Things Go Awry

Photo An Askew House by ane88zg under Creative Commons license

(Photo An Askew House by ane88zg under Creative Commons license)

Although it’s too soon to be sure, my posts here may be scarce or thin this week. No matter how good you are at what you do, occasionally things go awry. If you’re trying to do something that can make a big impact, something important, that doesn’t exempt you from having to grapple with problems along the way.

Recently that happened to a couple of projects I’m involved in. They got into trouble.

One is in the midst of being hauled onto the rails again.

The other is more of a challenge. It’s research. It’s trailblazing. Unexpected difficulties arise when you’re doing something no one else has done before, and that’s exactly what happened to us. We hit a blockage.

By the end of last week we at last found a way to move forward. We can get back on track, but not by the end of the quarter that just started. We can catch up with our planned schedule in the following quarter.

What we’re doing is one of those things that only certain industrial sectors will notice even though it can have a huge impact. This is how most important innovations happen: behind the scenes, unnoticed by multitudes who end up benefiting. If you want to change the world, it’s best if your ego doesn’t need adulation for it. Changing the world in ways that get you covered in glory is uncommon.

This week we have to pull together documentation for a quarterly review with our main funding source. We have to explain our situation and our revised plans to the funding source. We have to show the funding source why they should allow us to continue.

Obviously, that’s where I must concentrate my efforts this week. My apologies in advance for the impact on my Substack presence.