So if you've been alive in the last few months, you've probably heard of Facebook. It's the social networking website that is taking over the world. Hopefully, their server can keep up with the demand.
One thing available on Facebook is games. Now, you play these games and as you progress (depending on the game), it will ask you to post your status in the game. Some games even require social interactions from your friends to continue playing. This is all very well and good, people have fun with the games, and it serves to bring people closer together and on Facebook longer.
However, there are times when you probably shouldn't be playing games. One of these times is while you are at work. Now, I'm good with checking your status occasionally. That's not a big deal. But games at work... That's at work on the clock as opposed to on lunch or break or something. How, you ask, do I know someone does this? Well, obviously it goes on, but in the case of one person, I saw several game updates crop up while was supposed to theoretically be working.
Call me strange, but that doesn't strike me as the brightest thing to do. If you play, at least keep it to yourself. Don't advertise.
Friday, November 20, 2009
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Perceived Insignificance
Every job is a self-portrait of the person who does it. Autograph your work with excellence.
I got a land yacht car from my brother-in-law to drive to work, and in the back seat was a book called God's Little Devotional Book For Men. After I disposed of the cover, which was in poor shape from sitting on the floor of the back seat for three years. One window didn't close completely creating a heck of a humid environment, though the book itself never got wet. But I digress... What I wrote above is a quote I read in there this morning, and personally, I try to do the jobs I do as well as I can because I know the result reflects on me.
Not everyone feels this way, however. No where is this more apparent than in the service tickets that people create to send to this other department. As I indicated in a previous post, people get away with stuff because they can, and I'll grant that this other department's requirements are more than just a little over the top. Yet, we have to follow them, and since people don't, I get to do something called gatekeeping to make sure they do.
What is interesting is what you can perceive about people through these little virtual items that pass by me in droves every day. People tend to create their tickets the same way and have the same types of information every single time. For any given person, you can tell whether they take the requirements seriously, have any respect for the other department, understand their job, or sincerely want to do their best every time. There are people whose name I like to see come up, and others whose tickets I dread opening because I know what I'm going to find.
These people boil down to three basic categories. The best one is those who follow instructions and do a great job in ensuring that these tickets have sufficient information to not only complete the job at hand, but give sufficient understanding to anyone looking at the ticket. By looking the ticket over, I know what the problem is, what the customer wants, and even what needs to be done to fix it (if only I knew the first thing about how they do their job to fix it). These are works of art, and you can tell the people making them respect either the people receiving the tickets, or have at least been threatened to the point that they understand and respect their jobs. These reflect well on them.
At the other end of the spectrum are the ones who either can't or don't want to follow the simple list of instructions for these tickets. Something is always missing, and when you bring it up, they get ugly stating that the other department will accept the ticket without this. This attitude of theirs led me to correcting these tickets myself in most cases, since the information was actually contained in the ticket; it was just in the wrong place. They couldn't be bothered to even move a piece of info from point A to point B. Clearly, they despise the other department's requirements, have a disdain for having to make these tickets to their specifications, or just don't understand why they need to do what they need to do. It's usually the same people too.
In the middle are actually the most irritating of the bunch. You see, while you have a leg to stand on in requesting more information from the rule-breakers, this next lot gives you enough to fit the bill, but not enough to understand the problem unless you "know" enough about the background processes. Trouble is they do include the information that is required on the list of instructions, so as much as you might want to send it back for more clear information, you can't because they followed the rules to the bare minimum letter. They know exactly how much it takes to get by, and they do no more than that. Their regular tickets that only have no requirements are nightmares to decipher. When I get one that I have to actually fix in my real non-gatekeeping job, it usually takes me twice as long since I have to decipher what the problem is before I can even begin. By contrast, I can usually solve tickets from the first category without any information gathering because of their completeness.
So, if I ever become a manager, having had the insight I'm getting from this gatekeeping process, which group do you think I'd want on my team?
I got a land yacht car from my brother-in-law to drive to work, and in the back seat was a book called God's Little Devotional Book For Men. After I disposed of the cover, which was in poor shape from sitting on the floor of the back seat for three years. One window didn't close completely creating a heck of a humid environment, though the book itself never got wet. But I digress... What I wrote above is a quote I read in there this morning, and personally, I try to do the jobs I do as well as I can because I know the result reflects on me.
Not everyone feels this way, however. No where is this more apparent than in the service tickets that people create to send to this other department. As I indicated in a previous post, people get away with stuff because they can, and I'll grant that this other department's requirements are more than just a little over the top. Yet, we have to follow them, and since people don't, I get to do something called gatekeeping to make sure they do.
What is interesting is what you can perceive about people through these little virtual items that pass by me in droves every day. People tend to create their tickets the same way and have the same types of information every single time. For any given person, you can tell whether they take the requirements seriously, have any respect for the other department, understand their job, or sincerely want to do their best every time. There are people whose name I like to see come up, and others whose tickets I dread opening because I know what I'm going to find.
These people boil down to three basic categories. The best one is those who follow instructions and do a great job in ensuring that these tickets have sufficient information to not only complete the job at hand, but give sufficient understanding to anyone looking at the ticket. By looking the ticket over, I know what the problem is, what the customer wants, and even what needs to be done to fix it (if only I knew the first thing about how they do their job to fix it). These are works of art, and you can tell the people making them respect either the people receiving the tickets, or have at least been threatened to the point that they understand and respect their jobs. These reflect well on them.
At the other end of the spectrum are the ones who either can't or don't want to follow the simple list of instructions for these tickets. Something is always missing, and when you bring it up, they get ugly stating that the other department will accept the ticket without this. This attitude of theirs led me to correcting these tickets myself in most cases, since the information was actually contained in the ticket; it was just in the wrong place. They couldn't be bothered to even move a piece of info from point A to point B. Clearly, they despise the other department's requirements, have a disdain for having to make these tickets to their specifications, or just don't understand why they need to do what they need to do. It's usually the same people too.
In the middle are actually the most irritating of the bunch. You see, while you have a leg to stand on in requesting more information from the rule-breakers, this next lot gives you enough to fit the bill, but not enough to understand the problem unless you "know" enough about the background processes. Trouble is they do include the information that is required on the list of instructions, so as much as you might want to send it back for more clear information, you can't because they followed the rules to the bare minimum letter. They know exactly how much it takes to get by, and they do no more than that. Their regular tickets that only have no requirements are nightmares to decipher. When I get one that I have to actually fix in my real non-gatekeeping job, it usually takes me twice as long since I have to decipher what the problem is before I can even begin. By contrast, I can usually solve tickets from the first category without any information gathering because of their completeness.
So, if I ever become a manager, having had the insight I'm getting from this gatekeeping process, which group do you think I'd want on my team?
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
I Didn't Know You Used ALL the Programs on this Machine
This was pretty amusing when Optimus Prime told me about it. I just had to post it to share with all of you wonderful person that reads this blog.
So this IT guy at this hospital decided to take the CPU that Our Software was installed on, back up what he thought he needed to back up, re-format it and then pop a new machine in its place for the end user, who had no idea this was going on. I mean, why check with the actual user of the computer before switching it and completely repurposing the old machine? She got into work the next day and found that Our Software wasn’t there at all. The IT guy came out and tried to re-install it, but part of it won’t work now primarily because he didn’t know how the program worked so he didn’t know that a) it needed to be saved and b) what part of it he needed to save. What did they do next? Call us to fix it. Oh, and it needs to be done NOW.
So, naturally, we did what we could with this, but really, it wasn't going to work without a reinstallation. And since this program is fairly customized from place to place, he'd better hope that he backed up the right parts of the software or we're talking a cost to the tune of no less then $500 depending on how customized it was and how much time it will take to get it going again. But hey, he was proactive in keeping the end user on an brand new, updated computer.
Now, this was an older product, and I think Prime talked the end user into exploring the newer version of it since they were going to have to pay anyway. That newer version is much easier to maintain for them and us.
This whole scenario is akin to you changing out my car while I’m sleeping and putting a new one in its place. The new car is great and all, but you didn’t move the locks over and you don’t have a new key to give me because you threw those out thinking they weren’t needed anymore. To top it off, I can’t even have my old car back because you sent it to the scrap yard and now it’s a big square paperweight. Let’s call Ford. I’m sure they can fix this.
Monday, November 16, 2009
Because They Can
As I stood on the eighteenth floor of the building I work in looking down on the world, I saw a FedEx van pull up in front of the gas station across the street. He didn't park in a designated parking space, though. Instead, he parked longwise across three spaces. I knew immediately that this guy was there for a delivery, as opposed to just stopping to get a Coke. I knew this because delivery trucks often park illegally to make a delivery because "they'll just be there for a second." Trouble with this picture is that it's a convenience store. Everyone is "just there for a second." Why do they park this way? Because they can. It's how they operate and we know this.
It got me to thinking about how a lot of people live their lives. How many times do people break rules because they can? Now, the rules are not always hard and fast laws such as the parking scenario. On a screenwriting board I'm a part of, someone asked about a writing convention we refer to as "we see." They asked if it's okay to write like this. Of course, you're welcome to write however you think will tell the story, but I responded saying that "we see" is generally a lazy way to write a screenplay because there are better ways to write whatever you're trying to write. This led to the overblown discussion of how other people do it, professional scripts, competition winners, yadda-yadda-yadda. It's a frustrating discussion to read, and I'll spare you the headache. My point was simply that despite what other people do, that doesn't mean it's the best way to write it.
Another situation is at work. I get to review these service tickets to make sure they're correct before sending them to another department. Two reasons: that department is just that picky and a lot of people don't want to follow the requirements if the other department will just take them. It's the latter part of that statement that I deal with more than anything else. I commented once that someone left out a required piece of information, and I immediately got a remark that the other department will take it without that info. This may be true, but it didn't change that the information is required according to the guidelines. Just another instance of someone trying to do less than they should because they can.
Yet another instance is the off hours at church. I've been to a couple outside of service hours, and what usually goes on is people park in the handicap spaces. Am I aware that no handicapped people are likely to show up and need the space? Of course. But there is a law that gives requirements for parking in handicap spaces, and from a Christian standpoint, we're obligated to follow the laws of the lands so long as they don't violate God's laws. There is a parking lot full of spaces. Why break the law? What is that saying? You don't want to walk a dozen more steps?
I strive fairly often to be the best I can be at whatever I do. This involves often going beyond the requirements, but I always start by meeting the requirements, following the rules, or doing what is right according to established guidelines. All of these examples are very, very minor things. And yet, in each of these examples someone is being less than their potential best in favor of making things a bit easier for them. But what would it hurt to start with that extra step? Park the FedEx truck correctly and leave the spaces open. Alter the "we see" descriptions to something else. Follow the ticket guidelines. Park in a non-handicap space if you don't meet the guidelines. I do all of these. It doesn't hurt me at all.
What part of you does this boil down to? Character. Character is defined by what you do when you're alone. If Jesus were looking over your shoulder every minute of every day, would you do what you're doing now? Oh wait. He is.
It got me to thinking about how a lot of people live their lives. How many times do people break rules because they can? Now, the rules are not always hard and fast laws such as the parking scenario. On a screenwriting board I'm a part of, someone asked about a writing convention we refer to as "we see." They asked if it's okay to write like this. Of course, you're welcome to write however you think will tell the story, but I responded saying that "we see" is generally a lazy way to write a screenplay because there are better ways to write whatever you're trying to write. This led to the overblown discussion of how other people do it, professional scripts, competition winners, yadda-yadda-yadda. It's a frustrating discussion to read, and I'll spare you the headache. My point was simply that despite what other people do, that doesn't mean it's the best way to write it.
Another situation is at work. I get to review these service tickets to make sure they're correct before sending them to another department. Two reasons: that department is just that picky and a lot of people don't want to follow the requirements if the other department will just take them. It's the latter part of that statement that I deal with more than anything else. I commented once that someone left out a required piece of information, and I immediately got a remark that the other department will take it without that info. This may be true, but it didn't change that the information is required according to the guidelines. Just another instance of someone trying to do less than they should because they can.
Yet another instance is the off hours at church. I've been to a couple outside of service hours, and what usually goes on is people park in the handicap spaces. Am I aware that no handicapped people are likely to show up and need the space? Of course. But there is a law that gives requirements for parking in handicap spaces, and from a Christian standpoint, we're obligated to follow the laws of the lands so long as they don't violate God's laws. There is a parking lot full of spaces. Why break the law? What is that saying? You don't want to walk a dozen more steps?
I strive fairly often to be the best I can be at whatever I do. This involves often going beyond the requirements, but I always start by meeting the requirements, following the rules, or doing what is right according to established guidelines. All of these examples are very, very minor things. And yet, in each of these examples someone is being less than their potential best in favor of making things a bit easier for them. But what would it hurt to start with that extra step? Park the FedEx truck correctly and leave the spaces open. Alter the "we see" descriptions to something else. Follow the ticket guidelines. Park in a non-handicap space if you don't meet the guidelines. I do all of these. It doesn't hurt me at all.
What part of you does this boil down to? Character. Character is defined by what you do when you're alone. If Jesus were looking over your shoulder every minute of every day, would you do what you're doing now? Oh wait. He is.
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