Stanly Raspberry And The Procedure Conspiracy, Part I

 

Situation: Dark and stormy night.

My mission: infiltrate the Project Association for Industry Non-Autonomy (PAIN), in order to glean their motives in churning out so many suspect guidance documents on project management information systems.

My name: Raspberry. Stanly Raspberry.

Duhh duh DUH duh. Duhh duh DUH duh DUHHHHHH……

The story you are about to read is not true. The names have not been changed, since they were made up in the first place.

Duhh duh DUH duh. Duhh duh DUH duh DUHHHHHH……

“That wig and fake mustache make you look like Geraldo Rivera” snarked Charlie Gumshoe, my contact within the force.

“Then why didn’t you do this disguise-and-infiltrate business yourself?” I asked.

“You know that officers of the force can’t do that, Raspberry – we need a free lancer, like you.”

Charlie was driving me to the facility where the key players from PAIN were scheduled to meet.

“Remember” he began, “only a few of these guys have ever met face-to-face. We ‘borrowed’ your entry credential when one of their members from Las Vegas turned up in the hospital, and told us what was going on when he was under anesthesia.”

“Then why do I need a disguise?”

“Because some of them might readily recognize you – we understand Monolithic Corporation has a heavy presence there.”

I might have known Monolithic had their meddlesome hands in this.

“Don’t forget” Charlie continued, “you’re Max from Las Vegas, but we’re not sure which interest you represent. Since all of these attendees consider themselves experts in the field of project management, only speak up if you are completely confident you have the intellectual high ground. Otherwise, just listen. We need to know why they are issuing all these guidance documents, some of which we believe have some instructions that make little practical sense. We just can’t figure out why any organization would go through all this trouble to issue shaky guidance.”

Charlie pulled up to what appeared to be an abandoned factory.

“This is where they’re meeting?”

“It’s the address on your invitation.”

I stepped out of the car, and walked through the door on the front of the shattered facade, as if I had been there before. Rubble was strewn about the puddle-ridden floor, but an exit sign on the far side of the room was brightly lit. I strode towards it, and noticed a device that looked very much like a badge reader. Checking my credential, it had a magnetic stripe – so, I used it.

The floor beyond the exit sign seemed to fall away, revealing a staircase going down to a basement. I walked down the stairs with a rising sense of apprehension. At the bottom of the stairs was a dimly-lit hallway, which terminated at a red door. I walked through the door.

Inside was an advanced-technology conference room, with a large C-shaped table. In the middle of the room, surrounded by the table, was a metal sculpture of what appeared to be seven or eight binders, each overflowing with pages, stacked atop each other.

“Max! We’ve been waiting for you! Now we can begin!” said the portly speaker, who took his seat at the top of the “C.”

“Our last issued guidance document mandated that cost performance systems compare the line items in the Basis of Estimate with their counterparts in the general ledger, as part of ‘cost performance management.’”

“Excuse me” I interjected, “but isn’t that just comparing budgets to actuals? And isn’t that automatically not ‘performance management’?”

There was an audible gasp from the participants.

“Why wouldn’t you want to know that?” demanded the poorly-shaved fellow sitting next to me.

“That’s not the issue. Whether you are comparing cumulative budget to cumulative actuals, or period line-item budgets to period line-item actuals, that’s certainly not Earned Value Management, and therefore not performance measurement.”

Angry-sounding murmuring erupted among the attendees.

“But it does amp up the number and difficulty of approved processes, does it not?” asked the portly chairman.

“Oh, right!” I exclaimed, feigning enthusiasm, while realizing that I might be hearing clues about PAIN’s ultimate goal.

The chairman continued. “That, combined with our push to have Estimates to Complete constantly re-estimated, and then time phased, allows us to demand that same comparison on a month-by-month basis! No contractor performing project work can ever avoid a reportable deviation from such an analysis!”

At this point the room erupted in a sound that can be best described as what would happen if somebody told a really funny joke at a Darth Vader impersonators’ convention. In the middle of the laughter, a man disguised as a waiter leaned over to my side.

“What are you doing here?” he whispered.

Terrified that I had blown my cover, I turned to see that it was…

Wow, look at that! I’m out of space for this week. Tune in next week to see the amazing conclusion of Stanly Raspberry and the Procedure Conspiracy.