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Descriptions Debate… Point of Termination vs Point of Ending??
Tom Bushelman replied 5 years, 3 months ago 17 Members · 23 Replies
- Posted by: LDavis
I prefer “termination” and I’m the one with the license, being told by someone without a license that I’m basically supposed to sign whatever is put in front of me “as long as the numbers are correct”… to which I’m fundamentally opposed.
My practical answer to this is that if the wording is clear, don’t worry about the style. But…
Having one specific option to something that is essentially a professional decision, even if the forced option is otherwise acceptable just irritates me enough to say no even if it’s just for the sake of being contrary – even if the one trying to force the choice is higher up in the organization.
But IMO, there is a bit more at stake here than the almost meaningless matter of POE vs POT, particularly if this is the first time something like this has happened to you. If the unlicensed person tries to push his/her authority for this, what more significant matters may come up where the choice will matter. When that happens, regardless of who is higher in the corporate food chain, where will the responsibility for that decision land should problems arise because of it?
If you roll over on this matter now, you will have already lent some validation to that person overriding your professional authority on other things later and pushing back will be more difficult when it really matters.
In my current position, if someone else writes a description for me to sign and the only issues I have with it are writing style preferences, I’ll just go with it. If there are also some technical issues I need to send it back for, I’ll often mark changes to reflect my preferred style. But thus far, I have not had anyone try to tell me that I must sign & stamp something that I didn’t want to sign. If that had happened, I’d be pretty quick to draw the line in the sand – or chisel it in the rock.
On one occasion, the lawyers upstairs wanted me to provide an opinion that I did not agree with in a report. I told them that if they could provide me with the appropriate legal underpinning to show why the conclusion they wanted me to draw was actually the correct interpretation of the boundary matter at issue, I would put the opinion they were looking for in my report. They couldn’t or wouldn’t, so they reassigned the project to a surveyor who was willing to sign whatever our legal folks told him to sign without questioning it.
The boundary unit supervisor had agreed with me and agreed when I asked for a legal memo on the matter before I would consider changing my opinion. But he made the reassignment when legal asked/demanded it anyway. Speaking later with the surveyor who it was reassigned to, I found that he agreed with me on the underlying matter yet had provided the desired conclusion without question. This is one of the reasons I am very unlikely to ever be a supervisor here. Had I been the supervisor, I would have backed a well-reasoned and principled stand by one of my licensed staff, and if forced to reassign, I would have ensured that whoever the project was reassigned to had a very good understanding of the underlying issues and what had led to the reassignment before they decide whether or not to provide a differing opinion.
When it comes to times when it would matter, I don’t understand why a licensed professional would provide a certain opinion simply because that’s what they are told is expected, not fully understanding the issues the opinion speaks to and not making an attempt to learn. I doubt I ever will. I don’t have much respect for a licensed professional who would provide an opinion which goes against their professional judgment, whether as a business/career decision, or simply as a matter of capitulation, and I doubt I ever will.
- Posted by: dgregb
For language I use “Point-of-Beginning” and “to the Terminus.” I really like “Terminus” because of the association with the Roman god and because it sounds so authoritative.
I go one step further and write the whole description in latin. Cuts down on calls from other surveyors nit-picking my grammar.
I had an SIT working for at a firm years ago that had come from another “low-baller” firm. This firm frequently used the term “new-made line” which drove my inner grammar nazi crazy. He used that term while working under me and argued the point with me because he believed in it. Good for him to stick up for what he believed in. However, I do like consistency when possible, in the same company, not to mention my name and stamp was going on it so it got changed. I don’t know if that correction ever stuck with or not. I start at a Point of Beginning and end at the Point of Beginning. If I were to use a different ending, I like Terminus better.
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