reduced and recycled

I hate experts. They carry with them the weight of experience you could only envy, and I had an envy attack today. It was an early meeting, and the consultant and I were to meet our client for a debriefing, and some investigation. Watching the consultant work was like watching a man point out my gaps in investigation, so it was partly painful, and partly educational.

Or maybe not so educational. I knew if I took the time to sit down and examine things through, I’d be able to ask the same questions. See, it’s not the number of questions that you ask that’s important, it’s the quality of those questions. And you can only come to know which questions are more important after years upon years of experience.

And some specialist knowledge in the operation of some industrial-sized machinery, of course. So were standing in front of this huge, huge industrial press machine and he was going through its operations in minute detail. I was, in the meantime, taking notes like a fucking schoolboy, which pissed me off to no end: why didn’t I see the things he was seeing? It was so elementary. I was lucky I didn’t have to share notes with the consultant; I’d be embarrassed.

I suppose my lack comes with the territory; you can only be specialised in a few things. At least, that’s what I’m told, but I refuse to believe that. In the years I’ve worked in my firm, I’ve been forced to learn a bit of engineering, law, medicine (ha!), and criminal investigation. It’s exciting, I know, but there’s always that nagging feeling that there’s more to learn, and the feeling that if I could indeed acquire the knowledge, I’d be worth far more… ah, well.

Then again, there’s the other side of the story: some consultants are worth shit. Apologies to Caucasians, but my experience in Malaysia (and Singapore) is that quite a number of Caucasians claiming to be experts are really worth shit. And it doesn’t end there: some Asians who claim to be worth much as consultants are also worth shit.

I mention Caucasians because Malaysians (and Singaporeans) seem to regard Caucasians with awe, and some Caucasian consultants take full advantage of this fact. Not too long ago, we hired a consultant with “international” credentials to source some items for us. We found ourselves doing most of the work for the Caucasian MD who came down to see us - and not by choice. Martin and I knew how much this MD was worth: frankly, shit. Our bosses up in KL, though, were falling over themselves trying to please said MD. Martin and I, cut from different cloth, couldn’t be arsed. And oh, boy the charges this MD levied.

The same shit happened just two weeks ago: we called in specialists to take charge of some works that required immediate attention. Said Caucasian boss drove all the way down from KL to meet with our client, gave some cursory directions, got the client to buy garbage bags for some, ostensibly, professional work. Needless to say, our client refused to deal with said Caucasian upon his return visit.

Experts, hmmm. A little ambivalent about them, now that I think about it. The thing that marks good consultants from bad ones? In my opinion, practical knowledge and know-how. Technê, in other words. Consultants with technê.