver's seat is fixable with Duct tape, and that nasty idle could be just a bad spark-plug wire!" With several hours of hacking, and our friend would have a running ride. Not the 'dream' car, but something that worked. Wow, it idled like a 440 with a 3/4 cam, but it was just a leaky carb float.
We all found something by the Spring, and had figured out how to get our babies running. For Si, it was a 55 Chevy truck with 410,000 miles. All it needed was a couple of valve guides, an ignition wire, and 2 junkyard tires. For less than $100, I was cool! I didn't get a working radio. That would have to wait. Besides, you couldn't hear the music anyway with the rotting muffler. I decided to ignore the whine that signaled impending doom for the differential. A problem for another day.
We all had wheels! Still thinking about the Dream Car, of course. Working to get an apartment, getting though college, or doing time in the Navy, meant another car had to wait. If we didn't get our girlfriend pregnant, made it back from 'Nam, avoided a DUI, and saved some money, we could cruise in style in our dream car someday. Until then, we had to hack what we had to get around.
We all learned to see the potential of a situation. Your current car was never going to be a 'Cuda, but it ran... you could get a girl to the beach and back. You begged and borrowed tools, used junkyard parts, and worked the system to make the 'deadline', then the Saturday night date.
Back to today, all of that helps deal with the project you are 'lead' on at work. It won't meet the PRD or MRD specs. The sales guys will have to dance to appease the customer. Marcom will need to 'massage' the upcoming Press Release... but it works. And, it delivers value that wasn't there before. It will bring in revenue this quarter and fund the staff we still have.
There are always tradeoffs, always tough decisions when you have limited time or resources. If you maintain a big picture view, you can see what to do now and what to do later, in Version 1.1. You see a process. With my old '55, the project wasn't 'done' until it went to the junk yard 'crusher'.
I kept the '55 running until I could afford a decent used VW. That got me through college, and to the point where I could get a 'dream' car. Not the 'Cuda, not the SS, but something better for the times. The used Dino would have been too cramped. That shiny new Corvette used too much gas. The restored '440 was too noisy. And all would have delayed the purchase of a Condo. Cars were depreciating assets. Property values were going though the roof. Cute nurses didn't seem to care about Hemi Roadrunners, but just loved the pool at your new Condo. Dreams change.... something that you cannot imagine when you are a young gear head.
Turnaround.com will make it through this product cycle. I hacked 55 Chevys then, I hack software releases now. I try to keep the big picture view for my team, the young guys who never turned a wrench on a lube rack, never had to chose between eating dinner and buying gas.
The value in being an old car guy is that perspective. Still, it doesn't help me understand why kids post pictures of their lunch on Facebook....
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