Would you like to take a survey? - Part 7
Wow. So much to say. Lots has happened since my last post. Hopefully I won't forget anything!
I'm currently back home in Carleton Place for a little break. Came back on Saturday. We leave again tomorrow (Thursday) morning for St-Bernard-de-Lacolle - again. We're surveying both directions of that border crossing once more, this time for a week. Should be okay, I think. Hopefully the customer service has improved somewhat since the last time I was there... ;-)
After that, apparently there's been a little change of plan. Originally, we were supposed to head out west (Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba) to do surveys at various border crossings there for the next month (until early October). However, we recently learned that MTO (the Ministry of Transportation of Ontario) has backed out of its commitment to fulfill that leg of the project. Therefore, we're being re-deployed throughout southern Ontario in order to compensate for the slack. Mostly border crossings, I believe - Niagara Falls, Sarnia, Windsor, et al. I'm not too bummed out about the change. I've never been to that area of my province, so it should be interesting regardless. Plenty to see and explore. Plus, the contract got extended by another month as a result - we won't be finishing now until early to mid November. I can hardly complain about an extra month's pay!! Besides, I can always take a trip out west later on; there's no rush!
Anyway, last week in Quebec was pretty eventful. We were staying in Mont-Saint-Hilaire, about half an hour's drive east of Montreal. Pretty little town. Our hotel - the Auberge Montagnard - was quite nice. On their website, you can actually see a picture of the exact room I stayed in!!! At the main page, click on the "Rooms" button - mine was the "Comfort 3" example! I recognize the painting on the wall. Spectacular view of the mountain itself right in front of the hotel. Our survey site was just outside nearby Saint-Mathieu-de-Beloeil (it was another inspection/weigh station, like the previous site in Pointe-du-Lac). It was pretty busy - lots of traffic on the highway (Autoroute 20 East). We pulled off some pretty good numbers.
The week culminated with some significant changes for me: as of tomorrow, I will no longer be a crew chief. I am going back to being a normal surveyor and transferring to another team as well. To make a long story short, my previously mentioned "island of tranquillity" got hit by, if not a hurricane, then at least a tropical storm! Basically, I was having some professional difficulties with one of my team members. In the course of trying to deal with the situation, I made some significant mistakes & errors in judgement as a crew chief; I failed to sit down and clearly communicate my concerns to this person. That, coupled with my own uncertainties and my inability to minimize them in front of the surveyors, led to several members of my team openly voicing their doubts as to my effectiveness and capacity to be a crew chief. When this happened, I realized that I really had to re-evaluate my position and make an appropriate decision. I feel that, given all my mistakes and my crew's escalating tensions & doubts, I was perhaps not ideally suited to be a good and effective crew chief. It is neither fair nor wise to force a crew to continue to serve under a leader they no longer respect or have faith in. I have no real pride or ego riding on this - to me, "crew chief" is just a title, not worth all this stress and aggravation. Besides, I was always happiest when I was doing the actual surveys; all the organizational and administrative duties and headaches increasingly felt like a burden I no longer wanted to bear under the circumstances. Therefore, in the interests of both myself and ultimately my team, I concluded my best course of action would be to request the switch and transfer back to surveyor. I called up one of the project managers at Transport Canada I'd become friendly with and explained the situation and my request. Being very understanding and sympathetic, he readily agreed and approved it. I'm completely satisfied with my decision; my family and friends are equally supportive as well. It's a surveyor's life for me!!
Getting home Saturday turned out to be quite a challenge. Not to mention an exercise in frustration, aggravation, and monumental patience! Basically, through a conspiracy of circumstances and poor planning, I (as a driver) got suckered into doing a ridiculous amount of running around the Ottawa area, picking up and dropping off both people and luggage. After a three-hour drive from Drummondville (even further east of Mont-St-Hilaire!) back to Ottawa, I wind up in Orleans. From there, I had to drive over to Vanier, to drop off both one of my guys and his luggage as well as the luggage of another surveyor. Then back to Orleans to pick another guy's luggage that had to be ferried over from Rockland (!). I drove this luggage over to the Glebe. From there, I had to finally drive the cargo van down to Britannia Beach to drop it off at the house of one of the top brass. I arranged to have my mother pick me up there and return me at long last to Carleton Place! After starting out in Mont-St-Hilaire at around 9:00 a.m., I didn't get home to CP until about 7:00 or 8:00ish! AAAAARRRRGH! Needless to say, I won't be doing that kind of runaround again anytime soon - if I have anything to say about it!
One funny yet personally embarrassing anecdote to mention while I've been home: went shoe shopping yesterday evening. While talking to the salesman, I noticed that he was giving the shoes I had on a rather odd look. He then asked me if I realized that I was wearing two different shoes! Upon looking down, I saw that he was right. Oh, did I feel like such an idiot at that moment! What's even funnier is that I'd been wearing these the whole time I was in Quebec and never clued in! Luckily, they were both black and of a similar style, so no one noticed (I hope). We all had a good laugh at that little discovery... :-)
Anyway, that's it for now! With any luck, I should post my next update reasonably soon.
A la prochaine!
I'm currently back home in Carleton Place for a little break. Came back on Saturday. We leave again tomorrow (Thursday) morning for St-Bernard-de-Lacolle - again. We're surveying both directions of that border crossing once more, this time for a week. Should be okay, I think. Hopefully the customer service has improved somewhat since the last time I was there... ;-)
After that, apparently there's been a little change of plan. Originally, we were supposed to head out west (Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba) to do surveys at various border crossings there for the next month (until early October). However, we recently learned that MTO (the Ministry of Transportation of Ontario) has backed out of its commitment to fulfill that leg of the project. Therefore, we're being re-deployed throughout southern Ontario in order to compensate for the slack. Mostly border crossings, I believe - Niagara Falls, Sarnia, Windsor, et al. I'm not too bummed out about the change. I've never been to that area of my province, so it should be interesting regardless. Plenty to see and explore. Plus, the contract got extended by another month as a result - we won't be finishing now until early to mid November. I can hardly complain about an extra month's pay!! Besides, I can always take a trip out west later on; there's no rush!
Anyway, last week in Quebec was pretty eventful. We were staying in Mont-Saint-Hilaire, about half an hour's drive east of Montreal. Pretty little town. Our hotel - the Auberge Montagnard - was quite nice. On their website, you can actually see a picture of the exact room I stayed in!!! At the main page, click on the "Rooms" button - mine was the "Comfort 3" example! I recognize the painting on the wall. Spectacular view of the mountain itself right in front of the hotel. Our survey site was just outside nearby Saint-Mathieu-de-Beloeil (it was another inspection/weigh station, like the previous site in Pointe-du-Lac). It was pretty busy - lots of traffic on the highway (Autoroute 20 East). We pulled off some pretty good numbers.
The week culminated with some significant changes for me: as of tomorrow, I will no longer be a crew chief. I am going back to being a normal surveyor and transferring to another team as well. To make a long story short, my previously mentioned "island of tranquillity" got hit by, if not a hurricane, then at least a tropical storm! Basically, I was having some professional difficulties with one of my team members. In the course of trying to deal with the situation, I made some significant mistakes & errors in judgement as a crew chief; I failed to sit down and clearly communicate my concerns to this person. That, coupled with my own uncertainties and my inability to minimize them in front of the surveyors, led to several members of my team openly voicing their doubts as to my effectiveness and capacity to be a crew chief. When this happened, I realized that I really had to re-evaluate my position and make an appropriate decision. I feel that, given all my mistakes and my crew's escalating tensions & doubts, I was perhaps not ideally suited to be a good and effective crew chief. It is neither fair nor wise to force a crew to continue to serve under a leader they no longer respect or have faith in. I have no real pride or ego riding on this - to me, "crew chief" is just a title, not worth all this stress and aggravation. Besides, I was always happiest when I was doing the actual surveys; all the organizational and administrative duties and headaches increasingly felt like a burden I no longer wanted to bear under the circumstances. Therefore, in the interests of both myself and ultimately my team, I concluded my best course of action would be to request the switch and transfer back to surveyor. I called up one of the project managers at Transport Canada I'd become friendly with and explained the situation and my request. Being very understanding and sympathetic, he readily agreed and approved it. I'm completely satisfied with my decision; my family and friends are equally supportive as well. It's a surveyor's life for me!!
Getting home Saturday turned out to be quite a challenge. Not to mention an exercise in frustration, aggravation, and monumental patience! Basically, through a conspiracy of circumstances and poor planning, I (as a driver) got suckered into doing a ridiculous amount of running around the Ottawa area, picking up and dropping off both people and luggage. After a three-hour drive from Drummondville (even further east of Mont-St-Hilaire!) back to Ottawa, I wind up in Orleans. From there, I had to drive over to Vanier, to drop off both one of my guys and his luggage as well as the luggage of another surveyor. Then back to Orleans to pick another guy's luggage that had to be ferried over from Rockland (!). I drove this luggage over to the Glebe. From there, I had to finally drive the cargo van down to Britannia Beach to drop it off at the house of one of the top brass. I arranged to have my mother pick me up there and return me at long last to Carleton Place! After starting out in Mont-St-Hilaire at around 9:00 a.m., I didn't get home to CP until about 7:00 or 8:00ish! AAAAARRRRGH! Needless to say, I won't be doing that kind of runaround again anytime soon - if I have anything to say about it!
One funny yet personally embarrassing anecdote to mention while I've been home: went shoe shopping yesterday evening. While talking to the salesman, I noticed that he was giving the shoes I had on a rather odd look. He then asked me if I realized that I was wearing two different shoes! Upon looking down, I saw that he was right. Oh, did I feel like such an idiot at that moment! What's even funnier is that I'd been wearing these the whole time I was in Quebec and never clued in! Luckily, they were both black and of a similar style, so no one noticed (I hope). We all had a good laugh at that little discovery... :-)
Anyway, that's it for now! With any luck, I should post my next update reasonably soon.
A la prochaine!
posted by Blake @ 1:24 a.m.
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