The Jim & Kathy Experience
I met Jim when he was brought into Digitran to fix the mess they called software. I was working as a consultant hired by Jim’s arch-enemy, Denis Sandel. Talk about polar opposites. I guess the easiest way to describe the two men’s opposite polarity is; Jim is an excellent pilot, Denis flew low so he could follow the highways.
I was totally blown away by Jim’s knowledge of just about everything. His willingness to teach and to learn, his enthusiasm that anything could be accomplished, his intense concentration to dig down to the bits and bytes of a problem no matter how long it took. Also, his appreciation of his employees efforts. His love for his family.
Then he fired me. LOL! He had to, company was broke and all consultants were let go; but he got me back!
I guess I can tell Jim now that the few times I figured stuff out before him, was just luck – like a brooktrout api error reversing video... I happened to point to the right hex codes – just luck Jim...I’m not that brilliant, but thanks for thinking it! His amazement at my ability to bring the entire network down by dropping a pen on my server; walking into a room and having computer crash; and knowing all along why the new drivers for the fax cards would not work – it was because of bad floppy disk copies – and I did not know it was a major issue with the vendor.
In times of success and failure Jim was always involved and supportive. A little know secret that only Rich, Marcos, and I witnessed... Jim and Denis having a “disagreement” that ended in shouting and chest bumps. Our money was on Jim; Jim you were awesome standing up to that bully! Only saw it once and never again.
Jim made the long hours fun and productive. We always would tease him about coming up with the next Frame Relay idea, when all along we were working on his next frame relay. Fax over the internet? Who, other than Jim, would have dreamed that up and found a way to make it work. Then corporate America interfered with productivity and Jim left. There has been no replacement since then anywhere close to Jim’s leadership, respectfulness, and productivity.
~ Kathy Achilles
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