I hate clients so much....

Post Reply New Topic

Why is it that no matter how good they seem there is always a point at which they start telling you how to do you job rather than asking you what the best solution is? Why do they need me then?

I am so tied of wasting energy and time having to email them back and forth explaining why they would be worse off doing x.

In this case they ask for some features, and a CMS. I choose intelligently, a programmers choice that I would use myself. I don't know why I don't just keep my mouth shut, I just can't help being honest.

Then they start get all paranoid, because they have tried Joomla, which incidentally is unsuitable and a total gimmick, which purport to be a jack of all trades but is a master of none.

I had another client, who wanted to do a private project with joomla thinking he wouldn't need me, it wasn't long before he was asking me to make a ajax chat for him (or more accurately come up with a better solution than the terrible botch job of solution from fly be night coders that joomla attracts so often).

Just because some thing comes under a certain category or phrase doesn't mean it in any way comparable. Joomla, I would never use that with a client. It has an extremely fixed mould API, convoluted xml based bundles, and most of all it is bloated and doesn't work terribly well.

What I am talking about doesn't really have an API as such you have complete flexibility to do what you want, it just has method to integrate with the interface, and is a systematic way of working. It is basically a neat, simple and elegant system on top of MVC framework.

They don’t have the level of knowledge for me to explain this properly. Nope. They want and CMS, but they don’t want because they are telling me to write individual feature and then loosely string them together, but also so how my magic they will have a CMS. I don’t have the time to explain to them good programming practice. They think because they have done so perl out of a for dummies guide they know what their are talking about. In their own word they don’t have the expertise to do this.

I have told a client where to stick it before, I am quite reasonable and polite normally but everybody has their limits. I not saying I am anyway close to doing it with this guy but I am wondering why this keeps happening and if there is anything I can do to stop it. I already have a pre-emptive blub. I thought this guy was on board, he said he values professionalism and honesty. I tell it like it is, it not going to fob him off with a botch job solution.

Lol. I think I would be the botchy perl job type person. I would love to get to the skill level that you seem to be at, with the knowledge you have. What courses did you take?

working for people has got to be the worst. i feel for you, but almost every job has its snags like that. when i was washing dishes for clients i was so clumsy i would cut my hands all the time and drop s**t, if i worked with computers it would be the same. just different arena

I often have to deal with an internal battle when customers (who come to my company because we're experts) start trying to control the way the job gets done - rather than focusing on the desired outcome. Part of me is insulted that the client doesn't just accept my expertise - but another part of me is intrigued by the implied challenge to that expertise.

I look at it as the client's inability to communicate their desires, except through the way they would accomplish the task, if they had to do it themselves. So it becomes part of my job to nod my head & agree with them - all the while trying to figure out how to actually achieve the desired results.

In other words - my main rule for myself is to figure out how to make it work (a corollary is to figure out what they are really asking for.) It is extremely frustrating to have one of those clients. Luckily, I'm one person removed from the actual customer (I do the tech work, while a project manager deals directly with the client) - so I usually get to pass on the most frustrating interactions.

But I always take it as a challenge - can I still do the job, given the constraints placed on me by the client? The constraints force me to be more creative - so these clients give me an opportunity to really shine.

My first career was music - and I always carry with me this philosophy of Igor Stravinsky:

your job is to sell your work and get the clients money and make him happy. if he gets screwed in the meantime, what do you care? they are a bunch of ungrateful bastard anyway.

You can only screw your client in a fast turnover business, or if the reward are sufficiently large where you won’t need to work for months after. It makes no sense to screw you clients otherwise. That is why con artist operate as get in get out, or go for the long con.

It do not do this, I don't want to screw anyone over. it would do me no good it would make me no better that people who promise to do jobs they can’t do and then botch it

Besides i think he want me to create whole framework for him which isn't going to happen OR he think he is going to do without one, which also isn't going to happen.

I can completely sympathize. I am so, so sick of my clients. I am tiered of using energy on them. So I think I'm gonna get another job.

You can't get in a situation where you are working on tasks instead of dealing with "clients." I deal with the public but my company has very strict paramaters on what can and can not be done so it limits "negotiations" like you are talking about.

If i were you, i would start looking for a new job before i said or did something that could leave a permanent record in my reference-pool.

Nowadays, i am primarily looking for work in a non-commercial/government organisation that i do not have to put up with that kind of s--t from IT-illiterate customers.

Even if i am offered 50K a month (Swedish currency) as a consultant i would rather take a less paying job that did not involve meeting morons... sorry, "customers".