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Ask Slashdot: What's the Best Way to Retrain Old IT Workers?
A medium-sized company just hired a new IT manager who wants advice from the Slashdot community about their two remaining IT "gofers":
These people have literally been here their entire "careers" and are now near retirement. Quite honestly, they do not have any experience other than reinstalling Windows, binding something to the domain and the occasional driver installation -- and are more than willing to admit this. Given many people are now using Macs and most servers/workstations are running Linux, they have literally lost complete control over the company, with most of these machines sitting around completely unmanaged.
Firing these people is nearly impossible. (They have a lot of goodwill within other departments, and they have quite literally worked there for more than 60 years combined.) So I've been tasked with attempting to retrain these people in the next six months. Given they still have to do work (imaging computers and fixing basic issues), what are the best ways of retraining them into basic network, Windows, Mac, Linux, and "cloud" first-level help desk support?
Monster_user had some suggestions -- for example, "Don't overtrain. Select and target areas where they will be able to provide a strong impact." Any other good advice?
Leave your best answers in the comments. What's the best way to retrain old IT workers?
Firing these people is nearly impossible. (They have a lot of goodwill within other departments, and they have quite literally worked there for more than 60 years combined.) So I've been tasked with attempting to retrain these people in the next six months. Given they still have to do work (imaging computers and fixing basic issues), what are the best ways of retraining them into basic network, Windows, Mac, Linux, and "cloud" first-level help desk support?
Monster_user had some suggestions -- for example, "Don't overtrain. Select and target areas where they will be able to provide a strong impact." Any other good advice?
Leave your best answers in the comments. What's the best way to retrain old IT workers?
People honest enough to admit their shortcomings, are probably quite able to tell where they can still be a good contribution. This late in the game, they must have ownership of their tasks, or they will hold everybody else up.
Sounds like they are well liked and have excellent people skills. Use that. 1st level help desk, training new employees, vendor contact, IT intranet, etc.
A thing with people that's often overlooked is that different people have different values. The main ones are
traditional authoritarian
individualistic achiever
egalitarian community
and systemic integrative [1]
For example, the traditional mindset is happy so long as there is a hierarchy which is dictating what needs doing, with a sense of loyalty and appreciation. So change for change's sake is not welcome, but change in the context of stability and loyalty, can be welcome. The core point is, safety and loyalty and conforming to the norms.
Whereas, the individualistic achiever is happier being able to do independently driven, the typical "modern thinker", the self-made man, etc. Here you might be more concerned with, asking people what do they want? Where do they want to go with this job? What are their interested? What do they personally want to develop? And then just letting them get on with developing any opportunity which appeals to them and which is useful for the company.
The egalitarian community type is motivated somewhat differently to the first two. This is anti-hierarchy and is looking more for meaning and purpose in the job. This person want to work for a charity which is devoted to a good humanitarian cause. They have a need for personal meaning and a sense of being equally valued as everyone else. Their own voice matters. The group is important, and so it is about helping people to voice their own experience and do so in a way which helps them relate to the group more, in a more meaningful way.
So that's three main "values" and there is one more crucial point: people's values change over decades. So you might find that, people who were happy in the same job doing the same standard thing for 30 years -- which would suit them if they were traditional authoritarian ie. they valued stability and being told what to do -- may by now be in the achiever value or the egalitarian value, simply because as individuals, they grew as people and now have new needs.
So part of retraining isn't just swapping out one set of work tasks for another -- that may be done perfectly well, yet kinda fail -- because as a person one may now wish for a different kind of expression of values in their work, and in their training.
Another way to out this is that as people grow they tend to become more complex and have more complex aspirations.
Actually my reason for writing this is that the article description suggests that the "problem" is how to deal with people who seem stuck in old patterns and unable to change... so I thought it worth mentioning that the people may have indeed changed... they have become more complex individuals, but the work itself hadn't changed... so the opportunity here is to tap into whatever new complexities these individuals may now be capable of. Older may well mean wiser.
Hire some entry-level admins who already know what you need. This will be cheaper over the long run.
It's people like you that are destroying our society.
What I would do is to give them a machine, park it on their desks and get them to install Linux on it. Tell them you want them to install and configure something that will be of use to you running on Linux. There must be something your department is missing that is sorely needed that they can get going, and at the same time pick up some skills in configuring Linux and installing software, patching, maintaining, backing up, monitoring etc. It's important that you don't give them artificial problems to solve - it needs to be real, and useful if they get it working well so there is real payback for this investment in time. Perhaps a web service like a CMDB, or a knowledge base - install Apache, Samba etc.
.. or let them use their imaginations.
Perhaps there is a production service that you want monitored; they could install Zabbix as a service, and then get them to install the agents on servers, produce the dashboard, monitor it daily and identify and fix issues that are shown up.
Perhaps you need a backup service for all of your desktop machines. Get them to install Amanda as a backup server. Install a tape drive, create a backup regimen.
Get them to install some virtualisation software - build a test model of a production service with the same software levels where you can test changes &c.
AND get them to document everything, coz when they go you will want them to hand it over to someone else as an easily maintained service. If it sticks, and they get enthused, then let them do some simple changes on the production services, and so on. If the only cost to you is to move some existing machine that isn't being used elsewhere, and all of the software is free as in beer, what harm could it do? Give them two machines each, get them to set up clustering, HA, PostGreSQL running in an active/active configuration
"basic network, Windows, Mac, Linux, and "cloud" first-level help desk support" is pretty wide and vague. Specifically, what kind of issues are they unable to address? First step would be to go over all the help desk tickets and see just what tickets come up most often that these employees need to be able to address. Then, start pinning down how to fix these issues under each OS, writing up comprehensive knowledge base articles as you go along. Use this as an opportunity to implement an actual knowledge base system, that can be used and expanded on by all your IT people.
My guess is tasks like updating network settings, adding printers, and troubleshooting permissions / domain credentials would be the major issues your helpdesk encounters. Make your knowledge base very specific, copy-n-paste type of instructions (especially if dealing with the command line). Utilize the fact that your Macs are somewhat POSIX compliant, so much of the training for Mac and Linux can be dual-use at least for "under the hood" items like I outlined.
You'll need some type of lab too, with machines that mimic your environment for them to train on. As for "the cloud", your vendor should be able to provide training for this. Since these people also know many other people in the org, leverage that as well. You should probably form a cross-sectional "advisory board" (borrowing from ITIL) that includes some users too to see what issues they commonly have that need to be addressed.
We had a not too similar situation when we decommissioned our old COBOL system. The developers were of more mature years (50+), but instead of just letting them go, they were moved into more of a BA role. They have a lot of domain knowledge built up from years of working on a monolithic system, it transferred quite well to doing business analysis and converting it into specs for devs on the new tech. They also had better people skills than green devs, which is rather important when trying to understand WTF the business wants or means
If you are a Journeyman in the field of IT, people don't train and update your knowledge, you do it for yourself. People who are good at this trade are also good at educating themselves and learning in general. People who aren't good at it might get a little better with training but they were probably not very good to begin with.
We'll make great pets
IT workers are "old" when they reach 30, not 40.
For whatever meaning of "IT workers" (see my comment below for more clarifications), this isn't applicable under highly-specialised conditions, where the more experience the better. I am 39 (although started programming a bit too late) myself, I am working under very demanding conditions and planning to continue doing it for many years. The older I become, the clearer are my ideas and the better and easier my work becomes.
When talking about programming/software/IT, low-specialisation or too-narrowly-delimited experience are starting to become a problem almost in any context. Although there seems to be a tendency towards easier environments, the reality is that everything is getting systematically more complex and being very knowledgeable/resourceful is starting to become a requirement almost anywhere. When problems appear, you want trustworthy people able to quickly and reliably fix them; to not mention that, ideally, you would prefer those errors not having been provoked in the first place, what is much more likely to occur when experienced people are around.
There are certainly quite a few privileged companies with good enough resources which are mostly interested in people using/applying what someone else did before. Those companies might afford relying on cheaper/younger labour force, but that attitude is likely to provoke long-term problems anyway. Experience will always be a very relevant asset in a field as complex and systematically evolving as IT, regardless of its exact meaning; at least, when talking about medium/high quality products and services.
Custom Solvers 2.0 = Alvaro Carballo Garcia = varocarbas.
"Old IT Workers". It is one more stereotype. There are weak "Young IT Workers" too.
For example, one may think that workers in advance age miss work due to illness more often than young workers. It is a stereotype too. The research shows the opposite.
It is due to such managers we have got cute baby-face puppets at about any office and counter who do not have a clue, who do not have any real life experience. And as a result the production goes away from Europe and the US.
I would start with the retraining course "Prejudice or discrimination on the grounds of a person's age" for this IT manager.
It sounds like they have loads of experience, but not practical skills for your current setup. Realistically if you were to train them to update their skills they would be just the same as any new (and potentially cheap) hire that you make - this isn't getting the best out of them.
No, what you want to do is take advantage of their experience. I'd be looking to shift their role, and only you can know what slots you have open, or where they may be able to contribute most. If they know everyone, then liasing between departments, IT and the users for example, may be good. They have probably got management skills which are under-utilised, and they will certainly be able to provide mentoring to new and inexperienced team members.
I'd start by talking your thinking through with them (individually) explaining the potential they have, and sounding out what they think they would like to do. You may find they have ideas which you haven't considered. If they want training up, then that is an option, but this is unlikely to be the best for the business.
You were hired to manage two guys who are on their way out. And you can't fire them.
Take that as a lesson in the organizational reality rather than your stated position.
You should consider that your position is not as secure as you think it is, and respond by turning these employees into niche superstars. Help them go out on their high note and you will give yourself a leg up.
They have internal cred. You are the new guy everyone 'above' is evaluating.
It's important to know that the administrative staff and others who hold goodwill toward these subordinates of yours could be your position's catapult, or it's anchor.
Old workers in mid/large companies have one incredibly useful superpower: They know people and their quirks, and they know processes better than SAP and process managers combined (especially how those processes really run, not just what's on paper) and more importantly, they know how to bypass them. They know how to cut the red tape and who to talk to to get on the fastpass for resources. They can sit down with some other old fart in another department, have a cup of coffee and get a "free" test machine for you, they know the people who know where hardware is being hoarded that isn't used (and can be put to good use). And so on.
We had one such "old guy" in our team. His knowledge was dated and we mostly needed him for the ancient servers that we just couldn't turn off yet but aside of that, he was incredibly valuable whenever we needed something and couldn't go the formal way (or when we didn't have the time to wait for official channels to clear). When he retired, we lost our main source for "free" hardware, quick access and useful "connections" to other departments. He was also very useful in deadlocked meetings where he could take someone he knew personally from another department aside, ask for the real reason why they're stalling (or give him the hint why we have to) and they could hash out an "informal" solution together that both sides can work with. Saved us literally weeks of pointless meetings.
Yes, such people are poison and bane for process managers, but they're a boon for your department, especially if you're drowning in bureaucracy.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Look, it's very unlikely that senior admin staff has not bothered following the evolution of the IT hardware of its own company. Because, how can you actually do your job if it does not happen?
Well I can see how this could happen: You only have that much time for self training. And either you use it to deepen your knowledge in an existing technology or learn technology hype of the day from scratch.
bickerdyke
Buy a Mac for each of these guys to use at home. Put the Linux distro you're using on the Mac in a VM. Task them with setting up the machine to run remotely on the corporate network under both OSs. They'll have fun learning, and will then be prepared to support others. The gift is also a nice way to reward them for their years of service.
If they couldn't be motivated professionally to learn Other-than-Windows distros which could have benefited them in their job, what the hell makes you think they're going to be motivated personally to learn it?
Sorry. No way in hell would I expend that kind of money and effort until I find out what the hell makes these codgers tick. I'd rather run a vulnerability scan across the network and prove to them that incompetence in maintaining every system properly will lead to disaster.
If they are close to retirement, the easiest and friendliest course might be to give them a buyout -- early retirement with a substantial bonus and a gold watch. Company politics may be against that, but you could make the case to management that they would be ahead over the next few years if they take this course, considering the new (and yes cheaper) talent that would replace them.
Fiat Lux.
He ... HE ... her ... she ... she was fired.
And your manager managed to get a sex-change in the middle of all that?
-> I dislike sigs...
I am at this age. There are skills in demand which I've not invested time and training in, and which it would take me years to become comfortable enough to contribute in any notable way. (.NET, anyone?) This is partly due to age: I'm not as adept at learning new skills with enthusiasm as I was decades ago. It's also partly due to a great deal of crystallized knowledge of other systems that have different structure, and requirements. So I don't take leadership on bringing in those newer technologies.
In the position of those staff, I'd appreciate your speaking to _me_, not just to Slashdot. Do they want to retrain? Does it excite them? If they're accustomed to "Adding Windows users" and other rote tasks, are they interested in learning PowerShell to automate their old tasks? If the company is large, can they learn PXE activation for Linux style deployments? With their experience, can they learn security or firewall management work?
I doubt the article is about a real company, but let's pretend it is.
So you have these two guys that don't know anything but Windows desktop support, and now you want to train them to be admins for Linux servers?
I call bullshit. What is going on here is that you have Windows server and domain admins that don't want to learn Linux, so they're trying to escape that duty by dumping it on the Desktop guys.
You claim to be a medium size company. Are these two guys clearing their calls and keeping busy for 40+ hours a week or are they sitting on their butts all day? You did not say, but If they're putting in over 40, then adding Linux server support to their jobs means you're being a jerk. The correct thing to do is hire an another admin to manage the servers, or more likely, you need to make your server admins do their jobs.
The two desktop guys do indeed need to be able to do OSX desktop support, and probably smartphone email integration. You'll have to buy them each a OSX box and a book to learn, practice and troubleshoot.
Server admin job is a different job than desktop support (except in small business). It is a different mindset for the most part, and it's not a good idea to mix the roles.
I work for a major defense contractor. I mean big.
We had a guy that was here long before I arrived. He worked with the top level management and was very well regarded.
He did not re-install windows. He did not program. He did not configure switches, routers, or firewalls. He did not build computers, install servers, or anything else.
So what good was he?
He knew everyone who could do these things.
He knew all the policies and procedures and work flows.
He knew how all of these disciplines interacted.
He knew the right way to set up infrastructure for the best supportability and growth.
He knew how to get priorities changed to get support to your project.
If you had an outage of any kind and had 100 people on the manufacturing floor idle, he was the one you called. He coordinated all the disciplines and made sure the problem got resolved.
But he was an old guy who didn't have current skills, so what the fuck use was he, eh?
Maybe this new IT manager should sit down with management and find out why these two have such goodwill. Then talk to them and find out what they really do.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
If you're going to be pedantic at least try to be pedantic about something that matters.
If you are pedantic about something that matters, doesn't that mean you're no longer pedantic? Pedant, by its (not it's) very definition focuses on minor, unimportant details. That's like saying "If you're going to be a jerk, can't you at least be nice?"