By Bill Adams
After several “not-much-happening-today” morning coffees, the Raisin Squad started picking on each other. Old people are easy pickings. “Do you wear a COVID mask so we can’t see you drooling all over yourself?” “You gotta hit the bathroom again? When you get older does your bladder get smaller?” White hairs can be brutal.
Trying to change the subject, I mentioned a work-in-progress column about fire apparatus specifications. It was a mistake. “All you salesmen lie.” But I’m retired. “It don’t matter; you still write about that junk. Vendors can sweet-talk for 20 minutes and never say anything. Specs ain’t nothing but smoke and mirrors. Nobody understands them. People just buy whatever they want.” They drove me out. It was a double Tylenol morning.
I finished the column, originally titling it the S&M in Spec Writing. Then I realized the magazine hierarchy would think I’m promoting Sadism and Masochism, which ultra-conservative readers might find objectionable. Raisins already believe S&M means Smoke & Mirrors, which also could be construed as accusatory by vendors.
So, for-the-record, S&M means Sales & Marketing, which on a corporate level is an honorable profession, but one I don’t necessarily agree with. S&M could also be called advertising and marketing, or marketing and advertising. But A&M or M&A doesn’t have the same pizazz as S&M.
Being politically correct, I titled it Avoid the Three A’s when Spec Writing. The three A’s are advertising, adverbs, and adjectives—the earlier encompasses the latter two. All three are meaningless, confusing, and unnecessary during competitive bidding. They confuse old people. It should be illegal to incorporate them into purchasing specifications.
Two Purchasing Specs
Old timers say purchasing specifications only have to say the rig has to be big, red, go fast, and carry a lot of hose. It is a bit more complicated. Traumatic to the mindset of some S&M folks is my belief there should be two distinct types of purchasing specifications. One should only be used by the S&M people and vendors to advertise and promote the product. Why? Fire apparatus manufacturers are seldom held accountable about the accuracy of their advertising. This is not an accusation that all advertising is smoke and mirrors. Some S&M can stretch reality to its limits by astute and liberal use of adjectives and adverbs.
The second spec should be called the legal specifications, meaning they’re the ones the rig shall be built to. Most apparatus are sold via a signed contract—a legally binding document. Here’s where the legal profession dips their fingers into the pie. Legal Beagles be