Ten: Progress Report I
Never Let Them See You Sweat.
Consultants’ Slogan
Normally a consultant presented a proposal in writing. These people preferred a face-to-face approach. Like making a presentation to the prospective client, Wiz thought, only I’ve already got the job.
Something over a dozen councilors had assembled in the Mayor’s office for the meeting. In addition to Mayor Hastlebone and Dieter there was a distinguished-looking man in a tasteful blue tunic whom Wiz remembered vaguely, one or two other sharp-looking characters and a few old codgers who looked like they had come because they didn’t have any place better to be.
Dieter was off to one side with a couple of other council members hanging at his elbows, talking to a slightly taller, younger man who managed to be handsome in a beefy blond sort of way and still look like Dieter. The councilor was punctuating his words with short, sharp hand motions and the other was focusing on him intently and occasionally nodding to show he more or less understood.
As soon as Wiz entered the room Dieter jerked his head around to stare at him and, followed by his entourage, pushed his way through the group over to him.
“Ah, Wizard,” the little councilor said just a shade too loudly, “I’d like you to meet my nephew Pieter Halder. My sister’s son. Fine boy and my heir.” He clapped the young man firmly on the shoulder. Pieter smiled vacantly and nodded.
Dieter fixed Wiz with an eagle’s glare. “Have you considered what I told you?”
“Ah, I have the matter under advisement.”
“And?” the little man asked sharply.
Out of the corner of his eye Wiz saw that the mayor was watching them. He didn’t look any too pleased.
“Well, as you know, this is a serious matter. . . .”
“Serious for you if you go against me, you mean.”
“While I’m sure we share many basic objectives . . .” The mayor cut him off by rapping his gavel to call the meeting to order and Dieter and the others retreated to the councilors’ benches. Wiz suddenly found himself standing alone in the middle of the room.
“I asked the wizard here to tell us what he’s going to do,” the mayor announced. “You all know what happened at the Baggot place.” There was general muttering and nodding. “Now he’s going to explain to us how he’s going to fight these dragons.”
“Well, actually I wasn’t planning on fighting them,” Wiz corrected. The temperature in the room seemed to drop ten degrees and the councilors started to mutter among themselves again, this time a low ominous mutter.
Wiz recognized his cue for fancy footwork. He steepled his hands, dropped his voice half an octave and nodded to the council.
“Obviously, to solve a problem of this magnitude it is necessary to grasp the entire solution space by completely reinventing the initial propositions. As you can see this is a major undertaking and to be effective the work flow must be carefully managed.”
The councilors were listening intently now, all of them nodding to show their neighbors that they understood perfectly, even if no one else did.
“Now,” Wiz went on, “currently we are in the initial definition phase of the project.”
“What definition?” Dieter objected. “The problem’s dragons and how much money we’re going to spend to protect ourselves.”
“Money?” another councilor put in. “Who said anything about spending money?”
“Well, there is the wizard’s fee . . .” Mayor Hastlebone started, but he was drowned out by three other councilors trying to talk at once. He pounded the table with the gavel trying to restore order. Wiz noticed the oak table was dented and battered in front of the mayor’s seat.
“As you can see,” Wiz said when the mayor finally restored order, “there are some fundamental issues which must be addressed before we can precisely define the problem.” Dieter opened his mouth to protest, then snapped it shut and settled for glaring at Wiz.
“We consultants know that before we can address solutions we must quantify the problem.”
“Quantify?” asked one of the councilors.
“Reduce it to numbers. We must have something we can measure and count so we will know how much progress we are making.”
“Seems like an odd way to go about solving a problem,” one of the councilors near Dieter grumbled, “counting things.”
“ ‘Specially for them as can’t count and ends up with eleven in a dozen,” one oldster piped up. That got a chuckle from most of the councilors, a red-faced mumble from the objector and a glare from Dieter.
“There are a number of proven statistical or numerical techniques we could use,” Wiz went on. “First we must choose the appropriate one.”
“We could count the number of people that get eaten,” a councilor suggested.
“No, that’s much too insensitive. We need something far more accurate.”
“The number of dragons sighted each week?” suggested another.
“Subject to misinterpretation. I propose using a composite index extracted from baseline data which we will collect. By applying appropriate analysis techniques we can reduce the multi-dimensional dataspace to a single, easy-to-understand figure of merit by which to judge our dragon-reduction strategies.” Not to mention being so complicated nobody will be able to figure out what it means, Wiz thought.
“And what do you propose to do about the dragons while you’re gathering all this information?” Dieter’s stooge demanded.
“Why nothing at all,” Wiz said blandly. “That would invalidate the baseline sample and disturb the entire database.”
“Ayup,” an old councilor nodded wisely. “Them databases get right testy when they gets disturbed.” He continued to nod and stroke his beard. Everyone ignored him.
“And how long is this baseline period going to be?”
“Normally you want at least one year’s data. You have to allow for seasonal disturbances you understand.” The councilors muttered and shifted in a way that told Wiz he had overplayed his hand.
“But since this is a rush job we will telescope that,” he continued smoothly. “Let us say three moons after the program is fully functional.”
“And meanwhile we do nothing,” Dieter put in.
“No, while we are gathering data we can start an educational campaign to explain to people the dangers of dragons.”
“But they all know dragons are dangerous,” another councilor protested.
“Yes, but do they know how to avoid dragons? Oh, I’m sure they have some strategies they learned by hook or crook. But we have a responsibility to teach them optimum dragon-avoidance strategies.”
“How are we going to do that?”
“Why, with an education campaign, of course. We will prepare pamphlets describing the dangers of dragons and how to avoid them.”
“Most of the folks around here are illiterate.”
“Quite all right. We will use iconographic representations for the literacy-impaired.”
“What did he say?” muttered one of the councilors.
“He means they’ll be full of pictures for them as can’t read,” explained his neighbor, who was quicker on the uptake.
It was a very long meeting.
* * *