Slashdot Mirror
Learning to Say No in the Workplace?
Ummagumma asks: "I'm trying to find out how those of you who work in the IT service industry, tell customers 'no', when the requests are unreasonable for whatever reason. There is a culture here of 'piling-on' work with regards to IT - and, unfortunately, I've never learned the proper way to tell people 'no'. It may sound simple, but in this economy, where jobs are tough to come by, I don't want to be seen as the impediment to getting things done Any suggestions on telling people that their work request can wait? Especially in a way that won't jeopardize my future here? I've searched the web, but most of the sites that supposedly have information of this type just want you to sign up for their seminars. I'm looking for actual, real-world experiences, and how the people of Slashdot deal with this issue on a day-to-day basis."
"Here is my dilemma: I'm a relatively new employee (~2 months) at a software engineering shop. I am the sole IT person for a 100+ person company, with 50+ remote VPN users, 40+ developers, 30+ servers, firewalls, etc. I do it all, from desktop and application support, to security, to servers. In the past, the IT department has been seriously under-funded, and there is an absolute ton of catch-up work that needs to get done. At this point, I could work 70+ hour work weeks for a year, and still not be caught up, between project work, upgrade, documentation and day-to-day stuff.
I've inquired about more IT budgeting (staff, equipment, etc.), and that just is not going to happen for quite a while."
Tell them "No means no!"
Don't say no. Give estimates. Show your time table. Put the onus on someone else to fit it in, so they are clear on what the tradeoffs are going to be. In my line of work, things got complex enough that maintaining a Microsoft Project document was worth my time. The visual output was well received with management.
Sounds like you're being taken advantage of. Tell them they need to provide the resources if they want the support. If they won't staff the department properly, you need to be vocal about it or else they're just going to blame you when things inevitably start deteriorating.
I've told customers in the past that we're not taking on any new clients until our production system has been upgraded to handle increased workloads, and in almost all cases they were willing hold until we were ready. They appreciated the fact that we weren't spreading ourselves too thin, risking long term failure for the sake of padding our short term coffers, so just tell the truth.
Is simply lay out the time. Say, "Yes i will do it, once i have this done as well as this" No need to say no, just show them that for you to say yes will require them to wait for it to get done an unreasonable amount of time. They complain? Then you may get staffed correctly soon enough:-p
The BOFH will show you the way to happiness and funds whenever possible.
Make sure you have a list of priorities from your boss.
Follow the list.
When someone asks for a low priority task, let them know that your boss has chosen your priorities and you have three months work before you will get to their task.
Try to help them to get their task done themselves quicker than you doing it.
Of course you will probably not be thanked for this. Peter
If you can get support from management, you can do anything. Unfortunately that means you end up at their mercy if they still want you to do EVERYTHING. Not much to do about it there.
At my last job I would often be asked at 5:20pm to do dumbshit stuff like get a full OS reinstall done on a half dozen machines in a department that needed an upgrade. No amount of explaining that this is not just an extra half hours work would mean a thing to those above me. If it were a one off I'd be fine with it, but from day one my job consisted of staying back insane amounts of time to get these things done, when the people who used the machines had set hours that never varied. No overtime either.
I ended up quitting, and while you might not consider that an option, if it comes down to working yourself dry and being used/abused then it's an option. Get on management until they relent, to get another IT person if you need. If you don't do it now changing later is all the harder. Hell, you're new at this job - do you know if the last person quit because of insane expectations like this?
In almost every type of employment, your job is to make sure your supervisor is satisfied with your work. Their job is to oversee you and make sure you're doing a good job for the company.
Now, if you drop that into the guise of any client-oriented job - be it law, medicine, IT, or even a lowly customer service job - satisfying customers is not your primary and sole responsibility. You have to balance each client's interests against those of the company, other clients, and the priorities of your boss.
If a client is expecting too much, your mission is not to do everything they say - that's a great way to throw your priorities out of order. You're letting them detract from your other responsibilities. If you don't feel right telling them that they're not your only client, then apologize, tell them that you have other duties as well, and refer them to your boss. Let him deal with it. That's why he makes more than you do.
Really - I can't stress this enough. Keep your boss up-to-date on what you're doing, and let him guide your priorities. If anything or anyone is straining those priorities, let him deal with it.
It's really that simple.
- David Stein
Computer over. Virus = very yes.
We avoid this problem with a simple rule: Any work for "the techie" for has to be passed by "the techie's boss." Really, for anything not sopmewhat urgently needed, only management-level personnel should be able to assign longterm tasks.
After all, your manager is supposed to, well, manage. And if not him/her, then a project manager of some sort. Any decent sized corp I've worked for had one of those. If you're getting snowballed with lots of work, then at least those above will be aware of it, and more can be done to manage your time.
It was called Fight Club, I think.
I am a viral sig. Please copy me and help me spread. Thank you.
I will share with you a tidbit of wisdom from those of us in design: keep track of how you're spending your time. Keep a detailed record of what you are spending your time doing and who is asking you to do it. Show this document to your manager and have them prioritize your time so that there are some rules in place. Managers are there to make sure you can do your job, make them work for a change.
I'm reminded why I bill hourly now.
The right way is to propose and alternative.
Scenario 2
PHB says - "I want X done asap".
overworked IT engineer - "No problem, which one of A,B,C,D, .... W would you like me to hold off on while I do X ?"
PHB ... goes away and does not come back until it's more important that A...W
Scenario 2
Customer - "I have this way out idea that will really be cool to do !"
Overworked engineer saya - "Fantastic, you know, we have a procedure for new projects, go fill in the form and we'll prioritize it".
Customer goes away and forgets the crazy idea.
Most of the ways to deal with anyone it to give them your problem. If you do this then you filter most of the nonsense. The golden rule is to never say no but to "Prioritize"! No-one will ever complain that you don't do your job if you are "prioritizing!".
You'll need to speak management speak (and that means Powerpoint and Project) to get your point across.
Make a list of all the existing items. Put them into some form of project timeline (Mr Project, MS Project). Show the dependencies, requirements, funding estimates and man-hour estimates.
Make management assign priorities to tasks. I don't mean broad categories like "high" and "low", but actual numerical order. No equal priorities.
Generate a nice GANTT chart that shows you'll finish sometime around 2015, if and only if no new projects crop up.
You need nice pretty charts and graphs with lots of primary colors and some nice page-transition effects to catch the attention of most management types.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
I think what you're looking for are policies. You want something endorsed by whoever is above you that details what you are and aren't supposed to be working on as well as what work gets priority. Maybe from 8-noon you handle new requests and 1-quitting you're on project stuff? Make it known that helpdesk stuff isn't the bulk of your job.
Also -- consider talking to people in each of those groups you outlined earlier. Maybe a couple of developers could be roped in to screening questions from their fellow developers before passing them up to you. It sounds like you're with an IT heavy company - the individual user groups can probably take some responsibility for their own actions.
Implement LDAP or AD and give a user from each group power to manage users within that group. That way you don't get called for password changes etc.
There's lots of things that you could work on to take load off of you. People do need to understand that you can't do everything. If you can get a work priority policy past the boss, at least you can start keeping track of the piles and whe a user says "why isn't X done" you say -- management says it's not a priority so it will be done when P D and Q are finished. ("when will that be" -- "6 months to a year") The users will go to their bosses and ask about the policy -- either the policy will get changed by your management, or they'll stick to it and back you on following it.
I've recently become development manager for one of our company's products. As such, it has taken a while to find my feet, both when interacting with sales & consulting internally, and when interacting with customers. I certainly erred on the side of saying yes too often, because I wasn't sure about saying no.
Not anymore. For me, it took mistakes, stress, and all sorts of complaints directed at myself or the company, whether or not it was my responsibility. It is this realisation that sometimes, I need to say no. People do get pissed off at you when you say no. But your job isn't to please people, it's to get a product out the door (well, for me it is, anyway).
So, you learn to say no when from the experience of getting a yes thrown back in your face.
dominionrd.blogspot.com - Restaurants on
This is an incredibly important skill in the IT industry.
The only good way I've ever found to do this is as a team. You have to know that your teammates and team leader will back you up. Your manager is not part of this as the request may come from them but hopefully they'll learn to trust your 'no' statements and start backing you up on these too.
If you are on your own then it's more difficult but generally that requires showing the requesting party why you are saying no. This may include asking them to seek approval from someone else to drop what you are doing, sign off on the risk, etc.
And if you are a contractor or similar then you need to supply your reasons and if they still insist then do what they want after making sure they are fully aware of the consequences (and you have a written communication to them including your objections).
Instead of taking the full weight of the decision, why don't you tell your manager that clients want A, but you already have B, C, D in the queue, and ask the manager to prioritize these items for you. Something will have to be delayed, maybe it will be client's current request, or maybe one of the things that were previously in the queue, but you won't be the one deciding what gets delayed.
.02c.
If you are in the position of power, then you should have enough power to make a decision without fear. If you are shaking in your boots, then shift the burden to the client by letting the client prioritize things for you. Obviously this is complicated if you have more than one client. Then you'd have to get them all in a room and have them talk it out.
The rule of thumb for power is that power should match your responsibility. That means, if you are, say, responsible for cleaning the floor, then you must be empowered to move things off the floor, to access cleaning supplies and so on. If you are a manager and it is your job to prioritize items and yet you are not empowered to say "NO", then something is terribly wrong, and perhaps, your project is going down the tubes anyway, and you should look for another job. Alternatively, you can just shut up and sort of roll with the punches and hope that clients will drown in the endless bureaucracy (let the thing that's holding you down hold your clients down as well) and eventually run out of steam. It really depends on the environment you work in.
The only diplomatic way I could find around this was in a prioritization scheme based on adverse impact. For instance, network issues supersede server issues, server issues supersede workstation issues, workstation issues supersede printer jams.
My initial problem was in trusting my clients to be understanding enough to "get it". To my surprise, when I laid it out, they were amazingly receptive, as most of them knew when it was their turn to have a network or server problem, they'd be at the top of the list.
I'm not sure how well that will play out in a corporate environment, but like my customers, your users may be more understanding than you are willing to give them credit for. You are one IT person. Everyone in the company can count to 1, I'm almost sure. They're also keenly aware of how out-of-whack the user/nerd ratio is. Conservative (read:CHEAP) companies will let it get to 70:1, users:nerd. Good companies will go 40:1. Exceptional companies will go 20:1.
I don't envy you your job, you've got to focus on efficiency. Good luck to you, it'll probably be either highly rewarding or we'll all see you on the 6 o'clock news pinning down your coworkers with an assault rifle. Let's hope for the former.
We all get along together like tornadoes and trailer parks.
From the words of a relatively experienced consultant:
Don't say no, say yes, and explain how long it will take (3 months) and when you can get started (in 6 months). Of course you must be very polite and empathise with them. Tell them that you understand how annoying their current problem might be.
Write a list of jobs, prioritise them, and then stick to the damn thing like superglue. If anyone has a request, listen to them, write it done, forward it onto your boss. Or alternatively if your boss is useless, stick the item at the bottom of the list. (my boss was so useless I ended up writing a small web-app to do this for me, and then for other people, and then for other people in different projects). But most importantly if you stick to your prioritised tasks you'll actually get some work done instead of constantly task switching, which wastes everybodies time.
Alternatively, if the request is just stupid, don't say "No, that's dumb", say "Maybe we could also (instead) do this, which would result in also having these positives, on top of what you've already said.". Diplomacy is the key!
Another important thing is to not let these users prioritise your tasks. They will all end up "super high" or something equally useless. Just use your own numbering scale from 1-10.
The alternative is to piss off all of your users, say yes to everything, look like you never get anything done, stress yourself into a heart attack by 40, write crappy buggy code and to hate your job. It's your choice.
Welcome to the real world!
Leaving a job in this economy is a fatal error. You won't get unemployment insurance (or food stamps) and you won't find another job. Nobody will care that the expectations were unfair or the working conditions intolerable. Put up with it somehow or become a bum. Your choice. I speak from experience.
Most of the comments in this thread are entirely accurate. Do not say no, but rather, document exactly what tasks you're doing, ask your manager to prioritize, and have customers go through him/her to get to you.
If your manager is unreasonable, you will have to do the prioritization yourself. Most important, though, is that you very clearly document the time estimated and actual hours spent on fulfilling a task.
What I have also found to be extremely useful (consultant, yeah yeah...) is, before starting a task, outline the actual task deliverables. When finished, do a quick writeup on what you did, who it was for, how long it took, etc. Doesn't have to be long, just look reasonably nice
This takes a bit of getting used to and initially may seem like a waste of half an hour per task, but I have yet to speak to anyone in any level of management who didn't appreciate that sort of thing. It gives them concrete proof of what you're doing, it gives you a paper trail to fall back on when people claim you don't have enough to do, and it makes your boss look good, because they have something tangible in their hands to present to their management.
Also, though I know it's not entirely relevant, it helps me to occasionally look at Stokely's Golden Rules of Consulting. It's more geared towards independent contractors, but contains some very wise principles.
Whatever happens, don't get frustrated. I guarantee you, eventually your customers will begin to understand that everyone and their mom wants you to do things for them, and will learn to stand in line. And my experience has been that when something is truly truly earthshatteringly urgent, they become even more appreciative if you can bend the rules a bit. That's how we kept a fairly extensive bar stocked during my last operations role
Cole's Law: Thinly sliced cabbage
One employer I had told me never to say I could not... let them know under what circumstances I could.
I have lived by that ever since. I am a supervisor that is responsible for not only my time but the time of others. I never say no, I just let people know, without whinning, where there project stands... and what possible delays there may be. I have neen known to tell someone that I was planning to shelve their job for a week, and if they want they can give me materials now, or wait until I am ready to start. I usually let people know that I am just trying to be honest with them and not lend them false hope.
In my small firm I keep my schedule posted as well as the tasks of my subordinates (I don't put their exact shedules... can of worms I won't open). Most of the time people can tell where on the totem pole their project falls and will often hold the job themselves seeing that something more important is in front of them. Ultimatly communication is the key, not bitching. If people see things getting done and you working hard and working snart, they will rarely (I won't say never) get upset at how long something is taking.
Say "I'm inserting that into my prioritized queue of tasks to be done in slot #98, right behind fixing the mail server virus filters..." Your problem is you're letting people's new requests take too high a priority.
"Freedom means freedom for everybody" -- Dick Cheney
As far as the customer is concerned there are three elements that concern them. Time, Quality, and Money.
On any product they can't have all three. Example: If they want it quick (time) and the want it cheap (money), it will be lacking in quantity. Or If they want it cheap, and they want qulity, the delivery time will be long.
Saying "No" is not always the answer. But if you explain how their request will affect the one of the three elements (time, money, quality) they will either:
A) Give you more money.
B) Give you more time.
C) Expect less at delivery(cut-corners)
D) Withdraw their request.
And everyone wins.
You probably already understand one of its key points (or will very soon): it's not sustainable for you or anyone else to work more than about 40 hours, week in, week out, without turning crispy. Work is different from time in front of keyboard or slumped in your chair. You can rack up a lot of hours north of 40/week, but in the long run will have almost nothing to show for them. Additionally, the book will tell you how to say no, as you requested.
One more thing. If you are supporting 100 people, then your days are unquestionably one series of interruptions crashing into each other. There's strong practical advice here about how to minimize interruptions, and work toward having an environment in which you can actually get something done without having to use "hiding" tricks. One of the stories in the book is about a developer who was so bugged by interruptions in his cubicle that he took to working in a toilet in the men's room for an hour at a time. I hope you aren't near that point yet.
Here's the book at Amazon: but you can get at the library, and probably faster.
Myself and my co-worker work for an educational services company. We manage a smallish network of ~150 UNIX machines and are responsible for maintaining them, the network gear, and network security. We also solve every problem that the applications developers can't figure out (which amounts to a lot). On top of that, we're continually striving to improve our network infrastructure. We're often dragged into meetings to plan and develop infrastructure upgrade projects.
Management's priorities are all over the map, and priorities can change every hour. This makes life incredibly difficult for us.
Our solution was to grab a big-ass whiteboard (you know, 4 feet tall, and 16-feet wide) and write down all of our tasks. No real detail... just enough to indicate what the task is. We mark which task we're currently working on. Whenever management comes by to give us more work, we take them to the whiteboard, write down the task(s), and insist they prioritize what's on there.
The amount of incoming work was enough to keep four people busy. We spent 2 hours daily discussing priorities with management. All tasks were important enough to keep on the board, and our Ops Manager maintained the priority list.
Then one day, the whiteboard filled up.
Management got the hint when we insisted on a second whiteboard. Instead of providing us with a second whiteboard, there's now whitespace available on the first board.
Just keep a list of tasks at hand, and make sure your manager knows what you've got on your plate. If you're given a new task, insist that he looks over your current list and assigns some priority.
I had an insane boss once, each day as business started he'd roam around the office for his morning ritual, he made each employee look him straight in the eyes and say "No" three times in a firm but neutral voice. If he didn't like how you did it, he'd make you do it again. Yep, he was totally nuts.
Simple: Lawyers, Plumbers, and Car mechanics are viewed as professionals. They charge an exorbinant rate for fixing things. In business and at school IT is freely given out like candy. When folks aren't used to paying for something, they assume that it in fact costs nothing.
It also doesn't help that we (myself included) are often all to eager to volunteer our help. If we as an industry were populated by cynical and legalistic mercinaries we wouldn't have these problems.
"Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
--Dr.W.Edwards Deming
the real question is how i can tell everybody that i know outside of work 'no'. I mean at least you get paid at work! i know slashdotters understand me when i say that i have no desire to fix anybodys parents, aunts, or friends computer!
yes, i will get a million geeks on my neck for saying this, and heck, before i became a corporate whore i was against this. But now i've seen the usefullness of this.
make up a system which includes procedures for change managment and incident managment. Everytime someone asks for something, ask them wether it is an incident or a change (or decide yourself), if its an incident (in which case you have break/fix situation), you know its a valid/urgent request and you can work on it. If its a change, you put it into a change managment system, together with the rest of the work you already have. Make this work visible (give out ticket numbers and such), so next time they want an update, you can refer them to your change managment webpage and they can see which project(s) are still to be fixed before theirs is started. This way, you dont come off as a sluggish worker AND you keep your customer happy.
ITSM, love it or hate it, but it sure is usefull.
Seriously, this is basically all there is to it. Use whatever calendaring software you have to break down what you're doing on a daily or weekly basis, if not hourly. Even a recurring to-do list is good. The idea is to show that your time is not an infinite resource.
If you can sit down and say something like "I can make time for this project this month, but it will require moving back those security updates for a week, and the database migration for a few days. Also, we're running low on shared drive space and there's no budget to augment the servers, so to add this in, I'll have to put everyone on a harsher quota for the next few days (and delete your mp3s off your shared drive)," and show how your time is mapped, they will see why they can't reasonably expect you to take on more work.
You'll also be able to get more actual work done, because the mere act of organizing your regular activities will let you see ways to cluster them for more efficiency ("oh, while this disk image is copying, I can hit that next item on the list, replace the video cable on that secretary's computer so she'll stop holding my mail hostage"), etc.
Also, at the end of six months or a year, maybe you can use the resulting log as evidence that you need an assistant or a pay raise or both. It's also good for remembering what to put on your resume, if your small company decides to lay you off and replace you with two kids who just graduated and also happen to be related to the VPs...
Get off my launchpad!
given an appropriate allocation of time, money and resources.
:
There are a number of things that are key
1) agree with senior management on broad priorities
2) draw up a list of what needs to be done
3) re-order the list in terms of the agreed priorities
4) present the prioritised list to management, and have them agree to the priority
5) Give an honest indication of how far down the list you'll be able to get
Go off and do stuff, and report progress on the list and re-prioritise the list say once a week, with their input.
IF they are half way decent as a manager, they will rapidly understand to either accept the level of capability they have, OR accept the need to increase that level of capability to meet their performance expectations. If they can't arrive at conclusions similar to these, in general you should be looking to work elsewhere.
If they want X to be done, explain what is really needed to achieve X. If some or all of the pre-requisites, give a honest estimate of how that will impact their timelines.
Oh - and plan on, and only commit to, 35-40 hours of real work per week per person, otherwise you'll burn people out, AND have no spare capacity to surge to meet the occasional urgent deadlines.
Another thing that can help, is to help filter the crap out, by getting agreement from management for allocation of resources to issues.
No system is perfect, but if you can demonstrate an understanding of the businesses needs and priorities, and be up front, but constructive, about the implications of meeting those, you can often say no without really saying no.
I was in your situation about 10 years ago with my first ever IT job. I agree with posts recommending a project plan, keeping your boss informed of what you're doing, and also escalating impossible work requests to your boss to manage so that you do not look like you are being overly obstructive (just busy!).
:) This CAN backfire if you do it too consistently, as people will start to think you don't have enough work to do, or that you are pretty poor at managing your time... but if you have 100 users, you can try it at least once on all of them :)
At the end of the day I tend to forget what I just spent 12 hours doing, so write everything down as you go along, and mail this to your manager at the end of the week, so they are aware just how busy you are.
BUT - my main area of expertise is DEFINITELY the route of underpromise and overdeliver. This is a technique for making yourself look more efficient than you really are. So - a user asks you to come and troubleshoot - say a missing share they used to have set up on their workstation. You know you can get round to them in 1 hour. Tell the user you will definitely come to see them in 2 hours time. Turn up in 3 hours and the users unhappy. Turn up in 2 hours and you've met expectations. Turn up in ONE hour, and hey - you're an hour early - RESULT! The user is v pleased that he is important enough for you to see quickly! User is happy. Now you knew all along you'd be one hour... but you've managed the perception of the user effectively, and he's a lot happier because, at the end of the day, you've psychologically out-manoeuvred him
Couple more things - when you helldesk phone rings, smile when you answer. You can hear it in your voice, and you will come across as a happy + confident employee, even if you're the opposite. This gives people confidance in your abilities, and they will enjoy dealing with you - and this costs you no time or effort. The more highly people think of you, the better your life will be.
Remember people. This is easy for you - I work with 5000 people, you only have 100. Bear in mind that at the end of the day, everyone wants to be adored *no, really they do!*, so you can use this to your advantage in a smaller way - treat users nicely, ie: as if you like them, and they will generally like you back. People who like you generally will let you get away with more... how much more quickly would you forgive your best mate letting you down, compared to a stranger?
I know none of these are super-practical tips, but you've already had tons of them - I promise they'll all make your job more enjoyable!
Good Luck.
Although my experience is slightly different because we are customer-based and not internal, our approach is to say "it will cost you". Then, if they insist it can be done faster you outline the risks. If there's money at risk they usually capitulate, but if they make unreasonable demands, the only thing you can do is go along with it making it clear you're not comfortable. At the end of the day it's 'their' money and 'their' responsibility. If the problem is that they expect you to do more hours than you think is reasonable and won't hire help then the problem is not how to say no - it's your unreasonable employers.
There is no "No" in the workplace. But there is a lot of other things.
... and will not stall us with the current project."
For example, there is the current list of your tasks, with a timeline and priorities. If your management comes with new projects, have them look at that schedule and ask them to reorder priorities and timelines, if necessary. That will give them an idea of what the new project will cost them in terms of delay of other projects, messed dependencies and other consequences.
For example, there is the simple question of money. If an external customer comes to you with a new project or a new idea that will mess up the current project, show them the consequences of their doing, and attach a price to this. "Your new idea will fit into the current project here, here and here. It will use up to x mandays of work, costing $$$ each, and will delay the first shipment of the deliverables by y days. Also, the new things will need adjustments to the project documentation, the handbooks, the testing procedures, costing another $$$. That comes down to a total of $$$$$$ for you at this point in time. Another alternative would be a separate project adding your features to the finished product. That might be slightly cheaper because of
The basic idea behind all these techniques is to make the internal structure of your projects and your schedule as transparent as necessary for the person asking you. It enables them to understand that their idea may be good (it probably even is), but that it is not suitable at this point in time. It also makes transparent for them the ressources they allocate and probably waste, if they insist on it now.
Which is much more effective as a plain "no" anyway.
Kristian
Nobody likes to be told "no" when they request something, especially from someone (like yourself) who is seen as a resource within the organization that is supposed to respond to requests.
I'm going to echo what others have said, and that is essentially, communicate, communicate, and communicate some more. Don't whine, just explain the facts:
Fact 1. You are a human being, and you have a limited amount of time to accomplish tasks, just as any other human being does.
Fact 2. When you have responsibilities, those responsibilities take time. Additional responsibilities will require more time.
Fact 3. If tasks are expected to be accomplished at a higher rate of speed, management must either allocate more resources to accomplish those tasks, or must properly prioritize.
Fact 4. You should not be expected to work 70 hour weeks to keep up with the basic demands of your organization. This, it seems to me, is the most important one in the situation described- it points to a failure on the part of the organization to recognize that in order to accomplish their goals, they must be willing to allocate the proper resources to those goals.
Speak to your boss/manager, and explain the situtaion in simple, concrete terms. Don't be afraid to say "It is not reasonable to expect a single FTE to accomplish the tasks allocated." Document what you're doing, explain why (in simple terms) it takes the amount of time it does to do things, and be prepared to explain your reasoning. You are the subject matter expert, not management.
What it comes down to is that when the rubber meets the road, an organization that wishes to have tasks accomplished in a timely manner by any division, IT or not, must be prepared to support that goal with resources. If the organization cannot or will not provide those resources, you MUST explain (politely) that it is not possible to accomplish what is expected in the timeframe alloted.
I realize that not everyone is in the position to say "give me the resources I need or find someone else to tell you what you want to hear", but the alternative is to eventually fail; in a case where you simply cannot make management see the facts, it would be prudent to seek employment elsewhere if possible.
I speak from experience here- I tried to be Superman and Scotty all in one to a number of organizations. I suceeded for a while, but only by totally destroying anything I had resembling a life outside of work, and that led to long-term health problems, both physical and emotional.
Trust me, you'll burn out long before anyone takes any notice of your plight, unless you make it perfectly clear what you bring to the table, and what you do not- 70 hour work weeks shouldn't be in that package.
I am a contractor doing freelance tech support, sound design, and web app programming. I've found that the best way to keep clients from taking advantage of me is to charge a lot.
Seriously! When clients have to feel their pocketbook getting lighter, they stop asking for piddling things and keep requests to important items.
Jory
As the parent poster implied, use MS Project (or whatever project planning software you've got) and put everything you've got to do on the plan.
... hours per week. Either you'll get lots of overtime (if that's what you want), or they'll hire you an assistant.
;->
**Keep it maintained at all times** - it only takes a few minutes to maintain it once you've got it set up.
**Be realistic with your time estimates** - if you don't know how to build a firewall, then allow a lot of time to do it.
**Remember that you aren't productive 40 hours a week** - depending on your role, you'll probably only do productive work 30-80% of the time, and if you're the only techo guy in the shop I'm betting you'd be somewhere below 80% productive. Reading email, going to meetings, cigarette breaks - they all chew into your 40 hours per week. Once you decide how productive you truly are, factor it into the project plan by saying the resource (you!) is only e.g. 60% available.
Then, when someone comes up and asks you to manually install virus checkers on these 43 new PCs, put it in your project plan, show how every other task you've got blows out by 2 weeks and see if your boss is prepared to accept the delay.
If you're at a place where they pay for overtime, enter all your time estimates in hours and do a few "what if" scenarios on your resource allocation (i.e. you!) to show how long things will take if you work 30, 40, 50, 60,
Without a doubt, the best/only way to get out of a situation where you're overworked is to be extremely organised and able to show anyone at a moment's notice exactly how busy you are. Once your boss can see the true impact of giving you "just one more" task, in terms of the slippage that will impact other projects, you'll be amazed how that extra work will no longer be as important
PS If anyone knows an OSS MS Project replacement that can do all this stuff, please speak up. I've been dying to replace it for ages, but it's a really good fit for this particular problem space
Okay as much as I agree with a lot of the prioritisation advice that has been given so far, I'm going to offer some different advice.
:-)
Wild guess... you're a perfectionist?
Me too.
It's a problem.
Seriously, aiming for perfection is a genuine personality problem in a work environment. Why? Because perfectionists can never achieve their goal but they'll spend twice as long as everyone else trying.
Here's the solution, tried and tested.
Follow the 90% rule.
Know exactly what you instinctively want to do to complete any task, and then aim for 90% of it.
Do this once.
Then ask yourself, honestly, have I really done a bad job here? The answer will be no, you've done a job that is the same as you'd have achieved if you'd aimed for perfection. But it took you half the time.
Perfectionists waste so much time aiming for that extra 10% and they never achieve it because it's a form of psychological self-punishment.
Get one thing absolutely clear in your mind -- you are NOT aiming to cut corners or be lazy. You're going to achieve exactly what you would normally, you're just freeing yourself from that nagging burden of an impossible goal.
Finally, consider this...
When you wonder about "how to say no" to people, are you worried about letting them down or letting yourself down?
See what I mean?
It's called Negotiation and is one of the hardest things to get right in business.
:-
If it's a client, you have to politely inform them that while you may not be able to get the job done for the time they are requesting, you can certainly aim for 'x time' - never mention other projects that you are working on for a client as you always want them to get the impression that they are the most important.
Never say No to a client - if you no you can't do it, then outsource it.
If it's your boss, you have to negotiate more heavily, as the boss is certain to 'pull rank' to get his/her way. Again, you need to request more time, however at this point you can indicate all the other project that you are working on and set a priority list
Ok boss, if this job is so urgent, I'm afraid I'm going to have to put X job on the back-burner to get it done.
Finally, if it's a marketing person who said to the client "Sure, we can get that done by next week Tuesday easy !", you have to hunt that marketing person down and kill them - after all, marketing types are a dozen a dime and really have little use except for blood-sport...
A slashdotting - you get the stick first and then the carrot !
My solution to this was to make a "to do" application.
If my colleague wants something done I tell him to put it on the to-do list with a priority rating.
I then work top down. That way he knows what I have / haven't done and what he's going to delay by wanting new things.
Managers should manage. I let him choose which work I'm doing next.
And I can't stress enough how well that appraoch works in a bigger company. Bump requests up to your manager and let him choose which you do next. It reduces your stress because you aren't trying to juggle a bunch of peoples feelings and with luck, if you are overworked, they will do something about it because they can see the situation rather than people bitching about you never doing their tasks when they think that their tasks are the only ones you have outstanding.
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
Keep a list of all assigned projects, whether on a web page for all to see, or on a whiteboard, and make damn sure everybody knows where it is. Get priorities assigned, not as in TOP but as in position on the list.
... body bags, medicine, ammunition, combat rations, fuel .... and the ensign got all huffy and backed down.
...
Here's a little story you might find enlightening, the importance of priorities in keeping requests under control. This is relevant, very relevant.
I worked with a guy who was an air force loadmaster in Vietnam, early 60s. He had some scut job at the main Saigon airbase. They used to extract carriage fees from shipments of steak and whiskey going up to the officers club at Cam Ranh Bay. One day, some ensign showed up, fresh as a daisy, said there were pallets going up to the club, and he was in charge of making sure they arrived intact, and demanded they be sent up on the next available plane. My friend had been in too long to give a shit about some wet behind the ears ensign, and furthermore, had the distinct attitude of What Are You Going To Do, Send Me To Vietnam? So he slapped a bunch of clipboards up on the counter, said fine, you tell me what cargo you want to take off, sir, and we'll see that your steak and whiskey gets up there right away sir. Now what will it be
That's the end of the relevant part of the story. Remember, make the job assigner decide not TOP priority, but where exactly on the list, so when other people complain, you can point to new jobs added above theirs. The goal is to get the suits hassling each other, not you. Don't argue with them. If they berate you, just say you need to know whose jobs to bump down the list. Be quiet and form, you need to know the positional priority.
OK, the rest of the story is more fun, not as relevant, but may help you to remember this trick.
The ensign demanded that someone stand guard over the pallets of steak and whiskey. My friend just sneered at him, Sir, you have a sidearm, why don't you use it? And the ensign did, he stood gaurd over the precious pallets for some time, until some crusty old chief, who had spit more sea water than the ensign had ever seen, showed up with a case of whiskey under one arm and a case of steaks under the other, slapped them down on the counter, and the pallets went out on the next flight.
There's a moral to that story to, but it's probably not a good idea to start taking bribes to shuffle your boss's priorities
Infuriate left and right
>>I've searched the web, but most of the sites that supposedly have information of this type just want you to sign up for their seminars.
There's a great book "Rapid Developemnt" by Steve McConnel, I recomment every developer/project manager to read it. I remember reading a good section on how to say 'No' in a professionl way.
He has a bunch of exerpts and articles here:
http://www.stevemcconnell.com/
Offtopic, Inflammatory, Inappropriate, Illegal, or Offensive comments might be moderated up.
These are the guidelines that help me achieve my goals, and my boss' goals, without going nuts in the process.
I can't stress this one enough. ALL requests for work should come through your trouble ticket system. Mid and Long-term projects don't need this as they should *only* come from your immediate boss.
Having everything in writing allows you to keep track of who requested what and when. It also leaves a paper trail should the user/client claim you did not meet their request on time/to spec. Last but not least, it enables you to justify your time management.
I know this sounds like a verbal wank, but it's true. If a task is not important, don't prioritise it above those that are. Keep in mind that your priorities are not those of your boss, and your boss' opinion of your work is really all that matters as far as doing well goes.
To be happy and successful in your job, you need to meet the priorities of your boss. If there's something that needs doing and it's not your boss' priority, make it one. Do this by explaining what it is, why it needs to be done, the impact on the organisation/yourself/your department/whatever if it's not done, the urgency and why it's so urgent.
When you're working on very important tasks under ultratight deadline, put your phone on "do not disturb" and ignore email. This helps your concentration greatly and, bottom line, if it's important enough people will walk into your office to see you. This is doubly effective if you're trained your users to do everything via TTS or email; they'll be reluctant to ask you in person, knowing you usually tell them to repeat it all in an email. Thus they'll only come to you when it really is important.
Following the above point, your prioritised list of tasks is sacrosanct - stick to it! The *only* tasks you should even consider inserting into the priority list you and your boss have previously agreed on, are those that can be classed as "DoMeNowOrElse". Before you class something in this way, ask yourself "would i be willing to do major (>2hrs) overtime to get this done ASAP?" If they answer is yes (e.g. downed email server), then it's worthy of insertion into the priority list. Also keep in mind these insertions should always go above existing priorities - it'll help dissuade you from arbitarily adding tasks because someone other than your immediate manager says they're urgent.
Meet once a week with your boss and ensure your priority list is still relevant with his needs. He or she usually knows much more about whats going on and what's important at a strategic level, so while you may think disabling that ex-employee's account isn't more important than upgrading a mailserver, your boss may know different.
This may sound silly in a discussion about workload management, but it's core to everything you do as a sysadmin. Remember that the only time most people see what you do is when they come to you with a request. They dont have the vaguest clue what your job entails - the difficulty, the hours, the stress, none of it. All they'll remember is the grumpy way you dismissed them with a "no" and went back to working on your "DoMeNowOrElse" task. Which to them of course looks like you're just goofing off at your workstation. While this seems the easiest, I find this point by far the hardest to stick to.
And, last but not least, remember this phrase: "A lack of planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part". But don't ever say that to your users unless you can figure a nicer way of putting it
Janie took my gun...
Especially if you are a programmer. At least a sys admin can get away witih saying no maybe 10% of the time. The second a programmer says no he has attitude and teamwork issues and eventually becomes Fredo's Kiss of Death.
... but if we do it this way we can get the same result."
There was a time when it was possible for us programmers to hide behind a project manager whenever the requests were unreasonable or just did not make common sense, but that is no more. When the mass layoffs started the first thing that happened was at least half of these project managers got the axe and many programmers got stuck in PM duties. This is why to many of us this job is turning us into politicians, because it is the only way to survive.
Of course, one could get high and mighty, but the only thing one would get out of this is a pink slip or a bad performance review (like it just happened to me).
The only possible escape is instead of just plain saying no, to deflect the issue with alternative approaches to the problem. What sounds better? "Can't be done.", or "This is not going to work because of
Pedro
----
The Insomniac Coder
Yeah, so've I. But what's the point? It's not maintainable over any real length of time. Personally, I prefer having a life outside of work, and that's never going to happen when you work that hard. And, what are the rewards for working stupid hours? Stress? Fatigue? More work? Effective pay cut?
In my experience, and observation of those around me, it's really hard increasing a 40 hour week to 50-55 hours. Adding 12 hours probably only adds a further 8-10 of real work. Beyond that it gets easier as most people are then unable to maintain a life outside work too. However, adding 10 hours more probably only adds a max of 5 hours real work, and it's gets worse as the hours pile up. Tired people are slow, mistake-prone and unproductive. Furthermore, once social life outside work stops, people start getting the social contact they need at work. They stop for more short chats, joke around more, etc. It's great for the work environment and back-slapping cliques, but it's not good for productivity.
What do you do? Work to live, or live to work? Do you work ridiculous hours just to make somebody else rich, or do you have your own business? Sorry, but this whole macho "I work more hours than you" routine is just stupid. It doesn't garner any respect from me - it means you have no life and are probably somebody else's whore.
If you get in trouble for saying 'No', it will not be because of what you said or didn't say in your interview.
You seem to be viewing this legalistically, when it seems that the parent was talking in terms of human relations at a lower-level; i.e. if you demonstrate you are willing to take any level of crap early on, it is harder to reverse that perception later- in addition to the fact that when you start a new job, you haven't yet got into a work-routine which you (yourself) will find harder to change at a later date.
Of course, life is never that simple, or easy, but that seems the most reasonable interpretation of the original post.
"Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).
Thanks for the great story, and dead on to boot. Upper management types are usually not planners per-se, they are *negotiators*, and unless you find a way to push back you're going to get fsck'd.
stirring the pot since nineteen mumblty mumble...
unless youre a CTO, Director, or someone that manages lots of people/projects, you should be turning to your boss for shielding for this.
you simply tell them their request will end up on the list and make them go away, then you make your boss prioritize your workload and/or tell these people that their request isnt worth anyone's time and effort and doesnt fit into the budget.
IF your boss is not fulfilling this role, then he is a crappy boss (cowardly) and shouldnt be managing things like this. I would begin looking for other work if I were you, since this situation wont get any better and you will stay miserable
if your boss IS capable of handling this, then maybe you are not conveying to him that you feel your workload is getting to be overbearing because of these kinds of requests. maybe he thinks you are just a go-getter workaholic type.
this is really a major function of bosses, try to use it!
A year spent in artificial intelligence is enough to make one believe in God.
If you get in trouble for saying "No" to unreasonable requests, maybe it's time to find a new job. If you can't do something you have to flat-out say it can't be done, and why. If you can't do something under a clear conscience, then you have to tell them no, and why you can't do it.
The crappy economy forced me to essentially become an IT contractor, which, let me assure you, beats the hell out of "would you like fries with that?" I worked at small organizations that had a max of 2 servers and maybe 10 workstations, all running a version of Windows. The longest I had stayed in one place was 3 weeks, and that was due to numerous problems left by the IT guy they recently fired. At several points in time, I was told to make all the administrator level passwords the name of the company because that was easier, and that I should do the same on the server, which holds all their client billing information, basically everything important. They also wanted the server accessible from the outside easily, so they wanted me to install a remote desktop server on this ancient NT server. When I started there, I basically told them they were wide open to an attack and to secure the computers with the name of the company as the password is asking for problems. This wasn't what they hired me for, but I could not, in good conscience, leave things the way they were, and they were glad to pay me to fix the problems they didn't know they had.
There were also several things they wanted fixed that I just could not fix. They wanted me to fix printing problems their custom software was having, and make it stop constantly crashing. Not having the source code, and being a not-too-great programmer anyway, I could not fix coding problems and told them flat-out, "There's nothing I can do to fix that problem, I can tell you why it's not working, but there's not a thing I can do about custom software." They understood this and contacted the guy who wrote it, end of problem for me and the company.
Many times (let's be realistic, 99% of the time) people requesting different IT related things have no idea what they're talking about or how to use what they're requesting should you tell them they can have what they want. In my scenario I suppose I had it easy at a couple organizations since they were contractors too, and basically understood that when you don't know how to do something, you pay someone that does. It took several days to get them to accept that they'd have to remember 8 different characters if they wanted to be secure.
That was just one problem though, I pointed out they had no backup plan and that a fire, or a malicious 12 year old on the other side of the world, could essentially shut their business down in a matter of minutes. This was what convinced them it was something to take seriously, and they started to listen when I said "no, you can't do that, you're asking to get screwed by doing that."
If you're having a problem telling someone you can't do something, or that they have unreasonable expectations, you need to relatively quickly find a weakness in the plan and tell them why what they want is bad. If the people have no idea what you're talking about when you say "leaving protocol/program/box X open like this creates a security flaw," then tell them the same thing in terms they can understand, such as "if you leave this open and something happens, you could lose all your billing information and you wouldn't know who owes you money." or "This could put you out of business if you leave it the way it is."
What's dangerous is saying yes to every request, reasonable or unreasonable. If you adopt the attitude that "eh, it's not my problem if they get cracked" then you're potentially risking the jobs of everyone employed at that company, yourself included. If you don't see a problem with that, you must be one of the people who developed security for Microsoft.
Please excuse any poor wordings of this, I just downed a double dose of nyquil because of the damned flu.
Time estimage guidelines:
... 1.2^10 = about 6, so 10 x (1.2^10) = roughly 60 days = 12 weeks = 3 months.
New programmer fresh out of college: Take his estimate and multiply by 8x. Yes he could get it done in 1 day, assuming he got so cranked up on caffeine his eyes stopped blinking and he worked on that (and nothing else) for 24 hours straight. In the real world a newbie can dedicate about 2 real hours doing a particular task each day, the rest is spent coming up to speed on corporate coding standards and libraries, email, breaks, and not 'in the groove'.
Veteran programmer of average skill, single person project : multiply his estimate by 3x. A third of his day is spent hand-holding the newbie, and another third is spent hand-holding management. The other third is spent programming, but luckily he knows to pad the schedule some (not enough, but some.)
Veteran programmer of uber skill, single person project : multiply his estimate by 2x. This is as good as it gets. A uber veteran programmer knows to leave his email client closed and his door closed so he can stay in the zone. He knows to pad the schedule more than he really thinks he should. And it still takes him twice as long as he expected.
Multiple people working on the same project : increase the timeline by a factor of 1.2 per additional person. If two people ought to be able to do it in 10 days it will take 12. If 11 people (10 additional) ought to be able to do it in 10 days it will take
Glonoinha the MebiByte Slayer
I told someone no, I wouldn't create a system that used a Social Security # for a login, and a badge number for a password... no no no. Had to do a sit down with my boss, their boss, and their boss... and I explained that 1) that information is definitely NOT secret, and 2) it was unethical to use information like that... it could compromise other aspects of the employees lives.
and I got fired... for "breach of ethics". apparently "pandering to a customer's silly whims and tantrums" is an article of ethics in that crowd.
meh
I'll try not to sound too much like a therapist.
Basically, no one has the right for any reason to violate your emotional and mental boundaries. Given this information, any employer who would expect you, the only IT employee, to work miracles on a budget with 70+ hour work weeks would either be insane, satan, or taking advantage of you.
In any of these cases in it not right. I assume you are salary which means you work whatever they tell you too. They can fire you because they feel like it. And basically, you owe them for giving you a job in such difficult financial and job market times.
Therefore, here is a practical solution. Explain to your customers, clients, employer and co-workers that you are one person doing the job of several. You are more than happy to get to their requests (which I can assume are typically easy user account resets, PC checks, LAN crawls) but to please be patient. And if you must tell them "No, I cannot do that." Be sure to add, "No, I cannot do that right now. I have too much work to do. Perhaps we can revisit this at a later date."
Keep in mind you do not want to upset them. So yelling "NO!!! GO AWAY!!!" as the BOFH would, while quite humurous, and honestly quite theraputic, would probably get you fired. You want them to be considerate of your time and your work so please be considerate of theirs (and it sounds like you are, otherwise you wouldn't be so willing to do the work and find it so hard to say "No.")
I hope this helps.
Rivendahl
... there is nothing that has not already been thought
A) In a small firm, get a little service ticket tracker and make sure everyone can access the prioritized queue report. That way they can see what is on your plate short term. Also make sure you put out a monthly email that lets people know what's up in IT land including *and this is critical* a summary of tickets closed, project status and so on so people know you are working your ass off. You are a stud if you can include downtime and causes on the report.
B) Self-Service Rules. If you work with 40 developers, focus on providing resources so they can solve their own problems. Make sure things are documented and available so people can find things. Make it so users can self-install software and so on. Don't be a control freak. With programmers and sales/marketing departments it wont work.
C) Become a horse trader for budget. When someone's got something that needs done, and it requires an upgrade or new purchase THAT IS AN OPPORTUNITY to get another department to fund you. Let people buy priority with budget dollars. I've diverted funds from advertising or sales training to buy servers because I NEEDED ECOMMERCE ONLINE NEXT MONTH!
D) Don't be a no guy or a yes guy. Ask questions like "How will this help make your department more efficient?" , "Will this change enable us to increase capacity?", "Explain how this will help the bottom line?", "What alternatives have you considered... why did you settle on this decision?", "This will have impact on ______. Have you discussed the impact with ______ in ______?", "This looks like a really good idea - what drove you to consider doing this?" A lot of times people will talk themselves OUT OF DOING ANYTHING or put the project on the back burner.
E) Don't be heavy handed with end users. Don't ever say to anyone that they or what they do are not important! When you have to say no, just be honest: "Accounting is down right now, can I get to this later?" "Do you need access to something you don't have to fix the problem?" "I think this is a great idea, but before I'm comfortable signing off on it, I'd you to discuss the idea with _______ and ______." And finally, you can always say, "No, I can't do it."
-- $G
One was told to do it or he'd be replaced by someone who would follow instructions
One who didn't say no ended up with a work-comp injury that the company, eventually, fired them for (illegal, but "prove it" in writing)
One who said "No. Not possible, given the constraints" was replaced by a 'yes-man' Manager wasted about 21 engineer months (15 real months) before the implantation was mathematically proven to be impossible in a public paper (due to race conditions where locks couldn't be used). Entire project was canned, manager was promoted for having the "smarts" to cancel such an ill-conceived project (no one remembered it was he who conceived it :-))
It's sorta like the saying "Easier to get forgiveness after the fact than ask for permission up front." Stoopid managers don't like to hear no, but prefer "yes" with shoddy work and bugs over all else. Knew one manager (managing a government security project) who was proud of having hidden bugs and problems and having beaten another company in competing for a contract (because they were "stupid" and were forthright and outspoken about problems or questions). This manager's motto was "it's not a bug unless the customer finds it" [so any work on "correcting" such "features" was a waste of company resources and an indication of the fixer's inability to follow orders (or so it said on reviews of his employees)].
It really depends on what type of company/manager you work for. But bottom line with global competition for your job is that those who follow orders without question rise the most quickly. Only if there are post-disaster or post-war investigations/tribunals are such ethics questioned -- otherwise, it's just "par for the course" in the battlefield of capitalism (lowest quality product that the consumer will bare for least price).
That's why the government had to create laws to stop exploitation of children, create minimum safe working conditions, minimum wages, product safety commissions, building codes (designed to be the _minimums_ necessary for a safe building, but are used by most builders as the target to shoot for -- because, again, in a capitalistic sense, shooting for anything higher than the minimum will cost more and make you less competitive than those that barely scrape over the minimums.
Of one of these 'do the minimum' managers, a government evaluator, who didn't like the manager's attitude, but had to *pass* him because he met the letter of the law on the minimums: "if you always shoot to just roll over the rim, sometimes you're going to miss".
But things are going to have to get worse before they will get better. Until such managers (and companies) are held accountable for failures, the situation won't change. Until customers stop buying buggy software, product quality will continue to decline (because if the customer is buying it, it still must be over the minimum -- let's try even lower quality the next time!). Anyone who cut their programming teeth during the dot.bomb era has been taught that software bugs are inevitable and to be expected. Software quality has been "spin doctored" to be something that is "not really possible" in real life. Everyone has been given _ALOT_ of propaganda about why software quality is impossible - to the point that most people are now believers. Though occasionally, there comes along a privately held company that disproves the myth (from slashdot, summary on qnx website) that probably got its biggest boost as MS FUD and propaganda.
Only when enough people die wil