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How Do You Justify the Existence of IT?

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the all-about-roi dept.

bakamaki writes "I work for a small manufacturing company as a SysAdmin. My boss is a DBA. We are the only IT employees. He recently decided to record hours spent on his projects and then evaluate how much time the databases he writes save the employees. Then he translates that into a $ figure. He's asking me to do something similar but I'm kinda at a loss. It seems most of the stuff I do is preventative, IE care and feeding of servers and network infrastructure in addition to all the break fix stuff I do for the user base with their desktops. When in this position what do you folks usually do?"

7 of 411 comments (clear)

  1. Writing your own eulogy by Hadlock · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Sounds like he's trying to justify firing you and hiring you back as an hourly contractor to cut costs. Go watch the part in Office Space where the guy is yelling at the bobs about how he communicates between the customer and the engineers. You're that guy.
     
    Good Luck.

    --
    moox. for a new generation.
    1. Re:Writing your own eulogy by rdeml · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Take a 2 week vacation and see if everything still works afterward. Your job is to keep everything working. If everything works without you, then you are not needed. If, however the boss balks at 2 weeks without IT support, you are vital.

    2. Re:Writing your own eulogy by Lord_Frederick · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Exactly. If you are just doing generic IT stuff, then a small company may very well be better off with some sort of maintenance agreement instead of keeping you. Your boss has already realized this and is probably already soliciting bids. Sorry.

    3. Re:Writing your own eulogy by mcgrew · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Hmmm... It's been a few years so I don't remember where I read this, but if you become irreplaceable you should be fired - because some day you may quit, retire, die, or be incarcerated.

      No company can afford an irreplaceable employee.

      --
      Free Martian Whores!
  2. Imagination by sam0vi · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Develop a worse-case scenario. Detail all of the problems that may occur without your system maintenance work (system hijacking, malware, trojans, client info loss, etc), and then write the amount of money each of these theoretical problems would cost the company. now add all those costs. i'm pretty sure you make less than whatever figure you end up getting. buena suerte

    --
    When my Karma level reaches 0 I feel in piece with the Universe
  3. Compare with the present, not the past by mangu · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Your points about technology saving money are true, but irrelevant. No one is proposing going back to doing by hand things that are currently done by computer.

    The right comparison, IMHO, should be between how much your salary costs, compared to how much would be spent if everyone did by themselves the work you do. Compare the productivity of office jobs supported by a well trained professional to the productivity of unsupported amateurs.

  4. Start printing copies of your resume at work by topham · · Score: 4, Interesting

    You've been asked to justify your cost. Here's a hint: Your BOSS needs to justify your cost, not you. Not to say you don't need to have input into the situation, but he's asking you for the wrong thing.

    Next, Start fixing up your resume. It's likely you will either get hit with a paycut, or one, of the two of you will be let go. It doesn't matter if they can't survive with only 1 of you. They will toss one of you, outsource the rest, pay more and regret it, but you will still be out of a job and they won't bring you back.