The new corporate buzz phrase is that 'we're easy to do business with' and the now ubiquitous phrase can be found in company magazines, promotional literature, advertising guff and on the toilet rolls in the company washrooms.
My own dealings, however, as a member of the company, and technically, an insider with assumed inside knowledge, have been far from easy. My encounter with Eastern Europe is a case in point. If even I can't get through to the right person in the corporation and am subjected to the 'one-way system' of telephonic technology, what hope is there for Distressed of Ealing? The inhouse phone directory was a dead-end, a friendly voice cutting me off after announcing that 'the person I need is not available right now. Please call again later.' and switchboard could not put me through because 'all lines to that department are now routed to the Baltic Sea.
My day was made worse by a friendly little email from the IT department stating that my IT request was now complete and had been closed. I opened my desktop and sure enough there was a new and shiny little icon just waiting to be clicked. But clicking on it only brought about a sudden snarl of agression from the PC , that unwelcome miskeyed chord that microsoft windows loves so much.
'You do not have the required access for this application. Please see your system administrator.'
Obviously IT were wrong and the IT request had not been completed. I phoned the number given in the email.
'Oh no,' said the officious IT request minion. "'Your IT request did not specify that you wanted to be able to use the application. You just requested the application on your desktop,'
'Well what do you think I wanted it there for? To make the desktop look pretty? Of course I wanted to use it,'
'Not on the request,' said the IT drone, knowing that if he could keep me from reinstating the IT request that there would be one less IT request on the outstanding IT request backlog report. 'If you want to use the application you'll have to complete a new IT request,' He said smugly. 'There's a 10 working day service level standard.'
Match point to IT.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
Oh, no, no! Don't you dare let them win this!
You obviously didn't use my Vonnegut strategy. Maybe that's not an approach you feel comfortable with. So, it's time to send them cookies.
Go buy a cheap knock-off of a fancy gift set of cookies. Take the cover off and take a picture of the mouth-watering cookies. Now send the cookies to the IT dep't with a little note going over your little battle with them these last few weeks. Then use the note to explain a bit about the standards you're expected to reach in your job-- the turnaround time for complaints and all that. Then congratulate them on being clever and smart enough to game the system. Tell them that they're your new heroes because of the low expectations they've managed to wheedle from their bosses and the company at large. Go on and on about how much you envy them.
Send a pic of the cookies and a copy of the note to to as many in their chain of supervisors as you can.
Then send a pic of the cookies and a copy of the note to as many in your chain of supervisors as you can. Begin grousing about the imbalance of power among the bosses in each chain. IT's supervisors must be cleverer than your bosses because look what they've managed to get for their employees.
Don't spend much on the cookies. The IT staff will be afraid to eat them, anyway.
Post a Comment