How Do IT Guys Get Respect and Not Become BOFHs? 902
An anonymous reader writes "I work for a small software company (around 60 people) as the sole IT guy. It's my first time in a position like this and after about 1.5 years I'm starting to get a bit burned out. I try to be friendly, helpful, and responsive and I get no respect whatsoever. Users tend to be flat-out rude when they have a problem, violate our pretty liberal policies constantly, and expect complex projects to be finished immediately upon requesting them. My knee-jerk reaction is to be a bastard, although I've avoided it up to this point. It's getting harder. For those of you who have been doing this a lot longer, how do you get a reasonable level of respect from your users while not being a jerk?"
Fuck em (Score:5, Informative)
You have to options: slap some reality into your users and put them in their place, or burn out. Your choice.
Carrot and stick approach (Score:4, Informative)
When they're nice to you, make an effort to fix their problem as quickly and offer suggestions. Be friendly and personable.
When they're not nice to you, everything takes twice as long. Get everything in writing. Do it all formally. REMAIN professional. Acting like a child will only make your own life stressful and miserable and ultimately get you fired.
Now there are exceptions. Anyone in a sufficiently high position is going to be able to have you fired if they think you're stalling. So do tread carefully.
The above advice might SEEM unprofessional - not always doing your best - but in the long run you're doing the business a favour. You'll be surprised how much more respect you get once your users learn that giving respects gets them the result they wanted. At which point everything runs more efficiently.
You'll never get anywhere in business by being seen as a doormat.
Re:Huh? (Score:5, Informative)
precisely... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Teach them! (Score:3, Informative)
employees know about these policies and understand them...so you and your users can get to know each other and understand...
make them respect you
And if that doesn't works, try crying.
Re:unpopular answer (Score:3, Informative)
Agree with the above (where's my mod points?) All offices are political environments and being a geek in that environment can be hard. If you really can't hack it, then buy some protection: make friends with the Queen Bee (every office has one, usually the CEO's PA) and get her on your side to watch your back for you.
I'd also add:
Maintain a list of tasks that you have to do. When someone asks you to do something, add it to the bottom of the list. If they insist on a deadline, ask them what other tasks on the list will need to be delayed/cancelled in order to make that deadline. Do it politely and professionally and don't let them get away with 'whatever'.
Re:Try the slow down method (Score:3, Informative)
Re:White Board (Score:4, Informative)
Agreed. The whiteboard is a great idea but any visible trouble-ticket queue would work. I'm guessing that the problem is that each person views you as their sole resource. They need to see that they are one of many. A formal trouble-ticket system goes a long way to alleviating that.
The other option (although you might be too small a group for this) is that all requests go through your manager. I've managed IT teams and when all requests have to go through me then I can be the bastard and the guys doing the actual work can be nice. If they need to bounce something they can just refer the trouble-maker to me.
The key is to put something - a system or a person - between the requests coming in and the effort going out.
I've done this for many years (Score:3, Informative)
There are some simple rules:
1. Don't be an asshole.
2. Learn to communicate effectively with people who do not know as much about the subject as you do.
3. Don't be an asshole.
4. When you explain something, and the other person clearly does not understand, do not simply repeat the explanation again word for word, only louder.
5. Don't be an asshole.
6. Document everything. Openly label that manilla folder "CYA."
7. Don't be an asshole.
8. Don't make promises you can't keep. Don't try to keep promises you didn't make (that's why you CYA).
9. Don't be an asshole.
10. Don't assume that decisions are made solely on a technical basis. Money does matter, and sometimes, good enough is good enough. "Because I want this kewl new toy" is a bad reason to spend ten times as much money.
11. Don't be an asshole.
And most important: Don't be an asshole.
What do you want? (Score:4, Informative)
After 15 years of working in this field I can offer you some advise but you are not going to want to hear it.
1. Do some work on yourself, read books on how to communicate with difficult people.
2. If you dont like how you are treated in any situation you have two options: remove yourself from siuation. Or accept the situation gracefully and do you best to improve it.
IMHO experience after trial and error, I have learned to trust my instincts. After years of working on my personality my goal is to be my genuine best with quality service and professionalism, by setting and example of being humble and compassionate to every one I meet, and I mean everyone regardless of what I think about the person.. Then after looking at the situation and finding no fault in my treatment toward others, I have to realize that I cant change people. I can only change myself and if my qualities are not enough to reverse someones bad treatment against me, I remove myself from the situation and find another company that values what I do for them and treats me with respect. I dont have time for people that are not able to appreciate my qualities. Let the deal with people that are just as miserable as them, They can be good company for each other.
The next job you interview for, start doing some interviewing of them in return. Talk with them about your qualities, and talk about your history with the people you worked with in the past and explain how you want work with those kinds of people in the future. If your interviewers become defensive, or try to dismiss your claims, that is the first warning sign. I usually give it three warning signs before I walk out and thank them for their time. The second warning sign is an interview that is too much like an interview and offers no friendliness or balanced approach to genuine conversation along with the interview process. If its all business and no talk about personal interests or desires, its not going to be a friendly place to work.
The third warning sign is when you ask or are given and opportunity to walk around and meet some of the people that work there. Ask them what its like working there, If you get allot of pauses in their communication or sideways looks that is the third warning sign.
Meet your interviews more than once and make sure they make you feel comfortable in the work place before you make any decisions. No job is worth not feeling respected, you can always find another one.
In my own professional life I have decide that I dislike most large businesses mostly because of petty politics and peoples obsession with status which means absolutely nothing to me. so I work for myself, I started my own small business providing excellent computer, web-site and video/audio services to people who give a shit.
Re:Try the slow down method (Score:2, Informative)
In my experience this is not how those situations go. Most often, people are passive aggressive. Telling them they aren't being nice isn't a response that makes sense in those situations. In my experience, brutal honesty is the best policy. If people push for more than is reasonable they are told outright - your request is unreasonable. Don't be an ass; just be firm and unwavering.
Re:Maybe you don't deserve any? (Score:4, Informative)
The biggest difference is the admin will take the time to have some way to roll back a change and should also take the time to understand what is going on which can mean hitting the docs or trying it on a test system, and if necessary they will wait for a window when the system is idle. Developers in that situation will often just play instead and rarely think of the consequences to every other user. A good admin will also play about with stuff they don't understand, but on a spare machine that is just there to be trashed and off the network if there is a chance of things going wrong there.
Re:Be firm.. (Score:5, Informative)
Alternatively, make a point of going for a walk around each of the departments you support EVERY day, to say 'hi' and maybe see if everything's ok.
In my experience, most of the frustration with 'IT' is very often trivial problems, that escalate until they get annoyed enough to go see IT about it. By having a walk 'round the site, you'll spot these, have a bit of a chat, pick up on the 'my mouse is a bit odd' type problems, and get 'em sorted proactively. It sounds like slacking off - and to be fair, it is, sort of - but it's the kind that will end up with your IT department appreciated and welcomed. Call it 'user support clinic' or something, if you need to justify it.
It will also let you see the smouldering before a fire breaks out that you'll have to go pounce on and fix - usually users will be bitching to each other about something being 'a bit flakey' long before it gets to IT as a critical fault.
Re:Put everything in writing (Score:2, Informative)
None of those would fix the problem, they just alleviate the symptoms.
Fixing the problem would be applying a patch that solves the issue, adding more memory/swap, replaced unreliable parts, etc.
If rebooting alleviates a symptom, then it might come up again, so the device is still broken. It is just that with Windows/closed source software it is hard to impossible to fix the problem, so people have gotten used to thinking of the symptoms as the problemn.
Re:Try the slow down method (Score:4, Informative)
I don't know the specifics in this case of course, but it's hardly unusual for companies to have some kind of internal billing between departments. This is, in fact, the best way I know of to get managers to realize and honestly consider the actual costs of their IT requirements. Ask anyone about backup and recovery policies, and you'll find out that ALL of their data needs to be backed up hourly, saved for 20 years, and MUST be restored within 30 minutes if a system crashes. Present them with monthly cost for that, and often they'll reconsider.
Charging per support ticket, and extra for rush jobs, would be another useful approach of the same kind.
Re:Try the slow down method (Score:1, Informative)
It's not real money - it's budget lines. It's common use in business that departements exchange budget lines with each others..
Say, you have ten days of service (8x10 hours) to give to department X for a year. Its calculated over trends of the last year. If you consume 9 days in 6 months, and in the same time, departements U, T, and Z consume only 3, you'll be pointed out as an abuser. Sure this has downsides, but that can be helpful in certain situations. It helped me, at last.
Re:Put everything in writing (Score:3, Informative)
"When people are sitting around waiting for the network to come back up, or the departmental printer keeps not working right, or the web is really slow--if there's an explanation forthcoming quickly, people can understand that you're working like mad to fix it. When an IT department has a stand-offish attitude and refuses to answer phone calls and emails in a timely way, people will assume the worst."
The problem is when the network is down and they want you to answer their emails.
The rebuttal to your point is "I can try to solve this, or I can talk to you about it. Pick one". Not saying that it's the right answer all the time, I guess the correct reply is in the middle.
I once felt your discomfort. (Score:5, Informative)
Every person who came to this command had to sit through a face-to-face IT brief with me. I gently explained what they could and couldn't do, how to report problems, etc. They signed off on the brief so I know they got it and I had a record of it.
Occasionally, I had some assholes who insisted on being...well, assholes...and breaking the rules. My policy was to sit down with them privately and explain that they did sign a document saying they understood the rules. I would also gently confront them with the problem they were causing, and I would ask them not to do it again. Then, I'd follow up. Still a problem? Disable their account, send a report up the chain. The fireworks would usually start (especially among the officers) when I shut them down...they'd run to the executive officer and piss like kittens about their access, at which point the XO would show them my message. Then he'd call me in, and we'd have it out in front behind closed doors. I always won. One or two incidents like this usually stopped them completely.
I had a set of policies that were outside the "official" IT instructions, but they were mine nonetheless:
I've always found that violators of my rules tend to get upset when they can't get to their stuff or find their passwords being reset every six hours. Sometimes you have to get their attention.
By the way, make sure you get away from the desk for a while during the day, even if it's just to go outside for a short walk or stretch. Just getting some non-office air in your lungs and stretching the back, legs and arms will make you feel a lot better.
I don't do sysadmin stuff now. I'm a web apps developer, a contractor, I get paid very well (a high security clearance helps), and my job has little of the stress and responsibilities I had before. This is much better.
Re:Put everything in writing (Score:2, Informative)
Where it is, often the problem can be with the management of the company. For example, failure to take IT's warnings into consideration, particularly with security but also with infrastructure procurements in an effort to drive down cost. It's understandable given the economic climate and could be IT's failure to express the seriousness of a situation to management. However, often people ignore warnings until it's too late.
Inadequate resource and poor upper (and middle) management of IT even from outside the dept. (especially in small-mid sized businesses) can often lead to everyone unfairly blaming IT.
How to deal with that situation? Convince management. Ask for a raise. Start writing your CV. Plod along against a management that deliberately ignores or takes shortcuts and just cash the paycheck. No answers from me here, the education (of management) route is best but often it falls on deaf ears.
There's a difference between "Bastard" and... (Score:3, Informative)
... not being a doormat.
If people are rude to you, be assertive: "I appreciate that you have a frustrating technical problem, but being rude to me isn't going to help fix it. Let's try to be constructive here." And then work on the problem.
If people are demanding complex tasks be completed immediately, be assertive: "I'm sure it is a priority, but what you're asking for is pretty complicated and it's going to take some time to get it done properly." If they don't understand that, you might try to explain it in terms of their job - "If a client asked you to put together a massive marketing campaign and have it completely ready to launch in 10 minutes, you'd tell them it's not possible, right? This is the same thing." Most people won't push it past that, and if they do, you can just be blunt: "It's not happening. It's not something that's open to discussion, it's just not possible."
Also look to your own behavior and see if there's something there that's irritating people or making them think of you as an outsider - like, do you roll your eyes or something when a person complains that their computer won't work when it's unplugged? Do you condescend when offering explanations? Do you frequently tell people you'll have something done in an hour when it winds up taking 2? Do you leave people hanging when they ask for help? Do you interact at all with your coworkers outside of immediate task-at-hand stuff (smalltalk, having lunch, etc)? Are you a fat, smelly nerd (serious question) who comes off like a parody of an IT guy?
Re:Put everything in writing (Score:3, Informative)
I've had 2 similar positions. (Score:2, Informative)
1) Check the cable.
2) Check the cable.
3) Seriously, check the cable. You'll feel stupid if you've been working for an hour on a problem only to find a disconnected cable.
4) Lock down your workstations. Hard. You won't win any friends right now, but when people stop having malware problems they'll eventually see the light. Tell them exactly why you are doing this; that you feel their pain; you think spamming should be a capitol offense.
4) Remember that no one loves you until something's broken (we'll fix that later)
5) Tell them there's nothing they can break that you can't fix, so don't be scared to try stuff.
6) Resist the urge to show frustration in front of others regardless of how stupid they are. They are there to do their job, not to become a computer expert.
7) When they want you show them something *always* make them drive. They are more likely to remember it that way.
8) Get off the internet, walk around the office. Find the person in each department who is always swamped with work. They've usually been there the longest and are the "go to" person. I guarantee you can streamline several of this person's procedures and give them back hours of their day. This person will be your friend forever.
9) This is one of the most important; always balance any reports you have written. If finance doesn't trust your numbers they're useless.
It may take a while but eventually you'll be hearing things like, "I know you're such a guru that this won't be a problem. Can you help me with..."