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Join IT Support For Abuse and Despair
tomhudson writes "The Register is reporting that IT support people feel abused and frustrated, with 2/3 swearing, almost half being depressed for the rest of the day, and 15% throwing things. Personally, I thinks their stats are off: I've thrown a monitor, a laser printer, keyboards, books, CDs, drives, kicked a few chairs, etc. Who hasn't? What have you thrown lately?"
Two elections and a temper tantrum.
"Speaking the Truth in times of universal deceit is a revolutionary act." -- George Orwell
Course, maybe that's why they "feel abused and frustrated"?!
"1984" was ment to be a warning, not a guidebook. You hear that Kim Jong-il!? BushCo?!
I've thrown a monitor, a laser printer, keyboards, books, CDs, drives, kicked a few chairs, etc.
Ballmer? Is that you?
I've thrown CDs around, but that's just for the Cubicle Full Contact Football. It's truly the only way to relieve stress after being on a 40 minute call trying to explain where the backslash key is.
IT support people feel abused and frustrated, with 2/3 swearing
That's a sign of unhappiness? I love my job but still mutter "ah fuck" when I get a network call...
mainly floppy disks and compaq laptops. against walls and/or out of windows, whichever happens to be closest.
/. is what happens when geeks talk. get used to it.
But really... Who hasn't experienced this over and over and over? The sad truth though, is that it probably won't get much better.
What incentive do people have to learn more about computers when someone will hold their hand everytime something goes wrong? From my own experience, the reason I can do so much is because I've been forced to learn how, because I don't have a go-to person, and because I use computers all the time.
How have others gained their skills?
Are you only interested in thrown stuff or does "tuning it with a very large hammer" count also?
"It's too bad that stupidity isn't painful." - Anton LaVey
"What have you thrown lately?"
Hmm, (1) 11x17 weighted paper airplane. (3) ruber bands. (2) paper foot balls. (1) cupcake. (1) playing card. (250+) pages of invoice test runs.
-Rick
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
I used to work in IT at my university (it was like the defacto thing for CS majors to do for some reason... guess they didn't know CS majors didn't know a damn thing about information technology). Anyway, I remember getting this one call where this one sorority girl calls up (i saw the name of the sorority house on the phone) and I picked up the phone and said what is in the subject line above. And she says to me "my Internet is down" and (this was during a scheduled downtime) i said "yes, along with everyone else's on campus" and she says "well i hope you talk to everyone like that" and i said " well, i hope you have the deed for "your Internet" in your hands right now. Seriously, why do people refer to things on their computer like "my aim," "my internet," "my little blinky light that you can only see if you look at it from a weird angle"... i mean, if it's not hardware (i know, the hdd light is, but it was a funny example) how is it really your's... especially if it's "your internet." and that's why i threw a red stapler right into the screen of a brand-new compaq R3000... i got to keep the computer after they made me pay $1500 for it...
I like suggestions, but I don't like contributing towards them.
Off the shackles of crappy IT positions. Now I only do IT for myself.
Serously, someone whould consider hacking a copy of Knoppix or Ubuntu live to work with WINE as a bootable CD for a remote repair service business.
Certain cheif executive officers have been reputed to throw chairs and such around as well.
The World Wide Web is dying. Soon, we shall have only the Internet.
Or my job. Same thing - after I realized two things:
1)the job really wasn't worth the hassle - we weren't an "IT company" so there was never going to be a basis for treating IT people as more than throw-away staff and,
2) it wasn't my dad yelling at me.
Actually, the second realization led to the first. It really didn't matter that someone decided that his bad day/attitude was an excuse to be disappointed *in me* (when I'd done my best to overcome the weather, the carriers, the infrastructure, the users, etc.), I'd done my best and my father would've been okay with that. I'm still in the industry, doing a good job (if I do say so myself) and things are good.
> From my blog "The open eleven steps to telecommuting"
> 4) Install a DHCP demon on the local server to allocate local IP addresses
I wish you would translate this to English for us non-IT users who would like to do it at home. It would be great to have a single master machine at home from which new systems could pull their configuration. But a lot of what you wrote is Greek to me. How do I install a DHCP daemon, and on which OS? How is remote reimaging done? Please provide more juicy detail, thank you!
To get back on topic, I would just request IT people, before you smash perfectly good (maybe slightly outdated) equipment, think about donating it to your local school system, library, or charity. I've seen our IT person destroy nice but slightly old laptops, and then lie about doing it. From that day onward I never viewed him in the same light, fwiw.
Second thing, if you can not donate them, at least give them to an appropriate disposal facility that knows how to properly treat hazardous waste. Having a lead-free environment is a Really Good Thing.
As someone who has worked behind a tech support desk and who has to occasionally call tech support and deal with (incompetant) level 1 tech support, I always remember the old adage "Kill 'em with kindness".
Whether you *are* the tech or you are talking *to* the tech, taking your emotions out of the equation makes the whole transaction soooooo much smoother. Sure, it's hard to do, especially when you're at wits end, but it usually pays off.
Once you hang-up the phone, then you can blow off all the steam that you want... Just don't blow your top... Health insurance doesn't usually cover that.
When I was doing tech support for Earthlink I would start by declaring that I would fix whatever the problem was. Then, I put on my best Ben Stein voice. It gently lulled the customer into a state of hypnosis, and he or she would robotically follow all of my commands. Most of the time I would fix the problem. If not, I just said "Reboot and it'll work, thank you, good bye".
On the other hand, when I have to call support, I already know what's wrong (I fix computers for a living). So I just put on my best Ben Stein voice, and gently explain to the tech that I've already run all the tests and I need such-and-such part mailed to me.
The key here is to use basic hypnosis to convince the other person that you know what's going on and that you should be listed to. It's very simple.
Having done tech support, programming, and a number of similar jobs, I have to say that neither I nor anyone I have worked with have thrown or otherwise abused computer equipment. If they had, I suspect they would have been canned immediately, and for good reason -- people who can't control themselves are a bit .. 'off'. The only person I know who actually has destroyed computer hardware was a layperson musician/artist who was having problems with some sound editing software.. he was very embarassed for the whole trip to MicroCenter to replace the keyboard, mouse, and CDROM drive. The point is that destroying things when angry is childish, and is something that hopefully most people outgrow by the time they're 14 or so.
For every problem, there is at least one solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.
Oooh. I like this corrollary. After thinking about how I deal with people on both ends, I probably end up unwittingly hypnotizing them. Nice!
:-)
You're a smart man, spooky_nerd.
I don't swear and I don't throw things. I don't believe in them as a useful thing to do and I don't accept them as a natural consequence of being abused and feeling dispair. I don't justify doing such things, and justifying it is part of the system that keeps that behavior happening. Excuses, excuses, I hear them every day.
Finally, to get some peace and quiet, I went over, picked him up by his love handles and threw him against the wall. That shut him up good, but I think I threw my back in the process. I tried to see the company doctor yesterday, but he couldn't find my personnel records, so I had to leave. Or actually, security escorted me out and took my badge. That's strange, come to think of it... I can't recall they ever did that before. Oh well, it's probably all sorted out today. Off to work I go!
Money for nothing, pix for free
I personally used to get off on people yelling at me over the phone, whoever said "kill em with kindness" had it exactly right. Be competent and honest and unless the person on the other end is a pschopath they cannot help but respond to that and people who were losing it will often apologize.
All that said - I'm glad I don't have to work service or support any more.
[Set Cain on fire and steal his lute.]
was an exception.
Flourescent (adj): smelling like ground wheat.
I agree with the service job abuse thing. Some people just won't listen to anything but a manager. I've had experience with those sort of people and I usually want to throw them through a window.
You need a licence to have car why not the same for a computer? It would stop us getting questions of "why isn't my monitor switched on?" when they didn't hit the power button on the thing.
Of course killing them with kindness works in the sort term but when you get the 50th call from the same person who can't speak a word on English you just want to hurt them if only to make sure that the lessons sink in.
Thankfully I have a bit more self control then to hurt my fellow man. But recently I have been suffering a lot as a result of in-sniping and have very nearly thrown things across the room (always wondered how a computer looks when it smashes against a partition wall).
Yes I do need psychiatric help and have been waiting 4 months for this from my Occ. Health without any success. With my situation the way it is the managers might get a free flying lesson if this isn't speeded up cause it isn't helping my frustration.
There have been many times when dealing with people that I wished I could kiss my own butt goodbye
Remember "My Computer"?
I talk about stuff.
In retail rude is only the beginning. People throw fits like 5 year olds to get their own way. People often listen to speak and not respond. People often get pissy if issues are not resolved instantly (little patience exists). People often treat everyone like slaves and act as if they are the leader of some sort of empire (many contractors, people from India upper class, and business suits types are like this). And then there are the people whom could care less about safety and disregard your orders or curse you out-- despite the fact safety trumps everything at HD. Being under staffed does not help, but most of it is management caused since we lost ~35 people from quitting.
Moral to the story: one can not take things personally, and step back as if it was a scene in something being shown in a film or tv and just laugh (sighlently, of course or not if no customers are around).
There are many nice people whom act civil, even when under frustration, but it is easier to remember creatures of bad social habits, unless it is funny or provide a good off topic conversation (people with ramble about almost anything). -lmsjr
I've worked in a couple of places where we had running Nerf battles any time the stress levels got to high. Unfortunately, one of them was in a secured facility, complete with "little green men" who carried M-16's. During one of our battles, we got carried away and spilled out into the hallway, thus alarming said man who had a real gun that shot bullets instead of Nerf balls. Other than that, I've always found that Nerf battles were exteremely theraputic and quite good for morale overall.
2 cents,
Queen B
HDGary secures my bank
The World Series
Change their password every day and explain to them that it will keep changing until they stop complaining... in fact, even better, log them out after x minutes of inactivity and automatically change the password, and e-mail it to you, so you are prepared. That demonstrates to them not that you are annoying, but that you have complete control of the situation. Reminds me of the Twilight Zone where a guy creates people and things by speaking into a tape recorder and the person or thing persists for as long as the tape does. Rod Serling comes on, and the guy shows him his tape.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_World_of_His_Own
No worse than everyone refering to movies, music, games, and books, and other creative endeavours as "My Culture" even though, much like in the "My Internet" case, they didn't have a hand in it's creation Nor do they plan on acknowledging those who made either one (Internet or Culture) possible, and in fact feel that they're entitled to both.
I have never thrown anything, but I once worked with a guy who put his fist through a wall. We left there for a couple of years as a reminder to be more controlled......