Re: Confession of IT nightmare employee
- From: Brian <Brian@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 7 Oct 2008 06:03:01 -0700
Al,
Thank you for the support. I think you said what I was trying to say much
more eloquently than I ever could have.
Brian
--
MCSE 2003
"Al Dunbar" wrote:
I find this thread somewhat amusing, in that it reflects numerous common.
misperceptions about what "the IT department" is all about - or should be
all about.
First, I think it will be in your best interest to take Brian's warnings to
heart. Regardless of the (apparently) bad attitude of your IT department,
two wrongs don't make a right, and your "wrong" *is* of the nature of
something with potentially serious disciplinary ramifications for you. His
suggestion that you come clean to management may be the best approach in
protecting your position.
Now, I said "apparently" in the above because, well, we have so far heard
only your description of the details. Not knowing the complete facts I won't
attempt to defend your particular IT department, but I should point out that
the way they *should* operate is in the interest of the employer. That
doesn't mean they need to jump whenever a user has a problem - if they did,
they would likely be up in the air all of the time and therefore unable to
accomplish anything.
One thing some IT departments get wrong is the attitude the "IT rules" are
their rules. They are not, they are the rules of the company. Likely they
were developed with input from those with expertise in the IT area (this is,
indeed, one of the raisons d'etre for the IT department), but they do not
become "the rules" on that basis alone without senior management
ratification.
There are reasons for rules. Unfortunately these are often not well
explained by IT, or well understood by the users. That is one reason they
are put into the form of rules, as, without rules, users (and even the users
in the IT department) are likely to make serious errors of judgment without
realizing what they are doing.
For a simple analogy, think of first aid: by following the "rules" you can
help prevent things like infections without ever understanding it as deeply
as those involved in medical research. Would you want medical researchers
running around explaining things to you, or would you rather take their
rules at face value and follow them?
Let's forget rules for a moment, though, and think about process. Like any
other department, IT must be accountable to management for their operations.
Their responsibility includes helping promulgate the rules, and sometimes
monitoring for compliance. And it also means providing user assistance as
appropriate, and according to service guidelines. Interestingly enough,
there can often be a perception that these are two opposites; a yin/yang
kind of thing needing balance to work proprely. When they do not meet these
requirements, there should be a system in place to point out the problem and
get a resolution.
If there is no such set of procedures in your organization, that is NOT the
fault of IT, but of senior management.
As to your refusing to be bullied anymore, I'm all for your standing up for
your rights in the workplace and expecting to be treated respectfully. But
taking the law (I mean the rules) into your own hands may not be to your
best advantage. You might get farther by finding a way to negotiate with IT
(hey, we are all human, after all), and lay a charge of some sort if that
doesn't get you anywhere.
/Al
===
"cinnamngrl" <cinnamngrl@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:619745bd-a2ea-40df-9764-223daacdd0e5@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
you pretty much said (as I interpret it), "I'm a case
manager and I work 47+ hours a week, and IT needs to do every thing I
ask it
to do. I don't care how much education/experience you have, you are
here to
serve me!"
This isn't even close to what I was saying. What I did say is that my
job is helping people, IT's job is helping people. it is tough for
everyone, get over it. I feel sorry if you have to label yourself a
servant. I chose my job, easy or tough I don't waste energy judging
the recipient worthy of my help or feeling sorry for myself. The
ebay thing is not a characterization, it is something that
happened. My office manager is a colleague. I don't work for her,
she doesn't work for me. I am not forced to go through her, except
that they just ignore anyone else. I don't think of myself as
superior, it just seems that way because I use spellcheck.
I think that people that make threats to cover for their faults. I
don't presume to know how it will work out, but i refuse to bullied
anymore.
On Oct 6, 9:39 pm, Brian <Br...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I think you missed the point of my message.
1. The reason things don't uninstall properly is the ID you are attempting
to use was not given those rights.
2. If you are unable to contact IT directly then you need to have your
union contract changed so you can contact them. Having a manager who is
unwilling to deal with IT because they are afraid of them just isn't a
tenable situation long term. This of course begs the question of why
people
are afraid of the IT group. IT exists to help people and serve the goals
of
the business or agency, clearly the IT group in your agency isn't doing
this
which is regretable as it gives all IT people a bad name.
3. Just because you are authorized to use the software/device doesn't give
you the right to install/uninstall it regarless of why you had to do it.
Again we return to the issue of your being unable to deal with IT
directly.
4. A typical response to working in an environment where IT views itself
as
superior to others and is unhelpful. By the same token your superior
attitude has the same effect on IT. I've worked in a multitude of IT
environments from ones where IT was appreciated to ones where IT was the
enemy (and everything in between). I can certainly tell you in the ones
where IT was viewed as the enemy there was plenty of blame to go around.
In
a simple paragraph you pretty much said (as I interpret it), "I'm a case
manager and I work 47+ hours a week, and IT needs to do every thing I ask
it
to do. I don't care how much education/experience you have, you are here
to
serve me!" Do you know how it feels to be an person who has worked 60+
hours
straight repairing an issue created by a user who thought they knew what
they
were doing? I sure do. And guess what, after 8 hours of sleep I was back
at
work the next morning. My guess is your union contract ensures overtime
for
those extra 7 hours a week you work, most IT people have no idea what
overtime pay is.
As to being in a union and your accumulated hours of employment. I worked
for a state agency for almost a decade. I can assure you that an IT
offence
such as the one you've commited would have had no civil service protection
for any state employee in my state. Check your union contract and I'm sure
you'll find you are in the same boat; no protection for knowingly
commiting
an IT security breach (which is the formal deffinition of what you've
done).
Your message shows a clear amount of hostility towards IT, but it seems
justifiable. However, we in IT face the same challenges as all others in
business and government service: limited budgets, limited resources,
limited
time. If your manager is unable/unwilling to interact with IT because she
is
afraid of them then these are issues which she needs to take up with her
supervisor so her team can receive the support from IT they deserve. Also
characterizing the IT people as crooks and thieves ("can't reinstall the
software because they sold the disks on Ebay") is extremely unfair.
My message to you was not intended to be judgemental though I can
certainly
understand why you percieved it that way. It was however probably the only
response you'll get on a board like this. The people you are asking for
help
in doing something quite likely against company/agency policy (and
possibly
even illegal) are the same people who are tasked with ensuring such
activities don't occur. As to not answering your questions I did in fact
answer them to extent I felt I could. Your first question was, "Why does
this password work in the script, but not for logon?". To which I
answered,
"it is possible to have an account which is an administrator, but which
does
not have rights to logon". Your second question was, "Also if I try to use
it in the command window (cmd.exe--runas /profile...) the
key board won't even type the password. Why?" I didn't answer this
question as the behavior of the runas command is well documented on
Technet
and on other sites. In the interests of being helpful however I will
indicate this is the intended behavior.
While I think your heart was in the right place and your motives pure; it
doesn't matter why you did what you did, it was wrong plain and simple. I
doubt you'll find an IT person anywhere who will support what you've done
as
being justified. While as I've indicated I do understand why you felt you
had to do it, I can't support it. My original suggestions stand on what I
feel your course of action needs to be, but in place of contacting IT to
determine why they didn't respond you need to talk with your supervisor
and
have her unstand your needs, since she is the required communication
channel.
At the very least you need to come clean to your supervisor so she can
support/protect you should she agree with you that your actions were
justified.
Good luck.
Brian
"cinnamngrl" wrote:
1. nothing fully uninstalls, which seems to be a big part of the
problem
2. I can't call IT, my office manager has to call them, and she is
afraid of them.
3. I am authorized to use Palm software. I asked for help when it
stopped working and that was over 8 months ago, I mentioned this to
the office manager but she is afraid to call them.
4. I am tired of being bullied by people that are so insecure about
their own qualifications that they attack the people they were hired
to help. I am using my palm in my job as a case manager, not
installing games or porn. I know what it is like to spend 47 hours a
week helping people that don't appreciate it so they can just get over
it. I certainly can understand why people might be upset, but I have
a union, hundreds of hours of accumulated time, and I am very tired of
being treated like dirt by people that can't reinstall software
because they sold the disks on ebay.
I am sure that you are a very important person, Brian. I can
certainly understand if you don't feel comfortable answering my
questions. I am amazed that you would take time out your busy vital
work to judge me.
On Oct 6, 12:00 pm, Brian <Br...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Well there are a lot of issues going on that I see. First, you hacked
your
work desktop to install a piece of software. Yup, you hacked it, you
may not
think so but my guess is your IT department would not agree with that
view.
Second, you then admit you hacked your work computer on a public
forum.
Third, the IT unit didn't clean up after themselves and left scripts
on your
system which you then exploited.
The fact that you have tried to logon using the username/password
combination provided in the script shows you are not content to leave
well
enough alone. As I'm guessing this is an AD environment you can be
assured
the logon attempt was recorded by AD and hopefully someone in the IT
unit is
monitoring those logs. It is possible to create an administrative
account
which has rights to install software, but does not have rights to
logon,
which is what the IT group has apparently has done.
My advice would be as follows. First, uninstall the Palm software from
the
system ASAP. Second, send an email to the head of IT with a request to
find
out why your initial request for software installation was denied or
not
followed up on (this is what you should have done in the first place).
Finally, come clean about what you've done. This may be the only way
to keep
your job, because if IT finds out before you admit to it be assured
your
termination will be swift and brutal.
Just my .02
Brian
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