Why Everyone Hates the IT Department 960
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by
Soulskill
from the gotta-be-the-shoes dept.
from the gotta-be-the-shoes dept.
Barence writes "Why are IT staff treated with near universal contempt? This article discusses why everyone hates the IT department. From cultivating a culture of 'them and us,' to unrealistic demands from end users and senior management, to the inevitable tension created when employees try and bring their own equipment into the office, there are a variety of reasons for the lack of respect for IT."
Re:Reflections (Score:5, Interesting)
Yup.. works both ways.
Users can be real dicks.. but so can IT guys. Yes it's the IT departments job to keep the system running and secure.. but the whole point of that system is so everyone else can do their work. When IT starts unreasonably hindering that, you see the hostility build.
This is especially true in software shops, where everyone tends to be fairly technically literate and have unusual needs for their systems.
We made computers too simple to use (Score:5, Interesting)
How often have you heard things like "My nephew is good with computers, he could do X"?
In the short history that computers exist we've made them too simple so that the average person thinks it's not complicated to keep those things running correctly (or develop new and better versions of it). The average person thinks a car (or even airplane for that matter) is more complicated than a computer. And this believe also translates towards the price they are willing to pay for it. Although that's not a bad thing, expect when you expect a Trabant to perform like a Ferrari.
I used to work in IT and.... (Score:5, Interesting)
As seen from the IT department it's a dynamic issue, and a rather complicated one at that.
Now that I'm no longer in the IT department and have to deal with the IT department I'm pretty everybody hates the IT department because fuck those guys.
Re:Untrustworthy (Score:2, Interesting)
Any good manager knows the slackers. Just because the slackers can use the computer should not move the problem from HR to IT. Fine if they need to use the IT policy to fire. But that should be the end of IT involvement.
My experience (Score:4, Interesting)
Primarily dealing with end users, they are ignorant (not stupid most of the time) and feel inadequate, as though they should know how to solve their problems but they don't, an attitude that is about as realistic as being handed an F-14 fighter manual and told you will be flying tomorrow.
What happens when I come into contact with them is they are primed and expecting to feel dumb so they do, and it's some how my fault, God forbid I dumb the explanation down and they "catch on" to that, "I'm not stupid you know" yes yes that's why you're here talking to me.
To be fair my delivery does need work, I am sure something close to sarcasm leaks out on occasion, I just never saw myself as their therapist.
With management, I have to say I don't get management, they seem to be baby sitters and I don't need sitting, I am autonomous and some seem threatened by that.
They have their own set of issues all of which seem to be created to appear they are needed, created out of sheer ignorance (Peter Principal) or just simple minded D-bags that some how got promoted and now you have to deal with them or rather their egos and egos don't make good business/management/IT decisions.
where to begin.... (Score:5, Interesting)
We wanted to upgrade our network and the easiest way to do it would be to set up our own wireless mesh network. Our IT department said "no, wireless networks are our business and you cant set up your own" even though ours would operate on the emergency channels and have nothing to do with them. They whined to management and now we cant set up our stuff.
So they said "hey, use our network (internet)" ok, so we gave that a try. One big problem, when the building loses power, it loses it's internet, and we cant have our panels not monitored. so now we are stuck using phone lines with internet as a backup.
And half the time they cant even do a simple thing like provide a jack with a set IP address for us. They even tried to take away admin controls on OUR computers that aren't even hooked up to their network
if they had just stayed out of it, we would have a very nice and reliable system set up. But i dont hate them, i'm just taking note of all their failures so next time they say "let us do it" i can show how bad of an idea that really is.
Re:Like lawyers, impose unrealistic limits (Score:2, Interesting)
I have a job to do. At home, the process is simple. I turn on the computer, and it just works. However, on the job, it feels like the IT department is trying to make my life as difficult as possible, while admittedly streamlining their own work. Sometimes I make requests that would save me hours a day, and the IT department complains because it will slightly increase their own workload. As for certain simple programs, and it takes them weeks to install those programs, costing me hundreds of hours in productivity a year.
I get that IT has a job to do, but it feels like IT often forgets that I have a job to do as well, and that at the end of the day their role is to facilitate my ability to do my job.
As the parent said, IT often sets things up in a way that is best for IT, not necessarily for the other employees... and that is objectively not the role of IT at all. As one of those employees, I am aware that IT is making their life easy at the expense of my productivity, and it really really really annoys me.
Re:Reflections (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm a software developer by trade, but I know how to admin a system as well (I helped run an ISP for several years.). At past companies I've been called in (while there and at home) to fix system issues that our admins were pulling their hair out over. However, I wasn't allowed to get all the access I needed to efficiently do my job.
At one place (web development) all of our developers wanted to run Linux, but none of the admins knew anything about Linux at the time so I was basically doing desktop support for the other developers as well. It was more of a courtesy to them than anything, because most of the time they could figure out whatever they needed anyhow. What scared me about that was all our servers were running Linux and no one, but me apparently knew how to manage them. I didn't stay there long.
Re:where to begin.... (Score:4, Interesting)
I work at an industrial plant. There's three tiers of network. One managed by our control systems group (with a comical emergency stop button to isolate the firewalls). One managed by IT globally with a lovely call centre in another country which we need to call so they can spend half an hour typing up an assignment to our local on site IT crew. And one inbetween network which essentially is computers owned by the engineers and control systems group, but we're not allowed to have admin rights too.
This crossing over of duties is by far the single worst idea in the world. The IT machines run like a dream and it's easy to get things done. The Control System machines run like a dream and it's easy to get things done. The ones in the middle are a clusterfuck of bureaucracy. It often ends up being a case of we know how to fix it, but we don't have the rights. IT have the rights but don't know how to fix it, and then there's a few hours worth of discussion before someone is allowed to do something really simple, and worst of all the fixes are usually quite critical. The single most frustrating issue we have though is security updates.
IT don't allow us to do our own security updates (and rightfully so), but these machines aren't managed by IT only administered by them so they can't apply security updates for us, and we can't apply security updates due to lack of admin rights, and round it goes again.
I will never forget our new radio system. Several repeaters over multiple sites, all hooked together with redundant fibre, some of the site controllers had managed switches that made this in my opinion one of the most complicated network to ever have only 5 machines on it, complete with VoIP routing between the repeaters. All of this was learnt and set up by us within 1 month. ... It took 9 months for IT to approve a link between a VPN box and my machine so we could remotely administer this box which sat in a shed.
IT is like the government. A big bureaucratic nightmare.
Re:Reflections (Score:5, Interesting)
Look at it this way. Your job is to fix things that break. A programmer or engineer's job is not to keep things from breaking but to build a product, test a product, evaluate products, etc. This means they may NEED root access, or to install something other than Microsoft approved products. The big difference I often see is that engineers are working to improve the company's bottom line whereas IT may often be working for themselves. Sure you do extra work, but isn't the whole point of a job to be doing work? One failure I see often is that so many IT people have a generic set of skills and if they're laid off they just head to the next generic job so they may not bother learning what the company actually does or learning who the non-IT employees are; they don't ask "how can I help you and help our company".
To be fair a lot of problems can stem from IT management. This is where the insular nature tends to start. Management goes and meets other high level managers and IT workers are encouraged to keep their heads down. Productivity is measured with metrics (as soon as the word "metrics" shows up you know it's downhill from there), such as how many tickets can they close and how fast for each. A worker who spends time trying to help users with unusual requirements or problems gets dinged closing fewer tickets than the rest of the team. And of course management actually wants the generic workers with generics skills (aka, MSCEs) as they're cheaper and easier to staff up by using buzzwords in job reqs.
For instance we lost our two IT people who'd been around the longest and who knew everyone, the ones that everyone relied on, the only two left who understood macs (half the company uses macs and linux). Not sure why they were the ones to go, but the cynical side of me says it's a mix of them having the most stock options and highest pay plus them not being 100% MS indoctrinated.
I started off in IT (before anyone called it that). We had to go the extra mile because that was the job and the computers we managed belonged to the users' departments anyway they weren't ours to try and control. Being a research lab every single user had a unique set of needs. We had user representatives meeting with us often to plan out budgets and divvy up computer time and disk space. We were absolute a _service_ organization.
It's a matter of relevance (Score:2, Interesting)
I work in a moderately sized R&D group. We do fairly cutting edge work involving applied electromagnetics for antenna design, RF component design, photonic devices, MEMS, the list goes on.
My experience with IT is as follows: they are highly skilled, very knowledgeable people but they are either exceedingly lazy or very condescending. The laziness might be lack of job satisfaction, but that's no reason to ruin everyone else's job - look elsewhere. The condescending aspect is what bothers me the most. I'm not a network whiz so I'm pretty terrible at debugging things like setting up a connection to a license server for our electromagnetics simulation software or getting a new PC onto the network. Every time (and I mean literally every time) that I've asked for help, it's either like I've just asked them for the world, or that I'm the most incompetent boob on the planet.
So the last time it really reached a head, I lost it and asked the gentleman: "what would change around here if I knew every aspect about these computers and network?" to which my immediate follow-up was: "you'd be out of a job." And that's the truth. IT is specifically in place to make MY job easier because it's my work (and my colleagues') that keeps the lights on in the building. By that I mean we're the only ones bringing in revenue - obviously the maintenance people have a key role, but you get what I'm saying.
Re:I used to work in IT and.... (Score:5, Interesting)
I was looking after a Jenkins server for a project we were running, Jenkins was running on the latest version of Tomcat with a Java 6 runtime. However due to customer requirements there was also a Java 5 runtime which as being used to generate the build. IT felt the need to un-install the JDK 5 and upgrade the the machine's Java 6 (to the version with Oracle in its name). The removal didn't update the Java_Home directory causing Tomcat not to work. They decided to do this just as we were starting an Integration & Test phase for a major release. The Jenkins server was linked to me on their records but at no point did they think to mention it to me.
Same Jenkins server, this was running fine and suddenly the builds starting failing. 3 hours of investigation later I find out its because the Jenkins server password has been changed. Never mind the server username was the name of the project (e.g. projectXYZ). IT came up with a new policy which stated all server accounts needed to be > 48 characters and they had changed them all without notifying a single person on the project.
How about when IT decided that in a software house no one needed Admin access, which would be fine except they tried to forbid admin access on projects which were developing software which required Admin access (for a number of reasons). Those projects had to go up to the business director and have him shout at the IT head to fix it.
Or the fact they decided no one should have USB. A great idea except I was working on an embedded project (along with a dozen other projects) which required an unencrypted usb stick to load the software on to the test rig. Once they realised how many people had a problem they tried to limit it. But when your working on a 5 man team only allowing 1 person to transfer files causes you to loose a lot of man hours.
I can think of dozens of other examples, none of them were dictated by upper management. People hate IT because IT doesn't look at how to better help people work.
Re:Why contempt? (Score:5, Interesting)
"They made me use Windows"
I feel your pain.
Don't worry, they'll be first up against the wall after the Ballmer Collapse.
http://www.businessinsider.com/steve-ballmers-nightmare-how-microsofts-business-really-could-collapse-2011-11?op=1 [businessinsider.com]
Re:I used to work in IT and.... (Score:5, Interesting)
I've worked in I.T. for about 20 years and still do.
The secret to keeping my sanity, though, has been sticking with only smaller businesses where I had more say-so. I think when you look at larger companies, I.T. becomes another big department tasked with implementing the whims of upper management. That puts I.T. workers right in the line of fire when a change is unpopular, yet they're not even able to articulate a good reason for the change to the upset employees challenging them. All they can say is, "Just doing what we were told." which comes across as a cop-out, or at the very least, a reason to express disapproval at them, hoping they'll report it to their superiors who CAN do something about it.
Where I work, I'm the only person doing the I.T. full-time. Sure, we have outside consultants we bring in on a case-by-case basis, since I can't do everything (or at least, do it efficiently) by myself. But all in all, I get to run the environment the way I see fit. That means I have to explain myself to the owners occasionally, and we do hold regular meetings to catch everyone up on the future plans and make sure they don't have reasons to veto them. As long as I keep in mind their budgetary limitations and don't propose changes that aren't cost justifiable though, they usually go with what I suggest.
I can't speak for everyone working there, but overall I get the idea that people are satisfied with the way our I.T. is managed. I'm always amazed when my friends tell me stories of new employees needing wait days just to get their Windows account or email mailbox activated. I've made sure to always get a new hire up and running with their PC and phone on their desk in a matter of 30 minutes or less after they start. We're small enough that when people call with problems, I can usually just go over to their desk in person and get it fixed for them while they wait, too. I think the personal interaction helps a lot, so I.T. isn't viewed as some faceless division of the company that you leave voicemails with when you have issues. I do run an automated web site filter and proxy, but it's configured to only block sites in a few categories we simply can't let people surf while "on the clock" (such as porn or sites known to distribute viruses and spyware). I let them use anything else freely, and tried my best to get management to understand that THEY are the ones empowered to handle problems in that area, not me. (EG. If your employee is constantly on Facebook and not getting work done, you should take note of that as their manager and discipline them accordingly. Blocking Facebook for everybody doesn't fix the problem, because that's a passive "fix" for the problem employee. He/she never gets called to the carpet for their own actions, so he/she winds up wasting company time in some other manner, like Facebook from their own mobile phone.)
My IT Dept rocks - really (Score:5, Interesting)
Our IT team is really the best. They are hugely popular with the staff and I can't imagine a better team. It's a 100+person R&D facility with 3 IT people. Here's how they do it:
1. Invisible firewall - there is one, but you can FTP, ssh, etc. to your heart's content without noticing it. It's even possible to run P2P apps. Of course, if it's non-work related then you're signing your own pink slip. Also, they do audit all PC applications on the network remotely, but I've never been queried and I run some really odd apps sometimes.
2. Simple to use Help ticket system - and they're fast in responding.
3. Adequately staffed - that helps.
4. No restriction on smartphones hooking up to the Exchange server - company doesn't pay for any phones or service though.
5. Multiple VPN services available, so if one doesn't work, try another. Worse case, SSL VPN is available or webmail over SSL. Helpful when traveling abroad or visiting companies that block VPN ports.
6. Support for Windows & Linux, but if you want to run a Mac you can. They'll support you as much as they know.
7. Software purchased under $2000 doesn't need to be vetted, reviewed, quoted or anything else. Just buy it on the dept credit card - with your manager's approval of course.
8. Printers everywhere - we are a printer company, so that helps, but we have competitor's products too, so if one fails and you're waiting for it to be repaired, you have at least two others to print to easily.
9. Copious amounts of network storage for shared files. All RAID. All backed up.
10. Large email quotas, which are instantly upgraded for power-users.
11. Overall a can-do, but pragmatic response to requests - want a load of email or docs archived? They won't waste their time or yours burning DVD's, but they will copy it to an HD and vacuum pack it for you.
12. Finally, no, and I really mean no, draconian controls or policies. Just don't set up a rouge WiFi AP or download porn. Basically, the cardinal rule is - get your work done and be a star.
Re:Reflections (Score:5, Interesting)
Somehow, management got the idea I didn't know how to run my computer, which I had built from scratch. They wanted to delegate all computer stuff to the company IT department.
So, IT brought me a whole new machine. Configured to their specs. The same as every other machine.
And with special little screws.
That damn thing was useless to me. It was like trying to fix a car with a typewriter.
I had my old machine loaded with all sorts of tools I had custom crafted for my needs. DSP stuff. Digitizers and digitizing software. Unusual displays. Dual disk drives and RAM drives, along with drivers of my own design. Assemblers. C++ compilers. Schematic capture and PCB layout software. SPICE circuit simulators. Mathcad. Thermodynamics software. Disassemblers and debugging tools just in case something didn't work like it oughta.
IT did not want to support that.
I could not run them on the "company machine" I was "authorized" to use.
My new machine was optimized for writing reports for management, loaded with all sorts of office productivity software.
Boy was I pissed. I whined like hell.
And got laid off. Poor "people skills". Bad performance.
Last thing I want to do is go back and work in an environment like that. I'd rather be on welfare.
I am way too ornery and set in my ways to be a decent corporate engineer. When they have that much money, they can hire someone who will tell them what they want to hear,
Re:Reflections (Score:5, Interesting)
But when you're still providing us with Windows XP in 2011, you are doing it wrong.
You do realize that not every company or department has the funds to provide you with the "latest and greatest". Some of us have to work with limited budgets brought down from up above. XP isn't ideal, but it's still being supported for the next 2+ years, which gives IT time to make sure the business apps will continue to function after the new OS is rolled out.
The problem is, and its not necessarily an IT depts fault, is that its often *more expensive* to underfund IT.
My last job at a major company I had to develop software on an ancient mac with 2 gig of ram and spent most of my time staring at the beachball. Every time I hit save, the beachball would spin. Every time I searched my code, the beachball would spin. Hell entering a line of code would make the beachball spin.
So my simple request "Can I please have 8 gig of ram" was denied because "Well if we do that all the coders will want it."
I pointed out that since i was being paid nearly $70 an hour, and I'm losing a good couple of hours a day on computer slugishness, that the investment would pay itself off in about 2 days, since not having the ram was costing the company about $140 a day. No dice.
Eventually myself and the other coders made an estimate of how much the non upgrades where costing the company in lost productivity , close to $8000 a week, and took it straight over the IT depts head to the big boss.
The next day a very reprimanded IT dept head personally installed my new ram.
Re:Reflections (Score:4, Interesting)
"But when you're still providing us with Windows XP in 2011, you are doing it wrong."
Sigh. So, you have personally checked out all software the enterprise runs under Windows 7 and will be willing to bet your job that it all works perfectly with no hidden issues have you? Here's a hypothetical situation for you:
A company has a software package that they run on 70% of their desktops called DerpMaster 2002. This is an important software package as almost half of the company's business is recorded in it. It works fine under Windows XP. In late 2010, the company decides it's time to upgrade their desktops to Windows 7 as the company president uses it at home and wants to "move with the times". The CTO doesn't see any business reason to move the company to Windows 7 as all of the company operations work well under Windows XP and Windows 2000 Server as they have been the last several years. At the president's insistence, the migration proceeds.
After a month's operation, end users and the IT department are starting to notice that there is random corruption of records in DerpMaster 2002. The first couple of times it was encountered the corruption was considered a random happening or disk fault on the fileserver and the affected record was restored from a previous backup. But now it's happening with a frightening frequency. A random sampling of the DerpMaster database of 300,000 customer records is taken and it's determined that up to 5% of random sample shows some form of corruption. That means there could be as many as 15,000 records corrputed. A series of calls to the makers or DerpMaster 2002 reveal that on small databases their own testing of Windows 7 showed no adverse issues, but they were able to scale up testing and show in-house that on a database of the size and activity level of the company's, there does indeed seem to be a problem with the application. Of course, DerpMaster 2002 is NOT certified for use in Windows 7, but DerpMaster 2011 is, and lucky them! They're willing to provide upgrade licensing for only $500 per seat!
So that sorts out the cause of the problem, but now the company has a database where 15,000 records out of 300,000 are potentially damaged. Rollback to a database backup prior to the migration is out of the question due to the thousands of transactions per day entered into the system. The only course of action is to spend enormous manpower manually checking and correcting if needed all 300,000 records. The system has to remain operational while this check is done, and further corruption has to be prevented. DerpMaster 2011 is a brand new product, based on an entirely new database platform and as such the CTO has difficulty believing it to be a safe upgrade until its track record is proven. To address the problem of corruption, all desktops are given a Windows XP virtual machine image, to run DerpMaster 2002 in. Over the next two weeks (with the IT staff pulling an average of 3 hours of overtime a night) the corruption in the database is eliminated and operations return to relatively normal. Except now the users have another level of complexity on their desktops accessing an application through a VM interface.
Oh and by hypothetical I mean it actually happened. So that's why IT departments get annoyed when someone tells them that switching from a proven platform that works for all company functions to a new platform because an end user thinks they should get with the times or they're "doing it wrong".