Slashdot Mirror
Who Plays the 'Blame the Tech' Game?
An anonymous reader asks: "I work for a marketing services company, and it is my department's role to develop and maintain reporting systems for all the data we collect. When a department manager sees a dip (or rise) in one of there KPI's the first thing they do is ask me to 'check out the reporting', because '[they] think there is a problem'? It's this just the culture of my company or have other readers experienced a 'blame the technology first, ask questions later mentality'?"
First let me say that the part where the researchers say "Get me the president!" isn't upon the first discovery of an impending disaster. It's usually after the data has been double checked & verified by other sources (if possible).
So, if your manager turns these reports over to upper management or shareholders & these have dire consequences upon how your department is viewed--then maybe it's not such a bad idea to double check the equipment or software.
Also, you're employed for a reason. If your manager ever handed over a faulty report, who's ass is on the line? Probably not yours. It's their ass that should get canned if they give faulty information. Now, if your ass was on the line and some outlying data came out in a report, would you constantly double check it?
And, has it ever been wrong before? If this is the twentieth time they've asked you to check it and it's never been wrong before, then maybe they're overdoing it. But if it's been faulty before, give them some credit for just trying to get to the bottom of things. Maybe this isn't the blame game, maybe this is just extreme caution. I don't get this kind of treatment where I work.
The sad part of it is that they're your manager & if they're blaming you, then they're probably saying that to the managers above them also. However, if I were upper management, I'd see through that and can your manager for their inability to take responsibility for those reporting to them.
My work here is dung.
if you liked being blamed for all of their problems
Don't assume they're lying. There's a problem somewhere. Experience has told them (and myself as a developer of products heavily reliant on reporting) that the problem is more likely in the software, than the type of paper stock they used in the printer.
If the problem isn't the reporting algorithims, it's in the data - maybe you need to check validation on the front end.
Do you always get so defensive about these things? I doubt it's a vast right-wing conspiracy.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
RIAA: Its not that our music sucks, its cause of PIRATES!
Ford: Its not that our Cars are crap, and expensive, its cause the Japanese imports are utilizing a weak Yen
Sub-Prime loan companies: its not our fault these loosers we gave $500,000 to buy a 2 bedroom house with an interest only loan are defaulting, its the Federal Reserve for raising the interest rates!
Blame is everywhere, its not technology, its the data. The reports he's questioning came from a computer. If "Ted" had tabulated the results, your boss would force 2 other people to double check the data in the report, cause maybe "Ted" screwed up a decimal place somewhere, even though Ted has a masters in statistics.
What are we going to do tonight Brain?
Project Managers often get asked to "rearrange the project plan" when it doesn't finish early enough. Employing more or different people so that the project finishes on time would of course be too obvious.
There is an old saying: "A bank never makes a mistake in your favor".
If they screw up, and put someone else's money into your account, (had friends that have had this happen), they yank it right back out. If they screw up and charge you some fees you shouldn't have been charged, you have to bring receipts, statements, (even though they should have them) and spend lots of time getting it corrected.
What are we going to do tonight Brain?
My wife is a horse-trainer/lesson-giver. Her students constantly make uninformed claims that the horse was having a bad day, or that the horse was just plain stupid, completely ignoring their own inability to ride.
How many teachers have been blamed by parents for not teaching their kids enough or teaching them poorly and thats why little Johnny isn't passing his standards tests?
What about high ranking political officials who avoid bad-press/prosecution by passing the buck to an underling?
"Blame the [fill_in_blank]" game happens for every industry, for every body. What makes you think this is a IT-only issue?
First, LEARN ENGLISH. ("role", "their") Until you do, respect will continue to evade you.
Second, if you submit something obscure to Slashdot, explain it. Specifically, WTF is a KPI?
Third, your manager DID ask you a question. If you want to avoid more of these questions, why not make the process of creating whatever a KPI is more transparent (e.g., make an interim detailed report available as a CSV) and let the questioners check their own work?
At the moment, people "don't trust the tech" because they don't trust the whiny, snot-nosed newbie churning out their KPIs. Prove yourself to be a reliable and detail-oriented person (OK, basically a 21st-century secretary) and maybe they will.
According to Joel on software people don't sue you because you admit the mistake, people sue you because they are mad at you. If you admit the mistake and try to fix the problem, they aren't going to sue you. If you try to pretend there is no problem, then they will sue you. The article linked above is a very good read for anybody doing any kind of customer support, or working in the tech industry in general.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.