Posted by Racer on November 9, 2000, at 20:54:07
This is a rant. You have been warned!
OK, so I'm contracting this week, as a designer. Sure, my background is a different kind of design, but I know page layout and all that, so it's fine. I can do this just fine.
So, what's the problem? The woman I'm working for on this one is driving me around the bend! She wants me to finalize the layout -- BUT SHE HASN'T CREATED THE CONTENT!!! All I've got so far is the draft content, which she says she's going to rewrite and add to. I was in big trouble today, and looked like a fool, trying to keep my head down and my mouth closed. She was treating me like a dim-witted clerk -- and I was nodding and saying, "yes ma'am" when I was thinking "You idiot".
Late this afternoon, I finally spoke up: You know, all of this is going to have to be redone when you add the content. All the changes you make to the content are going to effect the layout, so we're duplicating a lot of effort by doing it this way.
"Why would changes to content change the layout?"
Gee, you think adding paragraphs here and there might make a difference?
She still doesn't get it, but it's better now.
(Though she's still an idiot: "Why are there so many typefaces?" "There are only two typefaces" "Why is this font different from this one?" "Because the first one is a headline [sans serif] style and the second is body text [serif]" "Why don't you use all sans serif? It'll look better that way" "Well, because it's really hard to read text in a sans serif typeface" etc)
Here's the problem:
I already know that as long as I keep my mouth shut, I get into trouble. I end up looking stupid and feeling stupid and usually get into some sort of conflict or trouble. When I speak up for myself, though, I end up OK.
My mother always tells me to keep quiet so that I don't get into trouble and risk losing my job or whatever. She says that I just have to keep my head down and my mouth shut, because I need ANY job, etc.
That's where I learned to get into trouble, obviously, but I KNOW better. This is a lesson I've learned over and over and over again!
Why won't it stick? And have any of you experienced this sort of thing?
poster:Racer
thread:2434
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20001031/msgs/2434.html