9 years ago
I worked for the directory arm of KCom. It was split into two departments. Telesales and production. The servers were installed by a third-party company in London somewhere, but in order to save a bit of cash on the support front, the production manager went on a short course on MS Back Office 4.5. It worked, she did a good job of it and it did save a bit of cash. Her and the sales manager weren't thrifty tight arses nor were they the sort that spent profits on unnecessary things (like the sort of thing you'll have read about in the Bosses QOTW). They had a good balance of it.

However, she was only concerned with the server stuff and making sure Access/Goldmine database was up and running on users' machines. Anything less severe such as printers not working, and probably any other desktop problem you could think of was solved by people getting together and fixing it themselves with the aid of the occasional search on the fledgling Google.

That was until I came along. I'm far from being an expert, but I knew a little bit about a lot of things and being officially the 'webmaster' for a portal that never really got off the ground, I became the unofficial 'computer guy'. Several times a day I got "SLVA, can you have a look at this?"

But it wasn't just technical faults, it was stuff like formatting a table in Word, or how to save a file attached to an email.

I didn't mind, the failing portal meant I had plenty of spare time on my hands. I didn't mind reading up on the client-side part of MS Exchange because I'm slightly nerdy (I once went round and changed the computer names from something generic to the name of Jupiter's moons and I was Ganymede. I don't think anybody noticed or cared).

Then I began to feel a bit exploited. People started asking advice on buying a computer, or bringing me a magazine and asking which would be the best printer to buy. The straw that broke the camel's back was when a supervisor turned up for work with her laptop and her scanner and asked if I could set it up for her. I told her just this once, but that's it, I'm too busy (a titanic lie) plus I might get into grief with the boss.

I sent an email telling everyone to stop taking the piss. It worked though.

The moral of the story, don't be the 'yeah sure, I'll take a look' IT guy.

Click if you've been exploited and abused in the workplace.
( sandettie light vessel automatic New Twitter - @bollocksreally, Thu 24 Sep 2009, 15:29, 8 replies)

I clicked
And I sympathise, because that's the situation I'm in now!
( Agnostic Antichrist Baltimora, Thu 24 Sep 2009, 15:49, closed)

I feel like this to an extent
In that I don't have the same range of skills as you, but I'm by far the most computer literate at my workplace. Whenever there's a stupid job which doesn't prompt the use of our external I.T consultant, I'm called upon. Anything from drawing up some lit, worksheets, even family trees for the boss. Then setting up computers, fixing problems on computers, moving computers around, anything at all related.

Fact is though, I'm a lazy bastard who spends too much time on B3ta, and is more often than not a few minutes late. I don't shave very often, and I'm caned rather a lot of the time. Having that role makes it a bit harder to fire me - no-one else is as intimately familiar with the workings of our computers.
( Rookie You'll have to speak up, I'm wearing a towel, Thu 24 Sep 2009, 16:04, closed)

you couldn't pop around and take a look, could you....?
Yep I've had my fill of this too. And my personal favourite are the ones (usually bosses) who want you to go round to their house in your time NOT the companies and fix their home PC, and look miffed when you tell them to go forth and multiply!
(Bob Blatt, Fri 25 Sep 2009, 0:14, closed)

Anybody working in IT
gets this a lot especially from friends and family. My standard response of "certainly, £300 for the first hour and £150 per hour afterwards, £200 fine if your problem takes me away from watching Star wars, and £500 stupidity tax if the problem is caused by yourself" gets the message through nicely.
(Obi wanker nobi Its not a bug, its an unexpected feature, Fri 25 Sep 2009, 14:47, closed)

I know nothing of IT or indeed astronomy
but I do know that in Classical mythology Ganymede was a little boy who was bummed by Zeus. The name is a byword in pederasty for a young boy being bummed by an older man.

Is there something you want to talk about?
( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Fri 25 Sep 2009, 11:17, closed)

It's also
Jupiter's largest moon.

So are you saying you're fat? Or the most influential of whoever Jupiter was supposed to be (though still utterly insubstantially)? You're surrounded by a thin layer of Oxygen and Ozone?

Ganymede sucks anyway. Titan FTW!
( uberdeity Wondered why Owen Lars knew of the term "hell" on, Sun 27 Sep 2009, 0:44, closed)

Hmm...
Not at work (IT support means few questions from others) but friends/family are quite bad, especially when my mother failed to grasp that when I was running my own business, doing endless favours for her friends wasn't a great way of earning a living ("You'll make excellent contacts" is such a load of shit). Worst case was my parents' dog-sitter's friend's friend. I told them that I was busy and requested no further 'help' from my mother.
(johnson, Sat 26 Sep 2009, 15:55, closed)

Happens all the time
But since I work at an AA Rosette bar/retaurant, being paid in hot meals and beer is more than adequate payment. The last job I did netted £20 worth of food and booze for swapping out some RAM (and a five minute tune-up for good measure).
( Doctor Fruitbat wishes fruitbats could really be doctors, Mon 28 Sep 2009, 0:14, closed)