I once worked as a consulting electrical engineer on a large UK airport upgrade many moons ago, one of the problems we had was the timescales. The client wanted to open early and we just couldn't get the fire alarm system in and tested quick enough.

After speaking to the electricians about the kit we were using I realised we could switch to a more expensive per unit alarm which was far faster to fit. I ran it past the architects and they agreed - it would result in an overall reduction in cost too (as time is money with contractors).

Job completed on time.

I was suspended by my firm for a month and given a first and final warning as our contract paid a percentage of the overall final cost and I'd just accidentally saved the client a fortune.

I left 3 months later to take up a job in IT. Clearly I learned nothing!

"... as our contract paid a percentage of the overall final cost ..."

No wonder such infrastructure projects always go over budget and way past their schedule.

Yep, cost-plus accounting has a lot to answer for.

I used to work writing user documentation for a software company. But eventually they realised that if the customer looked up the answer to a question in my docs, the company got nothing from that; whereas if they raised a support query, that was billable hours. The job became a lot less satisfying after that.

To be fair I should have known how the job was priced as I was involved in the bid. However even if I'd realised at the time it wouldn't have changed my mind over what to do.

The client may have likely been a one-off customer but the architect who was getting it in the neck from that client was someone we had a solid long standing relationship with and so by helping them we more or less guaranteed ourselves more work in the future. Sure we may lose out a little (still profit) on this contract but profit is profit.

I think the problem was the partners had plans for the slightly fatter cheques they were waiting on, those new company cars would need to wait a few months.

Many years sinceupon, I worked for a purveyor of industrial control systems. We'd won a couple of nice big jobbies which everyone, including the client, acknowledged would have significant scope for changes as the projects unfolded. Change wouldn't be in the architecture, just mainly the size. To give the client's beancounters a dense of prediction, the engineering content was agreed as a fixed % of hardware cost. IIRC 50%.

Simple enough and the project continued with both parties entirely happy.

Then the customer realised there was a shedload of installation hardware from all manner of sources still to ordered. As we had been helpful, seemed to have a good buying support and the fact that the customer was in a bind for handling that part himself, we were asked if we'd be up for a further contract to do his bulk materials purchasing - cable, trays, all manner of bits and pieces.

We were quite happy to do that and agreed. Naturally there had to be a contract and one was duly prepared, which more or less mirrored the existing contracts.

Including how variations were handled.

The moment anything got added to the bought out hardware contract - and there was quite a bit of that was the project evolved - there was an automatic 50% added to cover "engineering".

We were delighted.

Dunno about the client.

Anon cos although it was donkeys years back, someonemight recognise it.

It's a well-known fact (though conveniently ignored when it's not your own money you're spending) that contracts are often (usually) won on the bottom line: many contractors price their tender on the basis of the minimum that meets the bid spec, even if that struggles to meet the cost and irrespective of whether it is actually feasible, and makes profit on the inevitable variations.

Before retiring, I could be asked to take part in bid reviews on major (multi million $) contracts and, despite advising that the work wouldn't meet the actual client requirement, was told to keep quiet and just check that the bid ticked the right boxes on paper. I soon learned that was work to keep clear of as I could later be called back to help clear up the mess. Well paid but not worth the hassle. I wish that had been taught at university as I would have been able to spend more time with my family as the kids grew up. We often learn too late that there's a lot more to life that earning more than we actually need.

Yup. Buy the job then, so long as the contract was set up properly, screw then on variations. Then screw them again on the support contract. Then screw them yet again on any upgrades.

"We often learn too late that there's a lot more to life that earning more than we actually need."

That hit home.

We used to make a product in two versions, 'conventional' and (let's say) 'advanced'. Projects were usually specified in such a way that we could submit two bids; one for exactly as described and a second for an alternative way of completing the same overall task. The consultants would assess the offers and put forward recommendations to the end-user.

Our 'advanced' offer was slightly cheaper in terms of installed equipment but generated massive savings for the end-user as the building structure was much simplified..... but that was in another contractor's scope of supply.

You can guess that the 'advanced' equipment was not ordered as both the main contractor and the consultant were paid on the basis of the overall project cost.

Working for a large consultancy company, we had a contract with a large telecoms company to move kit and apps from one DC to another. We seemed to be losing money, so I had a look at the contract. They had a convoluted algorithm which defined the type of servers/apps to be moved and the costs associated - which was produced by a third party and obviously no-one had actually analysed it.

So, I got my handy Exel spreadsheet (no MS Access though) and set up the definitions and then applied it to the servers we had moved or were going to move. It turns out that the telecoms company had applied it wrong and it saved us about £1m - which put us nicely back in profit.

Did I get any thanks or rewards? What do you think? Of course not.

Alan

Oh no, the computer containing all the fixed information that we haven't actually sent out yet just mysteriously caught fire. What a shame.

Sounds like something the BofH and the PFY would cook up.

All the code we write, the services we maintain, the automation we create, and the efficiencies we make - it all goes to make more money for the higher ups, and IT people continue to be seen as a cost they can't wait to reduce and outsource to India.

As someone going through this pain right now, a beer.

Division in other side of planet:

(HQ) Mgt: "You have two developers. Cost saving. Sack one"

Local IT manager: "But these guys already can't keep up. We need more resources"

Mgt: "Have x0,000 Dddelloittteee Dollars for support. Sack one" (fictional company, name made up)

... Meanwhile back at the ranch ...

LIM: "Hmmm, Dddelloittteee no longer respond, it's only been a month"

Mgt: "Oh, you used all your Dddelloittteee Dollars"

Last Local Developer: "I will need 80% pay rise due to increased stress AND time in lieu"

Mgt and LIM: "Faaaark"

Excel was said to reveal that the actual savings to the business was as measured in local currency was -100%. (so, 100% higher costs) Productivity reduced to 25% compared to 1 year ago. Customer satisfaction reduced to "statistically insignificant".

Management that makes those decisions deserve all the financial pain they're going to get.

I'm having a bad case of Deja Vu on this one.... Anybody else? Maybe it's just sleep deprivation?

Paris as it's the only icon with a question mark ;-}

I think a lot of us have worked for James's former employer. Too many managers with too little to do roaming the place looking for something they know nothing about nothing about in which they can dabble.

The Access DB was. However once you RTFM and discovered you could connect to 'real' databases Access became a really useful tool. Until the other tools in the dept got the yips at anything Access. I modified about 50 or so Access apps around the company once to use the data from MSQL 4.2 via stored procedures so I could modify the DB structure without having to re-write all the apps. After I moved on someone panicked and got rid of the apps and never managed to replace them before the company did something drastic though I know not what as is been totally subsumed by what was a lot smaller company when I was there.

You say useful, I say dangerous....

It got a bad wrap. It was a really useful front end when you wanted to build something fast to show a client (or your boss). It kept me in coffee and TimTams for a number of years.

The Access back end though... The less said the better.