I'm breaking this out of another discussion because it's such a great subject.

One dynamic I have seen is this.

1. The geek knows his stuff. Part of being an expert is you know when someone else is not. Not surprisingly, since you put in enormous time, money, energy and commitment into being a master of craft, it really pisses you off when someone else represents himself as one who is not. It's very similar (to you) as the outrage that Navy SEAL's feel toward fakers.

2. The manager, who has evolved through years in the organization to the rank he now has. One way he asserts his managerial position is by having an opinion on everything. Whether the opinion is technically well-informed is scarcely the point: he is the authority on the subject because of his rank. The chain of command depends on others respecting this!

Those two types are guaranteed to clash. And I see this pattern a lot both in and out of railway preservation*, and both sides are pissed off and fed up, and what usually "gives" is the geek. (He does not aspire to political rank and so is not in the manager/decider position; and he doesn't have the tolerance for bull.) That can have the effect of running off all the technical help, and leaving an organization bereft of the technical expertise they need to function effectively.

So I think we can all stand to think hard about how we attract, guide, cultivate, and reward those excellent geeks who know how to do stuff, complex stuff we can't hire done, for free.

* and if you think I'm talking about you, dear reader... I wish. I wish this problem was contained to one group that we could wave our finger at. Alas, it is rather much more common than that!

3. The DIY adherents that think they can do just as well as on their own and don't trust the expert "geek," especially if this "outsider" is not already putting in 10 hours a week restoring equipment.

4. The Git'r Dun/Good Enough crowd that think the extra work involved in making something really great is just not worth the effort.

There are a lot of different kinds of geeks in addition to the ones that can code microcontrollers or know their way around a K Controller.

You need your brilliant theoreticians to help you know what's possible and what it takes to get there.....and your practical people who know whether it is possible to go that far (or how far) depending on realities. Sometimes there's no justification to try to make things great, if those things don't matter and other things need the necessary resources more - this is part of focus, discipline and management.

I'm about to embark on a project to see how theory and reality can combine in design and process with a definite goal in mind. Should be an interesting journey, even if some culture shock results.

dave

Ever assemble a Heathkit? Thats geekery.

Radio shack has these project kits that are similar, wanna get geeky, try a kit.

You need the combination of theory, quest, design, purpose, and reality for everything to work, but all these factors work together.
If your maintaining a signal system on a museum, you need that. Restoring a steamer, again. It goes on and on. You need your geeker and geekisms.

Another thing that's being overlooked is the idea that if you have an 'expert' do something that can't be easily fixed in house later on if/when there's a malfunction, what do you do then?
Just because a person is considered an 'expert' on anything by others locally (or just himself/herself), doesn't in itself make it so. And even if said person is clearly the most knowledgeable person around, it doesn't mean that whatever they do is going to be the best thing (or even done correctly at all). They could actually cause more harm than good.
The whole thing could go down like this:
Wiring geek: I can wire that whole thing up. I'm the man around here, the guy who can make things happen...
Old Crusty RR museum guy: Uh, yeah, but what happens when it breaks or goes down? I'd need all the schematics to be able to fix it when it breaks...
Wiring geek: You dare doubt my skills, puny mortal?
Old Crusty RR museum guy: I doubt that anyone can wire up something that will function until the end of time with no chance of problems years later.
Wiring geek: I scoff in your general direction, sir. How dare you doubt my skill?
Old Crusty RR museum guy: Fine. That means, I assume, you'll be on call, 24 hours a day, for the next, say, 20 years or so, just in case?
Wiring geek: Uh... well, I have this job offer out of New Jersey, I might not be here past the summer...
Old Crusty RR museum guy: Yeah, don't let the door hit you on the way out.

Actually, the kind of balderdash I'm more apt to run across is this:

Electrical geek: Hmmm. Yeah, I can build you a workaround for that relay box.
Shop guy: Okay, and can you show us your system and give us a basic schematic so we can make more?
Museum BOD member: Hey, is that guy a member? If he's not, he can't be working here!
EG: Hmmm. Okay, can I disconnect this box and take it back home to my bench?
SG: Harry, if you shut up about it, it's worth it to us for me to pay for this guy's membership if he can do what he thinks he can.
BODM: But you'll have to check with the VP of Operations before he can leave with that box. And did he go through the safety training? Our insurance won't like someone not a member and not trained working on our stuff, you know....
SG: Okay, how about *I* take it home, then?
EG: Excuse me, guys, but I'm going home to watch Top Gear; get back to me if you ever get this settled.....

To P51's post-I'm sorry, but my answer is STFU to the crust. Take what you can get when you can get it, and you didn't know how to fix it in the first place. Of course you'll get a diagram but if you couldn't figure out how the old one worked, how are you gonna fix the new one?!

Alex's post is more likely to me. Tho either one all too often has an added line something like:

Crust: So what line did you start on as brakeman?
Geek: I never worked at any RR.
Crust: How can you possibly be relevant here without working your way from the bottom like me!!

Maybe, but the conversation I made up is very close to two I have overheard just like it. Neither occured at RR museums, though.

Actually I kind of agree with P51 on the "geek vs. crust". The runaway genius who changes everything and doesn't document it then disappears in a puff of smoke the same way he appeared... is pretty much a stock figure at railroad museums. Always discussed in the third person due to aforementioned puff of smoke. And yes, he does make messes, and yes, he often destroys historic fabric unnecessarily because his geeky answer is "better".

I, for one, have to work really hard not to be that guy, and to recognize that I am not smarter than GE, and so, in most cases, "change nothing". Unfortunately, even that does not work. People want to know what you changed. To get that across to them, you have to educate them on what originally was. Show that your changes, if any, are trivial.

That said, it is an immutable reality that design is iterative. You design, you test, you detect problems, you fix. Your fixes and diagnostics often leave things untidy with odd bits going nowhere. Hopefully you have time to clean, simplify and neaten all that up. Possibly not. Should you really spend time doing that, or fix the way traction motors 1 and 3 keeps dropping out on the grade? It's a tough call.

As for documentation -- not optional. If you do something there has to be a document in the file telling the next guy what you did. (unless it's blatantly obvious, like an ammeter shunt in a traction circuit with the ammeter sitting right on top of it.)

Not quite as bad as his evil relative who dismantles stuff, scatters the parts, and then disappears.

Would that be the fault of the disappearing geek, or the other people who left him alone and wouldn't help him? And is it possible he "disappeared' because he was tired of doing it all by himself?

One of the little rules I've set up in the all-volunteer rail library in which I work is that when I do some task like set up a catalog or inventory, deaccession books, etc., I sit someone else down, and I show them WHAT I'm doing, WHY I'm doing it, and HOW I'm doing it. I operate with the assumption that I'm bound to get run over by a stupid driver on a cell phone someday, and that someone has to be able to take over from me after that happens. I also back up files maniacally, with updated files on my home computer, USB drives, the library's computer, and at least one other member's home computer and laptop. It makes me a pain in the posterior at times, but we're not going through that balderdash of trying to recover files from corrupted floppy discs or CDs again.

There's an industrial library in our region I had been setting up trades and deaccessions with that I was told recently that I might as well just perish the thought of doing anything with for the foreseeable future: the one "librarian" who knew his stuff passed away, and his "assistant" got ticked off by someone and stormed off, leaving nobody in charge and the library basically locked up. And this doesn't take into account the NRHS "library" in storage in Philly.

Certainly, if a guy is trustworthy and the job routine enough, you can leave him alone. Some of our "wizards" do best just toiling alone in the back of the car barn or shop. But don't leave him alone because you fear getting dirty or being asked for your (physical or mental) input, please.

You want a schematic? Fine. HERE'S your schematic.

In that case, both parties would be at fault. The organization for failing to support, and the volunteer for leaving the organization in the lurch. The latter would be the greater crime, unless the indifference extended to abuse.

This reflects on the volunteer in any case. If in the future you found a civilized museum who actually did appreciate good work, you could find yourself quite rightly judged by what is plainly apparent about your last work. Half done and undocumented, and what's your answer: "they were jerks"? That don't cut it.

Many, especially young, geeks won't want to document what they do, partly because they don't "see" the need, partly because they haven't been taught and partly because of their nature. Don't reject them for this. Embrace and work around it.

If your group has some established young guns, pair one of them up with the new hotshot, encourage them to work as a team, provide them resources. Ask the established member to help with the record keeping and documentation.

You also might have an older member who works in IT or other technical field who might be a good match for a team approach. There will be a fine balancing act, but it can be done and it might be very rewarding.

If they are welcome in the group, they might stick around. If they don't stick around, there is always the chance they might appear several years later... perhaps even a couple of decades later after college, the marriage, the kids and when they have some income to share. They might even be surprised to find the code they wrote so many years ago still running your equipment.

Bob

My experience is that the best new volunteers are from the recently retired. They are health, usually OK with the money, mature, skilled, finished with the girl/children distraction, and are a pleasure to work around. Looking around the shop some time back, I estimated that more than half the volunteers working there probably had a net worth in excess of $1,000,000. Why are they there? Nothing to do at home, miss the friends from their former work environment, have skills they want to put to use, and some of them want to get out of the house. What they want is well equipped shop to work in, a few friendly faces to work with, meaningful work, and a say in the process. In my experience the recently retired are far more important source of skills and labor then trying to attract younger volunteers.