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How Do You Deal w/ User Induced Stress?

Posted by Cliff on from the 10-mississippi-9-mississippi-8-mississippi... dept.

Anonymous asks: "I've worked as a Network/System Administrator at a small company for two years now. It's my nature to remain calm and collected while trying to accommodate everyone, even when having a particularly stressful day. After two years though, I've recently found myself being stressed all the time and my calm, cool exterior is starting to show some cracks. How do Slashdot readers cope with the stress induced by a highly demanding job and being stalked by users asking for the same thing over and over (i.e. password resets, login problems, how do you...)?"

14 of 171 comments (clear)

  1. Easy... by Keebler71 · · Score: 4, Funny

    Stupidity Induced Beatings.

    --
    "It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance." - Thomas Sowell
  2. Serenity Now... by Plac3bo · · Score: 2, Funny

    ...Insanity Later.

  3. Or your boss, for that matter? by saarbruck · · Score: 5, Funny
    Against my recommendations, my boss just added a slew of new feature requirements to my project, so now I'm spending even more late nights at work trying to make magic happen. He stops by my office a couple times a day all chipper and excited, and it's all I can do not to strangle the dillweed. How does one professionally convey the message, "I don't like you, I don't respect you, you're not qualified for the job you're doing, get the hell out of my office and let me work." ?


    I'd love to know.

    --
    I am the very model of a modern major general!
    1. Re:Or your boss, for that matter? by Creepy+Crawler · · Score: 5, Funny

      You dont speak his language.

      "The cost/benefit ratio increases dramatically, along with exponentially increasing time to deployment, in that our competitors have a much increased chance of overtaking our solutions.

      My suggestion is that we freeze features for a specified version, and branch our software when we feel that our profit margin is maxed. This would guarantee that we would force our customers to upgrade on our cycle, thus guaranteeing future profits."

      I'm a network engineer in the consulting "business". In order to maintain contracts, you have to do the talk, and speak the language. Money and time are all that matter.

      --
    2. Re:Or your boss, for that matter? by jamesh · · Score: 2, Funny

      Postal service employees came up quite an effective solution to this problem. It may even be that their new placement as a result of this solution was less stressful than their old one.

    3. Re:Or your boss, for that matter? by treerex · · Score: 2, Funny

      Start trolling for relevant Dilberts and tape them to the door of your office or wall of your cube. Then start putting them in more conspicuous locations, like the bulletin board over the photo-copier or the lunch room refrigerator.

      You can also write your letter of resignation, print it out, and put one of those "Sign Here -->" Post-It notes on it. Put a pen on it and leave it on your desk. He'll get the message.

    4. Re:Or your boss, for that matter? by Clover_Kicker · · Score: 5, Funny

      A massive head injury should put you in MBA emulation mode.

  4. Vodka... by Gangis · · Score: 2, Funny

    ...Lots of it. Won't make the problem go away but it'll make you feel better for a while. Job security isn't guaranteed though.

    --
    "Black holes are where God divided by zero." - Steve Wright
  5. The answer is in the headline by TykeClone · · Score: 2, Funny

    Reset passwords, create login problems...

    --
    A fine is a tax you pay for doing wrong and a tax is a fine you pay for doing all right.
  6. start a mini help desk audio file by zogger · · Score: 2, Funny

    next time you have to go through an explanation, record it. Make a label for the entry. Accumulate different topics until you have a nice fat cd full of subjects.. Use labels like "AAAk! no password" and "browser is slow/doesn't work" "where's my email?" "how do I..." whatever. Along those lines, with the appropriate response. Burn a lot of CDs with the info, then just smile, hand one over to the latest customer, say "it's on there, first cd is free,you lose it, after that it's ten bucks". Or alternate, run it on the network internally with a pointer to it.

    The CD version may not relieve the stress, but at least it will cover beer and aspirin money.....

  7. Short video on the subject by plsuh · · Score: 1, Funny

    Internet Help Desk (studio version) :-D

    --Paul

  8. Gonja, mang! by patrick42 · · Score: 3, Funny

    In a job like that, it would make things a lot less stressful and more fun if you smoked the occasional j-stick before work. I suggest doing right before your shower so that you don't smell. You'll have a nice grin on your face, and people's problems won't seem to bad.

    I also agree with the person who posted about exercise. I started working out three times a week over a year ago, and now I go anywhere from three to five times a week. It definitely helps with stress, and has the added benefit of making you feel a lot better about yourself, too.

  9. BOFH... by Shag · · Score: 2, Funny

    Get thee to The Register, and read the BOFH stuff. ALL of it.

    That'll give you a few ideas to get started.

    --
    Village idiot in some extremely smart villages.
  10. Re:Exercise! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    "...and are much less stress free"

    I believe the poster wanted to be more stress free rather than less.

    :)