So, client number 2 has someone on their team very much like the Grinch. His attitude was evident from the start, but I did my best to ignore it because that's what I do with those kinds of people.

Anyhoo.... one of the messages Grinch 2 wanted me to incorporate into the course was the idea that change is good, embrace it and love it.

The course I created has lots of creative ways to keep a user engaged. For example, instead of the tired old multiple choice questions where you have a one in four chance of getting it right, my quizzes include things like wheel of fortune, fill in the blank, arrange things in sequence, etc.

Grinch 2's job was to be the content subject matter expert. Instead, he looked at my course and whined to the training director (cc'd me) that my quizzes weren't in multiple choice format. He wanted my quizzes to be multiple choice like all their other training pieces.

Dude! What about embrace change?

I nicely wrote back (cc'ing the training director), thanking him for his feedback and that I'd be more than happy to change the format if that's what the director of training wanted. And then I wrote,

While we’re circling back, I wanted to make sure that someone was looking at the actual content of the course. It was the attached Word document and needs SME review. I’m assuming [Grinch 2] is one of the SMEs.

The training director simply wrote back, "That would be correct. [Grinch 2] would be reviewing for content correctness as it related to the new policy.

Ha! Take THAT Grinch 2!

He's not going to be a regular customer of mine if I continue on with that client as a customer- so I'm not worried about running into him on a regular basis.

The course is called "Change management". Ha! Now THAT's irony.