The IT Rollercoaster of Issues

IT is still a relatively new field, and therefore suffers from some very interesting issues that mostly stem from upper management not fully understanding what it is we actually do. Sometimes we're treated like second-class citizens; the janitors of the computer world. Other times we're treated as gods, the Perseus of Problem Resolution, the Rhea of ROI, the Silenos of Solutions.

It is through the beer goggles of ignorance and misconception that IT is seen. And we suffer for it. Our work cycle must be the most misunderstood piece of the IT puzzle, though. Most IT professionals have some form of driving factor, like the need for new software, or stupid users breaking things. These driving factors create work for us. The flippant nature of these driving factors make our workloads irregular. For instance, today, I've said "hi" to people and twiddled my thumbs a lot. This is because people are not breaking things for whatever reason. Perhaps all my yelling and demeaning attitude have finally shown them the light, perhaps the firewall is doing its job, or it could be that an advanced alien species has been fixing our simple issues from the comfort of their spaceship, safely hidden behind a comet. It's punch time!

As I sit here, playing solitaire, reading webpages, I find myself constantly minimizing or closing applications as my boss walks by. My boss isn't evil, but Bossperson doesn't understand that there's nothing to do. I have a cell phone, I have a wireless device that receives emails, I have a laptop and the means to connect to our office and fix issues from anywhere, but if I leave 15 minutes early on a day like today, I will be written up because attendance is worth more than skill. My last job proved this to me. I showed my bosses that I was doing 50% more work than any other single person in my group, they in turn showed me that everyone worked 50% more hours than me. I was denied the raise that the others received for this reason. In other words, their incompetence got them a raise. Their inability to do as much work as me in a timely manner required them to stay late in order to achieve even a small semblance of the workload that I could manage.

I can work from anywhere, and do 95% of what my job entails. So why do I have to sit in an office from 8-5 Monday through Friday and play solitaire? There are weeks that I do indeed work 70 hours, but they are rare. If a job requires me to work 70 hours every week, that job can find someone else. I work to live, I do not live to work. Work is not the center of my life, nor the center of my social life. I would rather have a day at home, with constant phone calls coming in than a day at work playing solitaire.

Bossperson doesn't get it. Working from home is some hippy lovechild fad that'll die down in a few years to Bossperson. Afterall, long hours at work show dedication, like a lapdog. After all, everybody loves a good lapdog because lapdogs are loyal, friendly, and dumb as a stump! My boss knows what my workload is, and can monitor how much I've done and how much I do on a daily basis, but that's not enough.

IT also has a high degree of supervision associated with it, far more than necessary. I've rarely seen any lower than a 5-1 employee to boss ratio. There is no reason to have that many supervisors, managers, vice-presidents, and CEO's brothers-in-law looking over IT people's shoulders. We're supervised because we're not understood.

An IT group is pretty much self-managing. When you have a team of 15 people, who all share a single workload, they police eachother. If someone is slow or stupid, they're not liked be the rest of the group, and as long as you have an electronic tracking system, the group knows who is lazy. As for the stupid, IT people can smell stupidity. Throw the new guy into the group and if he's stupid, he'll be torn apart faster than a package of ding-dongs or even a Microsoft service pack.

IT people don't like to sit around doing nothing, despite what people think. I want to have work to do or I want to go home. There is no in between for me. There is no reason to sit here, with my thumbs fighting for dominance, only to warm the office with my body heat and my ever-so-charming persona.

Lower your head and pray with me:
I, a humble IT person, blessed with genius and good fashion sense do beseech the IT gods to send forth the IT Bosspersons to this website and make them see the light! Let them read these words here and raise mighty boss-like eyebrows unto you! Let them send me home when there is no work, let them supervise me less, and let them get rid of their horrible toupee because nobody believes that it's real anyway! This I beg of you oh IT gods, that there be righteousness and sanity in the computer world.
-Amemorystick

The Evil Within

Not all the horrors that well up in IT come from users. There are other types of evils, such as the evils that are born innately into the field; like users, free food buffet regrets, and offices full of useless paraphernalia acquired from multiple trade shows. Then there are the evils that other IT professionals bring into the business like help desks, blocked websites, Spyware, and Microsoft. These I find to be almost as annoying as users, but then again, if there were no users, help desks wouldn't be necessary, blocked websites wouldn't matter, Spyware would never get installed, and even Microsoft might become slightly more tolerable.

Still, one cannot forgive the inherent flaw in hiring people to do a machine's work. Worse, people specialize in the computer field and become good at only one or two things, unless of course they work at my company's corporate headquarters, then they become good at nothing. I usually make a couple calls a week to corporate for issues that require rights they have blocked me from or in order to see if they've already experienced and found a fix for a problem that one of my users is having. Those calls usually go something like this:

Helpdesk Dolt: Yeah?
Me: Yes, to whom am I speaking?
Helpdesk Dolt: This is Company A.
Me: OK. What is your name?
Helpdesk Dolt: I'm Dolt #1
Me: OK Dolt #1, I'm the tech here at location XXX. I installed PCL6 drivers for printer ABJ onto our server and now the spooler service errors out constantly. I want to replace the driver, but I do not have rights to add drivers to the server. Can you add the driver for me so that I can fix this issue?
Helpdesk Dolt: OK. Click on Start, then Settings....
Me: You want me to go into the printer properties?
Helpdesk Dolt: Yeah. So then click Printers. Then right-click on.....
Me: I'm in the Properties already.
Helpdesk Dolt: OK. Now I need you to read to me which driver version you have.
Me: I already told you that I installed the PCL6 driver.
Helpdesk Dolt: OK. That's the driver we want you to have.
Me: But it's erroring out the spooler!
Helpdesk Dolt: Oh. I guess you need to use the PCL5e driver then.
Me: Yes! Can you install it for me please?
Helpdesk Dolt: Um. I don't know how to do that.
Me: Arg! Evolution. Where are you?

IT Needs More Electricity!

After several very special issues this morning, I have discovered what IT professionals really need to keep their users in line. We need to further utilize electrical currents in order to improve user comprehension. Something along these lines:

The user decides to take a break to browse the internet, nothing against company policy, just a quick check of personal emails and a couple news sites. The user tugs gently at their new ITFury collar ®, adjusting it slightly. Suddenly they remember that they need to randomly browse dangerous websites for no reason whatsoever and attempt to infect their machine with popup ads and spyware. Just as they reach their mouse, moving the cursor onto a link that will undoubtedly bring their computer to a screeching halt, their eyes bulge, they convulse with no control of limbs or muscles.

Looking at the desktop of another user on his own computer, the IT guy smiles as the mouse thrashes across the screen this way and that. Never is life so satisfying as when others are learning valuable lessons from you, and this is most certainly one of the most satisfying methods of instruction. Turning from his screen, the IT guy smiles and says "Thank you ITFury ® for helping me teach my users proper, safe browsing habits."

Fury Summed Up

Well, here I am. This will be my uncreative outlet(IT guys aren't creative) for all those frustrating work-related issues that leave me believing that evolution isn't selective enough. I've been in IT for about 10 years now, and sit at my desk anxiously awaiting the next issue. That's right. I'm that guy who magically appears to fix your computer problem, who somehow, half the time, before you speak, knows exactly what is wrong and fixes it in a few keystrokes. I am an IT God. Now is a good time to pull out your ITFury ® worshipping kit, complete with ITFury ® altar, sacrificial knife, and KFC coupons.

I do my job, and I'm actually good at it. IT is not what most people think. There are two schools of thought on IT people. The first is that IT is a glamorous job where people wear suits and ties and punch two keys on the keyboard to launch shuttles and solve world hunger. The second is that IT is full of individuals with no people skills, pocket protectors, and taped glasses who all smell like elementary school bathroom soap. In truth, IT is cuddled somewhere between the two, like an anus between butt cheeks. While the two visions have some body to them, the truth has only plunging depths, and nothing good ever comes from those depths.

IT is a frustrating industry. My job is to fix things, and I love fixing things. People often ask me for help, and I love helping people.....smart people at least. One problem is that people ask me how to use their software(design professionals asking about Photoshop for instance). This is akin to a Nascar driver asking a mechanic for driving tips. I fix things, I do not use them. Another problem is that people are generally stupid. If I ask someone to look at the router, and they don't know what a router is or looks like, I don't expect them to tell me that they've found it. If someone asks me what happened to their machine, I will tell them, and when I ask them if they understand, they will reply with a blank, eye-glazed stare. I have actually taught several people computer useage basics in the last couple years. This is 2005 people! If you can't use a computer, you're not even fit to say "May I take your order!"

On a regular basis my job consists of fixing problems caused by user's stupidity. I explain to the lemmings(a friendly term for stupid users) what they did and how to avoid it. I then promptly get called back to fix the same issue. I fix computers, not people.