RE: Word and multiple conditions (a cutting edge skill?)

[MList -at- chrysalis-its -dot- com]

John Posada [mailto:JPosada -at- book -dot- com] thought he had me with:

[PHB responds with...]
> >"Interesting idea. Let me know when you have the first 
> >draft ready for my review...."
> >
> >I've used that tactic myself.
> 
> So, of course, since you know that will happen, you've 
> prepared it ahead of
> time and when he asks, you whip it out and hand it to him right there,
> right?

Nope. What I do is what I said in the next paragraph of 
my post, which you deleted:

"I just have to arrange that the suggestion come from other 
 quarters. I don't want to 'get any on me'." 


Y'see, the problem is that I don't really think that 
what they want can be done with the tool, at least not 
in a reasonable and efficient manner. (The responses that 
I'm getting so far would indicate that Word is not the 
tool for the job, at least not without add-on tools.)

The options are:

a) prove to PHB that what they want will work

b) prove to PHB that what they want will not work.

You may recall that it can be difficult or impossible to 
prove the negative of a proposition (a favorite tactic 
of lawyers and debaters is to put the opponent in the 
position of having to prove the not of an assertion).

So, if I fail to keep myself free of the contagion, 
I can do a whole mess of work (when my schedule does 
not really permit, thank you) just to show that something 
I don't think is worthwhile or efficiently do-able is ... do-able.

Or, I can do enough to show that it is not a workable 
approach.... and then be regarded as lazy or obstructive 
for not having put enough effort into *making* it work.

A person with a pet project, that they don't have to 
implement themselves, is not easily persuaded that it 
wasn't a good idea. Instead, failure to show that it 
IS a good idea becomes failure on the part of the underling 
who was tasked to demonstrate the wonderfulness.

On balance, I think I'd prefer that somebody else be in 
that position.

/kevin

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