Question Time 

Every now and then as I'm surfing the channels, I'll happen upon CSPAN when they're showing "Question Time" in the British Parliament. I think it's funny to watch. For those who are not aware, this is a time scheduled by law (every Tuesday I think) where the Prime Minister has to take questions from Parliament. Really, it consists of members of his own party lobbing soft balls at him for him to hit out of the park, while members of the opposition grill him on other issues. Watching the SNL sketches they do based on Question Time is of course even more amusing.

Why do I bring up question time you ask? On my current primary project, I have been finding that I'm spending so much time answering questions and helping other people out (which is part of my job here), that I really have no time to do the real work that's also assigned to me. Take this morning for instance. I got in at 8:00, and logged in. I had read through my first email (which was someone asking me to review something). Before I could actually review it (which was important), my technical lead IM's me asking for help. So I have to spend a half an hour with her. When I get back to my desk, the person who sent me the email comes by as soon as I sit down asking whether I've reviewed that thing. I say no, but I'll get to it ASAP. Then another IM pops up 1 minute later from someone else asking for my immediate help, and then I had two meetings. By the time 11:00 had rolled around, I had gotten absolutely nothing done of my own.

Seeing my absolute frustration, my technical lead came up with a solution. I am to block off a period of time each day where people are allowed to ask me questions. The only exception will be her... because she wants to be able to ask me questions any time. The irony is that I end up spending most of my "question time" helping her, so this does me very little good. I've also tried setting my status to "Busy" in instant messenger, but then people just come by my cube and ask me questions.

What I really need is an office with a door. A big steel door. A big steel door with a big deadbolt... and a guard dog.