A few years ago I was part of a project that had me working with what we call “end users” in the I/T industry. These are the people that get the glorious benefits of our service, though from their perspective, they only need to call us when something goes wrong. Those overnighters we pull to make sure everything is working in the morning go unnoticed, unheralded, and in most cases unrewarded, but back to my story. We were pushing out a large upgrade to all the desktops and laptops in the company, which in most cases meant some software had to be re-installed on the end user’s PC. I was one of the lead techs in the project, and not to toot my own horn, I was pretty damned good at it. I was in our area, just working on a couple things, when the Project Manager, Larry, walked in and asked me if I could go take a look at someone who said they were having a problem. It wasn’t one that I had originally looked at, but I usually got the second look calls, because I could work through them.
I went to the end users desk, and she had her husband with her. Her husband didn’t work for the company, but figured himself a “tech wizard” all on his own. I said I was there to help, and could I take a look. She explained that she didn’t have her Palm software installed, and she desperately needed it, she even brought in her husband in hopes that he could fix it. Now, having someone who has no knowledge of the company setup, and suspect knowledge of computers in general is not a good idea, and it can make those who’s job it is to actually do it even more difficult, but I let it slide. I sat down, and started looking things over just to get a baseline of where we sit, because while I hadn’t worked on the computer earlier, I was nearby when my coworkers were the day before. One thing I really hate when I am trying to work is interruptions; another thing I hate is when people try to give me answers to questions I didn’t even ask. You can guess what Mr. Super Helpful Information Technology was doing. As I am clicking through the computer checking settings and files, he’s pointing out what each one of the files and directories are. I’m thinking “I kind of know this, it’s why it’s my job.” All the while he is whittling on my last nerve. After I do my checks, I asked the end user “Everything looks ok here, did you try syncing your Palm? “ She said she didn’t know she should and she didn’t know how. If you have never seen the Palm cradle, it’s a space where you put your Palm in, and it has one button on the front, that’s it, one single button. After dealing with the Shoulder Surfer, I was a bit frustrated, so I said “You mean, you never hit that button?” She claimed “No. no one told me that I had to do it!” At this point, the frustration was plain on my face, and Mr. Super Helpful had enough of me “grilling” his woman. He says to me “I don’t like your attitude, what’s your name, and who do you work for?” One thing you should know about me, I don’t really respond to forceful demands, so I reply “I work for this company, what’s your name and who do you work for?” This leads to a bit of a shouting match that starts to attract attention. Larry hears it and comes over and gets involved. Mr. Super Helpful tells Larry that he doesn’t like my attitude and won’t tell him who I am or work for. Larry responds to this by telling him “I don’t care if he tells you he is the Queen of England, you shouldn’t be touching this machine, now calm down or security will show you out.”
I was a little worked up at this point, and Larry said I should probably go take a break for a bit. I ended up doing that, and in the end things worked out ok. I ended up working at that place for a few years, though I never forgot that woman, and occasionally I would do some nice things for her like making sure her password expired a little earlier than everyone else, or as a friendly reminder to keep her home drive clean, I’d make sure her space requirements were just a little stricter. Just remember, if you aren’t in HR, don’t mess with I/T.
