Years ago when I was doing my MA, my friend De'Lara was working for a quite brilliant professor - whose intelligence of course left her a bit out of the loop around new technology.
I was reminded of the story when I was walking around Norwich Cathedral with my brother last week, admiring the typesetting machine which the Jarrold company had donated to their education hall. It had only two sets of type, all the letters held in a huge wooden tray with a key for finding the right ones quickly. It wasn't based on QWERTY!
Anyway back to the future, in this case the late 1990's. De'Lara had done some word processing for Prof M in some font or other, but it wasn't what the esteemed woman had in mind. She was kind but firm, insisting that my friend re-type the entire thing in the preferred font. My friend tried to interrupt and say that it was no problem, she could change it in a few key strokes. Eventually, rather than let the situation develop into a full argument, she backed down and told the boss she'd see her in a few hours with the document in the new font.
What lessons do I take out of this for today?
- Shut up and listen, I might learn something
- There are usually easier ways of doing things
- Think more about what I really want, than getting stuck on how I want to get there
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