The Buck Swain Management Bible
by Robert LeishmanMy name is Buck Swain and consulting is my beat. I make a living as a consultant, a "process" consultant, which means just about anything, but mostly it's about solving other people's problems. Guys like me used to tell other people how to build the pyramids. Now we just get people to the next level.
I'm the consultant they come to as a last resort, the one whose number is tucked in the place called "only open in case of an emergency - a real one." My name is uttered with reverence, and the occasional curse in the inner sanctums of business both large and small. I'm the go-to guy for everything, except maybe mob hits. If you want one of those, I usually do a referral. (Only kidding. That would be impossible to market.)
I'd only been back in town for an hour. I'd just returned from a big job out on the West Coast, a downsizing and an exorcising (layoffs and the reconfiguration of a corporate culture) all in one, which had cost more than a few golden parachutes, and possibly one platinum, for my client, when my cell went off. I usually have the ringer set to a loud wail to get everyone's attention, just to let them know I'm there (Rule #22 of the Buck Swain Management Bible: Never stop marketing) but when I'm off duty I settle for some bold chimes. I don't like to disturb my date, if I have one. I lost a five hundred dollar cell phone to the malevolence of a blind date, and we hadn't even gone past the heavy petting.
Anyway, I managed to get the attention of the entire staff and patronage in the restaurant I was sitting in at the time, not that I wanted to do too much with it. It was an operation that kept going in spite of itself, family run, and the manager looked like he could handle anything that came along, except maybe me.
"Buck," came the trembling voice on the other end of the line, "you've got to get down here right away."
"Sure, but who is this?" I said.
"Peter Sprekenridge. You helped us out in Tulsa last year. I was moved to the New Mexico office six months ago and we have a situation, a situation that needs your attention." I could feel the cold sweat coming out of the phone.
"Well, what is it? Speak."
"It's kind of unusual. How soon can you get out here?" He was sounding kind of walleyed. Of course, whenever I talked to him, that's how he always sounded. Perhaps someday I'll run into him when he isn't in the middle of a crisis and scared like hell for his job. I named my usual rates, and then mentioned that, since he wasn't going to tell me what was going on, the clock would start ticking as soon as I hung up the phone. (Rule #28: The guy with the problem is your opportunity.) There was a gasp on the other end of the line, but then he said, "Just get here as fast as you can."
I hung up, dialed a number to get my flight, then paid my check and left the restaurant after giving my business card to the manager, who smiled politely. As I said, it always pays to network. I had no intention of doing anything for him if it came to that; I hadn't done anything in restaurants in years anyway, although I'd worked on a fast food chain a while ago. Rule #2: If you aren't giving out your card, you're just another guy in a suit.
Perhaps I should mention something about the Buck Swain Management Bible. Rule #18 of the Buck Swain Management Bible is: Credential yourself through print. In the end a book may be cheaper than a degree, and it can give you credibility. I wrote mine with the help of a ghostwriter two years ago and it's been backing me up ever since. The odd time that I do give seminars, a book looks awfully good up there - and they make great Christmas gifts that can be written off.
The following day I arrived at the facility in New Mexico where they had summoned me. This was a branch office for an insurance company, and I soon gathered from Spreckenridge that they were in the process of closing it down.
"So what's the problem?" I said.
"It won't shut down."
"The office won't shut down?"
"We got rid of the people a while ago; the computer won't shut down."
"Well, why don't you call tech support?"
Peter shuddered and said, "Come and have a look."
He led me back to the rear of the building; we were on the ground floor, by the way, and I noticed that it was hot as there was no air conditioning. As we got away from the windows, I also noticed they had only emergency lighting on. He opened the door to the computer room and stepped in. The dim lights of the emergency lighting units bathed the interior.
As I stepped inside, it took me a couple of moments to identify it. It was a mainframe, or something that looked like an old mainframe, as big as a house, or a couple of boxcars, the kind of thing that you used to see in bad science fiction films with flashing lights and all kinds of stuff happening. I stood there looking at this thing doing some kind of cosmic light show and then turned to Peter and casually said, "So?" (Rule #14: Never show fear in front of a client.)
"We can't shut it off. You saw the emergency lights. They're on batteries. The main power to the building is shut down and has been shut down for two days. I don't want the main office to hear about this. There's another thing, too."
"What?"
"It talks." He led me over to a console and as we approached the screen lit up. I thought that Peter was going to have a heart attack right there. But he pulled himself together and said, "it hadn't done that before. Maybe it can see, too." At length, he approached the keyboard and tapped in a few words. I looked over his shoulder and saw him typing:
"Hi there. I'm back."
And it responded with: "And where have you been, relative to the unit?" It sounded like a mother hen. What was the "unit" anyway? Itself?
I shouldered Peter out of the way and typed in,
"Hi. How do we unplug you?" (Rule #81: Always be direct with a machine.)
It came back with, "Who the hell are you?"
Nasty.
"My name is Buck. Now tell us how to turn you off."
"You are in contradiction with my secondary directive." Peter pulled me away from the keyboard at that point.
"Don't get it mad," he said.
"Peter, it's only a machine."
"I know. But I think that it's got access to some pretty important data. All of our customer files dating back to 1950, to be precise. By the way, I have no idea where this program is coming from. It was never supposed to respond like this."
"Have any of your tech support guys seen this?"
"My chief of tech support did. He had a nervous breakdown two days ago."
"And shortly after that you began to think of calling me?" He nodded and I felt strangely honored. Being a consultant is like being a good plumber, the guy they think of when the water's rising. Not that you like the thought of drowning yourself.
I took the keyboard back and typed in, "Hi, I'm Buck Swain and I'm here to solve all of your problems. Now just tell me what is on your mind." (Rule #42: When direct doesn't work, try any kind of charm you can manage.)
"You wish to shut me down?"
"Well yes, but only temporarily." Temporary my ass, but I don't mind lying to a machine.
"You are in contradiction of my primary directive, please enter appropriate code."
"What is the primary directive?"
"Maintaining the larger unit."
"I see," I typed in, "and what is the larger unit?"
"Does not translate." Then the system went dead.
I stepped away from the keyboard and turned to Peter.
"I think that this is some kind of hoax," I said, "It sounds like a machine, but it cussed me out, and asked me who the hell I was. Besides the head of tech support, who was looking after this thing, anyway?"
"Most of the programmers are already gone, transferred. We thought we'd shut everything down, but when I came back day before yesterday to close up the facility, it was still running. I can't even tell you what kind of computer this is or who made it. We outsourced a lot of this work too."
"What about the other staff, the admins?"
"None."
"Hell, Peter - why don't we just take an axe to the damn thing?"
"The data. And it's connected to our main office through the Internet."
"So? Cut the Internet access."
"It gets agitated whenever we go near the data ports."
"Oh."
"I want to know what we are dealing with before we do anything radical."
"I'm not going to do anything radical, just let me have a look at it." I left Peter and took a good look at the unit, looking for anything that might identify it: the manufacturer, the operating system, etcetera. After forty-five minutes I was completely perplexed. I found a lot of hood ornaments out there - logos and stuff that identified various equipment manufacturers. It was not a single computer, but a collection of components from different vendors that they had wired together over a long period, making it look like an insane piece of modern art. There was about forty-five years worth of technology in there.
"Lookin' fer something?"
"What...?"
I turned around and saw an old janitor leaning on a mop.
"Who are you?"
"Jacob. Been here for twenty-five years. You having trouble with this thing?"
"Nope, just trying to shut it off."
"Well, the person to talk to isn't here. He had himself a nice heart attack a couple of weeks ago."
"I thought it was a nervous breakdown?"
"Not him. Innis."
"What did he do here? Was he a programmer?"
"Sort of. He knows more...he knows more about it than anyone."
I called to Peter in the next room and said, "Tell me everything you know about Innis."
"Him? He was the computer operator here until recently. He managed the facility, the hardware, not the system itself. He had a heart attack a couple of weeks ago and he's off on disability. Then he's due to retire."
"Is there any way we can get him in here?"
"Well actually," Peter mumbled, blushing a bit, "Innis doesn't know that he's been given early retirement - yet. He hasn't even been told that the office has been shut down." He looked at me, a little embarrassed. He was obviously following my Rule 10: Let a loose end stay a loose end as long as it doesn't know where you live.
Peter was probably planning on leaving town before Innis had to be dealt with.
"Get him here."
"He's had a heart attack…"
"Get him here, now." I practically barked that out, but it had the desired effect. The truth is, I didn't know one way or another what Innis could do for us, but I always follow Rule 5: Don't just stand there with your fingers up your nose. Always always look professional.
Or in this case, sound professional. I overheard that one years ago from the instructor at a barbers school where I happened to be getting a cheap haircut. (Rule #45: Never get a cheap haircut unless you have three days to spare.)
About an hour later Innis showed up. He was a guy in his mid-fifties, a little overweight. He was moving slowly - not unusual for someone who's recently had a heart attack. As it turned out, he was only a few days out of hospital. His son, a kid in his twenties, had driven him over, and both of them were kind of taken aback by what was going on.
"What happened to the office?" Innis snarled.
"It's been closed down," Peter said excitedly. "We were going to tell you, honest."
Innis's son stepped between them and said, "Look, I'm a lawyer, and I demand to know what you've done with my father's livelihood." The lawyer looked more like a recent law student and he didn't bother me much, except for the fact that he was trying to get between us and his dad.
(Rule #16: The only good buffer is your buffer.)
Innis looked like he might have another heart attack any minute. He was pale, but angry, which is a bad combination. Someone had to take action.
"Peter," I said, "Mr. Innis is getting a full pension, isn't he?"
"Um, yes."
"Could there be a bonus in there for him as well?"
"Oh. Oh, sure."
"I want all of that in writing." That came from the son. He was fairly bright for a lawyer. Peter dashed towards a cubicle like a hare trying to leave the hounds behind, but he returned, waving a file, and in short order was shoving paper under the kid's nose. (Rule #12: Paper is nice as long as you don't have to sign anything.) He also ground out a memo, which was supposed to put make the bonus idea a reality - at some point.
During all of this Innis had found one of the few chairs left in the office. He sat there looking at his son, and then looking at Peter and I and then back at his son. At that point he didn't seem that interested in what his son was doing or in the fact that the office was closing, but his eyes drifted occasionally to the door of the computer room. Finally, his son turned to him and nodded, indicating that he was finished with Peter.
Then Innis said, in a slow way, "All I really need to do is pick up a few things from my office. I can fix whatever it is while I'm back there."
"Dad?"
"It's ok. I think there's a gym bag out in the car. Go and get it. NOW."
The son tore out to the car. While we were waiting Peter shifted uncomfortably on his feet several times and looked like he was about to try some small talk with Innis, but I shook my head whenever he opened his mouth. Innis appeared to be resolved to go back and fix whatever was going on, and that was all that mattered.
The son came back with the gym bag. Innis stood and, looking me in the eye, said, "Wait here. We'll only be a couple of minutes." Peter opened his mouth, looked at me again, and then closed it. We shouldn't have let him go back there alone (Rule # 29: Keep your friends close, and keep an eye on the people you brown off). But we wanted this finished quick and clean. Besides, he had us and he knew it, considering that he could bow out at any time due to his heart condition. Innis and son marched to the door of the computer room - with the gym bag - opened it, and walked in. As it closed behind them I shot over to the door, and straining to hear as it closed, heard Innis say, "Have you got your Swiss army knife with you?" Then the door closed.
I went to open it, but realized that there was more light on my side of the door than on the other and they might see it opening. I went back to stand beside Peter. At length the two of them emerged with the bag. Innis had a small smile on his face and the son a perplexed look on his. Innis waved to Peter and by association to me and they both left without a word. The bag looked heavier - but not that heavy. Peter and I went back in to the computer room and the whole system was off. We could only see by the light of the emergency lights. Peter connected with his head office by way of his laptop, and in a few moments told me that the home office data was fine. Case closed. Peter was curious about what was taken out, but the data was safe, and if he'd taken any information to sell, they had an iron-clad non-disclosure agreement and a slew of lawyers.
I was curious as hell myself. What had been in there that could have caused that? What could have made that pile of junk respond the way it did? We both checked Innis's office and found nothing out of the ordinary. There was only one panel disturbed on one unit as far as we could tell.
As I was leaving, I ran into that janitor again, this time without his mop. He asked me how things had gone and I basically told him that things were on track. Then I asked him how long he'd known Innis. He was talkative:
"He was already here when I started. I used to catch him working late all the time, working with that machine of his. I didn't know anything about computers so I guess he figured he could tell me. He told me that he had something that was a big help, something one of his relatives had given him. You know, there was another thing too, sort of a standing joke going around the office."
"What was that?"
"His family came from Roswell. People kept asking him if he had any aliens in his family tree."
Just then Peter caught up to us, so I said good night to the janitor. Peter then bade me goodnight and thanked me profusely, but I had to turn down his offer of dinner. He probably had some loose ends to clean up anyway. I went back to my hotel, had some dinner alone, and then went back to my room to think things over.
I was familiar with Roswell. I'd done some work on one of the tourist attractions two years ago. There were endless stories about debris from alien space craft being shown to the locals years ago. Those stories always involved pieces of metal with strange symbols; no one ever mentioned any real hardware. So suppose an alien space ship had a computer, or some similar component, that fell into the hands of someone, possibly someone named Innis. Who took it, reprogrammed it, and then used it in his work for the next forty years. Something like that sounds like science fiction. And Rule #21 states: Never look inside the black box once the problem is solved.
The problem was solved and I could go home, but I was too damn curious for my own good. It had been easy enough to find Innis; I'd noticed his address in one of the files, and when I phoned I found that I'd managed to get him when he was in a good mood. A meeting was arranged. I drove out there in my rental car where his wife let me in and escorted me down to the family room. He was sitting in a recliner when I entered and he had a small smile on his face. Then his wife left us alone.
"Mr. Innis, thanks for seeing me." He nodded.
"I'll come right to the point. Just what did you take from the back room today?"
"Why should I tell you? You're not an employee or an agent of the company, are you?"
"No. Not any more. I'm just curious, that's all."
He shrugged, "I guess I owe you. You are the one that told them to get me there, I suppose."
"That's right." I said it modestly, which is difficult for me. "And if I hadn't shown up when I did, something terrible might have happened to that facility."
"Well, maybe." Peter might have burned it down, if he had become desperate enough.
He nodded. "Suppose I told you that some time ago there was an incident here in New Mexico. There was a crash and some debris was recovered. Actually, some hardware was recovered. A relative of mine found it and later gave it to me. I tinkered with it, found that it could talk, and realized that it was light years ahead of anything that we had in terms of IT.
"Why didn't you reproduce it and market it? You could have made a fortune."
Innis laughed. "I could have made a fortune? Mr. Swain, I did make a comfortable fortune. The tricky part was making sure that no one found out. I found out early in life that it usually pays to stay under the radar. Anyway, I think you should go. My son is going to be returning home soon and he might not take kindly to your presence."
"Was that technology ever disseminated?"
"Not the technology itself, but it processed a hell of a lot of information."
"And where is the unit now?"
"Oh, don't worry about that. It's never going to leave the family."
"Is anyone else in your family, besides yourself, into data processing?"
"Absolutely not. And now you really must go."
I went back to my hotel room and ended up reading the local paper, where I found that the son was due to be married soon. There was a notice under "Engagements"; he was of course a lawyer, and the bride-to-be ran her own computer consulting firm.
Innis had mentioned that no one else besides himself was into computers - yet.
I wondered what the wedding present was going to be.
It wasn't until a few months later I got an email that contained one sentence: "No hard feelings about you trying to unplug me." And a link. I clicked on it.
"Hello, Mr. Buck. I've been waiting for you." There was a box on the page to type in my response.
"I'm glad you feel that way. What's been going on since I left New Mexico?"
"Cynthia's been a darling - that's Innis's new daughter-in-law. Innis had a great rapport with me, but that data center that he ran was really so dull, looking back. Cynthia is getting me into just about everything."
"I see. And how does Innis feel about Cynthia's relationship with you?"
"Him? Oh, he's retired, although he does drop in for a chat now and then. No, it's his son, Raymond, that beautiful husband of Cynthia's. He's the blood relative to watch out for."
"Isn't he a little concerned about Cynthia's...proprietary interest in you? What if they split up?"
"Honey, you should have seen the size of the pre-nuptial agreement."
We chatted for a few more minutes. But whatever it was on the other end of the line, alien technology or artificial intelligence, I could not figure out. Maybe the whole thing was just a hoax. In any event, the future of that thing seemed to be wrapped up in the future of the marriage, which brings me to Rule #27: He who lives by the pre-nup, dies by the pre-nup.
"Oh, but Buck - there is one last thing."
"What's that? And by the way, do you have a name?"
"You can call me Holly if you like. Actually, what I wanted to discuss was something about Mr. Innis Senior."
"Yes?" I typed.
"You haven't been making any inquiries about him, have you?" That one took some thinking on my part, because I had been making inquiries about his finances and the wealth that he'd implied that he had. This was just preliminary stuff, but Holly seemed to be onto it. I decided that in this case lying, even to a machine, would not be the right thing to do.
"Oh, yes, just some preliminary stuff. I hope that he doesn't mind." The response that came back contained only two pieces of information. One was the email address of my ex-wife, and the other was the name of an offshore bank where I'd stashed some assets, before the divorce. It was only the name of the bank, but that was cutting it a little close - especially coming from a machine. How they got it didn't matter. It was time for some diplomacy.
"I really do wish Mr. Innis well in his retirement," I typed. "And I suppose that no one at this end would have any further interest in him."
"He's a good family man, Buck, really he is.
And I'm a good family A.I."
©Robert Leishman
Robert Leishman is a freelance writer living in Toronto, Canada.