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What Would You Demand From Your IT Department?

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the minimum-level-of-service dept.

ZombieLine asks: "The IT department at my company (approximately some 500 people) is showing signs of incompetence, and has been ignoring knowledgeable user input for about a year. Additionally, they haven't been able to sell needed changes to senior management. Unacceptable server down time, maxed network storage, and no backups systems have hit the bottom line, and those on top are starting to notice. We users are staging a revolt to make IT more responsive to users by creating a group from the company divisions and IT to discuss needs and solutions. What would you put in our charter?" What services and responsibilities would you demand out of your IT department?

3 of 671 comments (clear)

  1. What would I demand? by Pvt_Waldo · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    Respect - plain and simple. Too often it seems like IT can become the domain of little nazis and control freaks.

  2. Re:What would you demand from your IT users? by SgtChaireBourne · · Score: 0, Flamebait
    ... Not to mention the fact that you are using high maintenance Microsoft Outlook type services ...
    That's probably the heart of the problem. The symptoms he described sound like your average MS shop. MS based services consume staff time like it's going out of style. And not just IT-staff, those stuck with such an infrastructure or desktop services lose a lot of productivity due to extremely poor levels of service and frequent outages, even re-starts. Sure the re-boot after a crash is automatic on XP, but you still have lost your train of thought and will have to re-expend a lot of effort just to pick up where you left off. By that point, other time constraints kick in. e.g. a meeting, another project, lunch, quitting time, etc.

    The basic description is that the IT department is over-taxed, but adding more staff won't help any if the underlying cause is the technology. The MS-Outlook / MS-Exchange is probably the most burdensome and should go first. File storage should move next. Then ease people off of MS Office. At that point, much of the maintenance difficulties will be gone, though you can go that little bit extra and eventually ditch MS Windows. They're there to work, not play games.

    --
    Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
  3. Leave us the hell alone by dsstao · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    As a member of IT departments in the past and a current (6 year) consultant, I say leave us the fuck alone. It's not up to you, as the user, to maverick it and plant your measly pathetic flag in whatever ground you think is right and then try to change the IT department to your stupid assumptions as to what you think it should be.

    Your company has 500+ IT people right? Somewhere in there I assume there's a few managers. Be a proper worker and follow the fucking CHAIN OF COMMAND. If you want something different, notify your manager, who will notify their manager, who will notify the CIO.

    "As a knowledgable user"... in who's opinion? You think you know enough about IT? Then, why aren't you in the IT department putting your money where your mouth is? Any monkey can tell if a server is out of space or isn't being backed up. That doesn't make you knowledgable.

    Seriously, IT people have degrees, certifications and a lot of work to do. We couldn't care less what some wanna-be motherfucking loser like you wants different. If we hear it from our (good) management team, we'll change.

    Follow the chain of command.