Damn it all... I'm pissed!
While I�m in the midst of the largest comedy of errors seen on either side of the US / Mexico border for years (at least since Poncho Villa got in cahoots with his real estate buddies and conspired to portray South Texas a desirable place to live, rather than a wasteland� want to make it desirable? Fight over it), I am decidedly NOT laughing� nor even slightly amused.
This coming Monday morning (and I do mean morning� like 2AM or so?), the company I�m working with at present is stopping the use of their old software system, and �going live� on ours. This software runs the entire company� financials, order processing, production, shipping, purchasing� everything. So, this is no small thing, switching software.
This weekend is the beginning of crunch time. Over the weekend before go-live, a full inventory of goods is performed, and then manually entered into the new system. This involves doing a physical count of ALL product on the manufacturing floor and in storage warehouses (of which this company has many� on both sides of the border), along with a count of all raw materials used in the manufacturing process.
The raw materials are fairly easy to enter into the new system, but the finished manufacturing goods require quite a bit of advance data entry before we can actually enter inventory counts (i.e. how much of each item is on hand). And therein lies my lack of humor.
A quick aside� Sapph, I know you insist that it�s we Americans that have bastardized the language by dropping the entirely unneeded letters in words [i.e. the second �u� in humor], but we just don�t WANT to return to the British Commonwealth. Any country that shows live LAWN BOWLING on TV and tries to pass it off as a SPORTS PROGRAM is something we would rather, quite frankly, distance ourselves from. I know that you Canadians don�t quite feel that way, with curling and all�
Back to my bitching� this company�s main plant and Corp headquarters is in Ft Worth, where I have a counterpart working. I�m here on the border, working with the warehouses here. The main plant was SUPPOSED to have all advance data entered so that we can enter inventory counts. Did you notice the emphasis on the word �supposed�? Can you see where this is going? Do you even care???
Of course not� you�re here to read lighthearted banter, albeit twisted at times, and to snicker when I write about some personal hardship or tragedy (at least as perceived by me). And, let me add that your snickering keeps me grounded, as then I know that whatever I�m lamenting about isn�t really a tragedy, but just a fact of life� like the time I lost the top scoop off my ice cream cone� twice� and was convinced that the whole incident was a conspiracy between Baskin-Robbins and some unnamed-yet-very-well-financed secret group at GITMO. Your snickering helped me see that Baskin-Robbins was acting alone� silly me.
But I digress� I�m writing for me, not you� so I�ll continue. Back to the lack of humor.
I just spoke to the warehouse on the Texas side, and with 8 full sheets of inventory taken, not a single item has had the required advance info entered yet. This means that we have personnel sitting at their desk, waiting to enter the counts� and there is nothing to enter.
I found out late yesterday that this was likely to happen. When I am doing a go-live myself, I always make it very clear to the customer that all this entry of this advance info MUST be complete before the inventory weekend starts. Inventory is never an easy thing by itself� add to that the stress of starting a new system, and it can be quite overwhelming for everyone. The days are usually long, and it�s not totally unheard of to finally finish Monday morning at 1AM, with the plant starting production at 4AM. The threat of running out of time is always present� so to have to WAIT on others to get started just makes me fume!
Oh well� I suppose I�ll have lots of time to write. Don�t be surprised of you see more posts this weekend� and for that, I�ll apologize in advance.
t85225 at
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