Raffle, Raffle, Raffle

Raffle for Artitude

You know those little tickets, you write your name on them, pay for them, hope you win?? Pretty easy? Wrong! I have been put in charge of the raffle for Artitude, which goes out to each student’s family, staff and board members. Each of the 300 booklets has 10 tickets. = Nightmare if you get one little thing wrong.

I managed to compile a database, which was fairly straightforward, from which to print the labels out that would go on the front of the booklet. After fighting with the printer for half an hour, I finally managed to print these labels out, class by class, ready to be stuck on the front of the booklets. Next I had to use a new program that contained all of the kids names and addresses and print these out, which turned into another fight with the printer for another 45minutes. By this stage I was wondering if it was just me.
In the database I had created, each child had a booklet number and the range of ticket numbers within that booklet next to their name. Match up each booklet label, with the child’s name and the booklet number on it, to the correct booklet and range of tickets and you were on easy street. Unless you put the wrong label on the wrong booklet (I must point out that these are professionally printed booklets, not easily changed). So that involved changing the database numbers instead, which put everything out of whack. So I continued to struggle with this for an hour or so, making sure all the booklets corresponded with the correct numbers and child, before labelling them putting them in the envelope with the letter and donation form and sealing the envelope.
This whole process took me 2 days. 2 DAYS!!! I couldn’t believe that a string of minor problems (printer, labelling, database) could have stretched a task out to 2 days. It really made me think of the time this sort of thing would take out of something like a consultancy, where everything is billed appropriately every 6 or so minutes. Who would you bill it to? It’s obviously not the client’s fault that these things happen. It really does put things into perspective when these things happen, how much work, time and effort goes into something as large as this event. Each tiny detail has to be thought of and addressed and you have to allow margin for error, in my case 2 days.

It just makes you think, doesn’t it??