An Interesting Day (less proofreading than I'd like on this)

 So, today was an interesting day.  First, the work stuff.  I started out with Barclays, taking a look at the revised bids and lining up the references to call later in the day.  The bidder who's going to win, NetPlanner, had one of two references call me back.  The other bidder whose references needed checking was Alison Smith; but I didn't have those.  A mail to the guy yielded a response by lunchtime, and I left a message for each of his three references.  Later in the day, I was on the OAC (owner, architect, contractor) call for Barclays; and this is the call where the real things.  I raised some problems with the schedule, and I'm waiting to see how the GC responds.  Also, as was explained to me last week, the low-voltage vendor whose bids I'm currently leveling will fall under the GC, so we talked a bit about the logistics of that.

Through the day, there was more nonsense coordination with the copiers and printers for TNS, with one woman (the office manager of something like 15 people) making a big stink about not being included, when it was she who should have let us know these requirements... three months ago.  The same could be said for the other Kantar OpCos (operating companies), but those guys were also stupidly behind.  I spent some time on the phone with Stephen, the overall PM for this project, and he shares my frustration.  But that doesn't do anybody any good right now, so I issued a sheet with the info I have; and we'll see how it changes in the next two weeks before the move.

Then there's the Barclays Mexico project, which we just won last week.  I spent some time on the phone with this new guy, Chris W. (not to be confused with Chris G., who's the lead for the Atlanta job).  He gave me some more info on the project, specifically about schedule and a few other things, and he asked me to update our written proposal to match the spreadsheet which he requested last week.  I did this, and I also spent a fair amount of time working out my travel for this trip.  I was smart enough to update (and BarCap was stupid enough to approve) my travel budget to include business class airfare, so that's the one benefit.  But other than that, this trip will be a huge pain in the ass.  I had wanted to fly down Thursday morning, spend a couple of hours there Thursday afternoon, and be on a relatively early (9:30 AM) flight home so I could have dinner with my family.  My site contact, however, doesn't want me there until Friday morning.  So now I have a late flight Thursday, in the office before that to run my TNS call and do some other things, and my flight home Friday doesn't leave until like 2:30, which puts me home at 1 in the morning.

I also started work on a new project today, VSS, which is some kind of media or media investment company.  They're taking over space from another company, so the cabling portion is pretty light; but the AV portion is more significant, and again we have to deal with security (on which I could write about 3,000 words; but since I've been such a slacker on this blog you'll just have to take my word for it).  The call lasted the full hour, but I have my marching orders.  All in all, I should be able to deliver this one; but since I had no input to the bid there might be some budgetary issues down the line.

Now, onto the other stuff.  I learned today about the departure from PTS of two people.  The first is Scott Gomez, but I don't have a lot to do with him.  The other is Charlie, who is the closest thing I have to an equivalent, although he's got a pretty sweet deal where he draws a fulltime salary but gets to pick and choose his projects (which he usually completes from his house).  That said, he's pretty sharp and he's also pretty good at the interpersonal stuff (with which I'd been struggling but am now very much on track).  So, we will be looking for people but realistically this puts me in a good position to show these motherfuckers how valuable I am.  My "portfolio" right now is pretty big, with all of the above projects as well as the new College Board job coming in and possibly another South American job for Barclays.  I need to keep kicking ass at this and keep my billable hours high so I can really make a stink if they try to screw me at the end of the year.  The other part of this is that if people with similar skill sets to mine are getting other jobs that means the market is opening up, so it's time to get my shit together and start looking around.  At the very least this will give me some good leverage with the people at PTS, but it could lead to a better position for (of course) better money.  But I need to get off my ass, so we'll see about this.  Maybe I can work on my resume and CV while I'm sitting in ten hours of plane rides.

Something else to talk about another time is the nonsense with the American Express cards.  But now that my computer is connected and my mail has been downloaded I need to get back to work.