About 6 years ago I had a friend in your same situation. He took the IT support job at a local RV manufacturer. After his first couple of weeks he got his first call to go repair a workstation where he found the normal "not related in any way to work" software, virus, excessive disk useage, personal hardware etc. Not having any policy against piracy or abusing work internet priveledges he reported the problem to his superiors. He was told to investigate every workstation and report who had what and for how long. He made up a nice memo, gave it to his superiors, and it was used as a document to fire him. He was hired to prevent these specific problems and "allowed them to continue on for the entire duration of his employment". Take whatever response you got from your boss, write it down if he didn't, and quote that in your letter of resignation. I'm sure you can find employment at a better company. If the company can't afford to buy software, sooner or later they won't be able to pay the payroll.
--MikeW
"Don't tread water next to a sinking ship, it eventually goes down"
I feel sorrow for the families and friends who lost loved ones. I'm sure the loss is unexpected, untimely, and unjust.
I blame the touchy feely "give me a hug" society for this event. Unfortunately people are to used to statements like "things will get better", "don't worry you'll recover", and "look forward to tomorrow, and not this moment". Some people always expect a "pick me up" when they are down. Our American society needs to be more emotionally hard. Not everything will be better. Some things won't change, and tomorrow just might suck worse than right now. We need to grow up and be a little more rugged like our grandparents were. This didn't happen at all until we traded an ass whoopin' for a hug and an emotional time out. Teach your kids to "stop crying and get tough" and prevent this shit from happening in the future.
Mike Wilson
P.S. And for Christ's sake, don't try to blame this bullshit on any video games or the kid drinking to much soda or eating too many candies.
Having had the opportunity to sit on both sides of the desk, let me voice my personal opinion. I can honestly say that showing someone areas to improve in will build trust, growth, and interest in your company. If "Jenny Sue" came to the team interview and performed horribly, but was really positive, give her reasons to try again. Don't say you'll call them back. If you tell the person "We are not interested", you push them away with a negative attitude and who knows what kind of negative web publicity they can provide your company. If you tell the prospective employee "This is a suggestion for improving on..." or even "Your might want to learn more about...", you build interest from the prospective employee. Tell them to work on those areas and improve their knowledge and skills and you want them to come back in a month or so. If the person is interested they will come back with more knowledge. I had to learn more for my last 3 jobs. Each time with more knowledge and a positive attitude.
This is a way to have this person start building their work skills and knowledge to your work enviroment without paying to train them. From there selection for hire becomes a process of where to fit them in with minimal training on how to work within your company. What is better than having a positive person come in to your company knowing they progressed to your standards, eager to be a team member. The result is a bad interview turned into a good future employee, with room for growth.
--MikeW
I work in a small IT department as well, and the business is profitable. If you
are sincere about saving dollars, it is important to look at consumables
within the office. If you have employees taking home pens everyday, it can end
up being $5 or $10 everyday just to replace pens. Watch employee use of the
network printers. Those lazer jet cartridges and paper are costly, try using a
network database to transfer info rather than using a printout which will
be thrown away five minutes after it has been read. Watch the use of post-it
notes, start using instant messanging or more email within the office.
Encourage staff members to download and burn CD's at home instead of at the
office. CD's do become costly when Joe is burning 4 or 5 CD's each day. Watch
the bogus spending. Trips to the local wharehouse store for restroom supplies
will also save money. Paying an employee for 2 hours of time is cheaper then
spending $40 or $50 in shipping.
Save on utilities. Don't allow employees to leave their workstations
workstations powered on while they are at home. Don't allow excessive
personal calls from work, even more so if the people commute and make long
distance calls to find out what their girlfriend/boyfrind/spouse is going
to watch on tv. Turn off restroom lights when no one is in there. Don't
leave area lighting on when no one is in the area or when no one will work
in the area.
Require some accountability. Make certain members of your staff accountable
for specific areas of work. Make 1 guy responsible for monitoring the first
floors use of network resources, and another responsible for any repairs. Make
another guy responsible for network connectivity, etc. Dedicate one person
to answering IT calls, and others for repair work. Do not allow the IT staff
to have 8 people sitting at desks waiting for calls, when 1 or 2 calls come in
each hour. Make staff members work. Staff members can move on to house chores.
It is a business, not a staffhouse. If IT staff members have time, make them
help with other chores of the house. They can empty thier own wastebaskets
into a larger bin or into a dumpster. There is no need to pay a maid service
or janitorial service to empty wastebaskets. Other duties as assigned does
not mean sit on your ass. If the staff is small enough, they will just have
to understand. You do not want to pay a programmer $25 each hour to empty
a stupid wastebasket. Likewise you do not want to pay him $25 each hour to
sit on his or her ass. Send unused employees home. If they are not going to
be benificial, don't have the employee here.
Remember that having employees is to help the company. If your employees are
willing to help save company resources, it will become possible to reward
employees. Since cutting all the over spending, and setting all the wasted
minimal things like these, our company has handed out raises. Being one of the
employees that has been pushed towards a more digital office, I have been
rewarded with raises, Winter Holiday Bonuses, vacation time, and a new
workstation. All employees in our company experienced this increase in
salary and work livability since these little cuts were made.
Being at the bottom end looking up, it sucked asshole. I was in dire fear of
a layoff which I had faced before. After a few months I realised how much was
instantly being saved. A few months after being trained in the new staff ways,
the previously misused resources were re-established as wages. The raises were
great. We were able to obtain raises without asking based on the fact the
company use of money was no longer being wasted. Unfortunately the companies
must always look at for overall profit and the purpose of being in business.
I'm going to contradict the wage increase. I haven't seen a wage increase in almost 2 years. I won't complain. How many of you actually enjoy going to work? I look forward to my daily experience dealing with the joys of being a programmer, support tech, etc.
We'd all like to see a raise, but be real. The average wage going up does not mean you like the job. Choose happiness at work before the extra nickel.
If you have enough skill to mow a lawn, due that on Saturdays. I paid a kid $10/cut to push a lawn mower around 500 square feet. In my spare time, I work on motorcycles, weld, fix car bodies (not bondo), repair small electronics and appliances, make tamales, everything except deal with computers.
Your side jobs will be limited entirely by your skill. If all you can do is use a computer, then your kind of screwed unless you can do some web sites, small networks, custom programming or pc repairs.
Your side jobs will also be controlled by "conflict of interest" with whats go on for work. If you build web sites for a living and build one outside of work, then that would be just cause for terminating you if your employer finds out.
InfusionX
I understand the need for a cabinet and not wanting to spend a $1,000US for something that looks nice. Buy yourself an inexpensive cabinet from Wal Mart(under $100US). Then add a few metal rails (angle iron from an old bed frame), and drill the holes to fit your need. You can buy a tap and a few screw under $10US. You can get away with a project like this for around $200 and some time. You might even be able to teach the family how to drill and tap holes too!
My Commodore 16 casette tape is the best, storage and you will never get anything bigger! That was many youthful moons ago. Now I'm looking at purchasing five 200gb drives to end up with a 1Tb disk array. Yeah, and that is just as Joe Homeuser with a 1Tb array. Who ever though a homeuser could end up with a Terrabyte of storage 10 years ago? --mikew
If you can handle an admin job and know the position, then get the job and do the work. Only do that what you can honestly handle. Make sure the company you work for will work with you on a school schedule, and get your education as you work. It might be time consuming, but 5 or 6 years down the line you'll have a degree with experience to match. You'll look great on paper (as sick as that might sound).
Slashdot Mirror
--MikeW
"Don't tread water next to a sinking ship, it eventually goes down"
I feel sorrow for the families and friends who lost loved ones. I'm sure the loss is unexpected, untimely, and unjust.
I blame the touchy feely "give me a hug" society for this event. Unfortunately people are to used to statements like "things will get better", "don't worry you'll recover", and "look forward to tomorrow, and not this moment". Some people always expect a "pick me up" when they are down. Our American society needs to be more emotionally hard. Not everything will be better. Some things won't change, and tomorrow just might suck worse than right now. We need to grow up and be a little more rugged like our grandparents were. This didn't happen at all until we traded an ass whoopin' for a hug and an emotional time out. Teach your kids to "stop crying and get tough" and prevent this shit from happening in the future.
Mike Wilson
P.S. And for Christ's sake, don't try to blame this bullshit on any video games or the kid drinking to much soda or eating too many candies.
Having had the opportunity to sit on both sides of the desk, let me voice my personal opinion. I can honestly say that showing someone areas to improve in will build trust, growth, and interest in your company. If "Jenny Sue" came to the team interview and performed horribly, but was really positive, give her reasons to try again. Don't say you'll call them back. If you tell the person "We are not interested", you push them away with a negative attitude and who knows what kind of negative web publicity they can provide your company. If you tell the prospective employee "This is a suggestion for improving on ..." or even "Your might want to learn more about ...", you build interest from the prospective employee. Tell them to work on those areas and improve their knowledge and skills and you want them to come back in a month or so. If the person is interested they will come back with more knowledge. I had to learn more for my last 3 jobs. Each time with more knowledge and a positive attitude.
This is a way to have this person start building their work skills and knowledge to your work enviroment without paying to train them. From there selection for hire becomes a process of where to fit them in with minimal training on how to work within your company. What is better than having a positive person come in to your company knowing they progressed to your standards, eager to be a team member. The result is a bad interview turned into a good future employee, with room for growth.
--MikeW
I work in a small IT department as well, and the business is profitable. If you are sincere about saving dollars, it is important to look at consumables within the office. If you have employees taking home pens everyday, it can end up being $5 or $10 everyday just to replace pens. Watch employee use of the network printers. Those lazer jet cartridges and paper are costly, try using a network database to transfer info rather than using a printout which will be thrown away five minutes after it has been read. Watch the use of post-it notes, start using instant messanging or more email within the office. Encourage staff members to download and burn CD's at home instead of at the office. CD's do become costly when Joe is burning 4 or 5 CD's each day. Watch the bogus spending. Trips to the local wharehouse store for restroom supplies will also save money. Paying an employee for 2 hours of time is cheaper then spending $40 or $50 in shipping. Save on utilities. Don't allow employees to leave their workstations workstations powered on while they are at home. Don't allow excessive personal calls from work, even more so if the people commute and make long distance calls to find out what their girlfriend/boyfrind/spouse is going to watch on tv. Turn off restroom lights when no one is in there. Don't leave area lighting on when no one is in the area or when no one will work in the area. Require some accountability. Make certain members of your staff accountable for specific areas of work. Make 1 guy responsible for monitoring the first floors use of network resources, and another responsible for any repairs. Make another guy responsible for network connectivity, etc. Dedicate one person to answering IT calls, and others for repair work. Do not allow the IT staff to have 8 people sitting at desks waiting for calls, when 1 or 2 calls come in each hour. Make staff members work. Staff members can move on to house chores. It is a business, not a staffhouse. If IT staff members have time, make them help with other chores of the house. They can empty thier own wastebaskets into a larger bin or into a dumpster. There is no need to pay a maid service or janitorial service to empty wastebaskets. Other duties as assigned does not mean sit on your ass. If the staff is small enough, they will just have to understand. You do not want to pay a programmer $25 each hour to empty a stupid wastebasket. Likewise you do not want to pay him $25 each hour to sit on his or her ass. Send unused employees home. If they are not going to be benificial, don't have the employee here. Remember that having employees is to help the company. If your employees are willing to help save company resources, it will become possible to reward employees. Since cutting all the over spending, and setting all the wasted minimal things like these, our company has handed out raises. Being one of the employees that has been pushed towards a more digital office, I have been rewarded with raises, Winter Holiday Bonuses, vacation time, and a new workstation. All employees in our company experienced this increase in salary and work livability since these little cuts were made. Being at the bottom end looking up, it sucked asshole. I was in dire fear of a layoff which I had faced before. After a few months I realised how much was instantly being saved. A few months after being trained in the new staff ways, the previously misused resources were re-established as wages. The raises were great. We were able to obtain raises without asking based on the fact the company use of money was no longer being wasted. Unfortunately the companies must always look at for overall profit and the purpose of being in business.
I'm going to contradict the wage increase. I haven't seen a wage increase in almost 2 years. I won't complain. How many of you actually enjoy going to work? I look forward to my daily experience dealing with the joys of being a programmer, support tech, etc. We'd all like to see a raise, but be real. The average wage going up does not mean you like the job. Choose happiness at work before the extra nickel.
If you have enough skill to mow a lawn, due that on Saturdays. I paid a kid $10/cut to push a lawn mower around 500 square feet. In my spare time, I work on motorcycles, weld, fix car bodies (not bondo), repair small electronics and appliances, make tamales, everything except deal with computers. Your side jobs will be limited entirely by your skill. If all you can do is use a computer, then your kind of screwed unless you can do some web sites, small networks, custom programming or pc repairs. Your side jobs will also be controlled by "conflict of interest" with whats go on for work. If you build web sites for a living and build one outside of work, then that would be just cause for terminating you if your employer finds out. InfusionX
I understand the need for a cabinet and not wanting to spend a $1,000US for something that looks nice. Buy yourself an inexpensive cabinet from Wal Mart(under $100US). Then add a few metal rails (angle iron from an old bed frame), and drill the holes to fit your need. You can buy a tap and a few screw under $10US. You can get away with a project like this for around $200 and some time. You might even be able to teach the family how to drill and tap holes too!
My Commodore 16 casette tape is the best, storage and you will never get anything bigger! That was many youthful moons ago. Now I'm looking at purchasing five 200gb drives to end up with a 1Tb disk array. Yeah, and that is just as Joe Homeuser with a 1Tb array. Who ever though a homeuser could end up with a Terrabyte of storage 10 years ago? --mikew
If you can handle an admin job and know the position, then get the job and do the work. Only do that what you can honestly handle. Make sure the company you work for will work with you on a school schedule, and get your education as you work. It might be time consuming, but 5 or 6 years down the line you'll have a degree with experience to match. You'll look great on paper (as sick as that might sound).