When IT gurus become managers and don't 1

[jhill7000]

I have a situation at my current employment that has quite frankly infuriated me. Our Director of IT is a great guy, absolute genius when it comes to troubleshooting. However we have grown to have 5 people in the department. The first four (including me) are hard workers keep our head down and get the job done. The fifth (our second help desk position) has become a problem.

We first noticed he surfed the web about 3 to 4 hours a day, more if we let him. To his credit, he knows how to play the game. He will ignore those who are “unimportant” to him and jump up immediately to those who he deems important and he does both with all of his gusto. He openly refers to the users as morons and will not help a “regular” user until they have walked to him at least three times. Calling results in a “Just reboot” response. We have had several people complain to us about him and one supervisor tell us we need to fire him. We work in a busy area where many people walk by and see him surfing. It’s giving us a bad name. I’m not even going to get into his attitude towards work so I digress.

On to the problem that has gotten under my skin. The director knows of this. Every member of IT has spoken to him privately as well as the 4 of us going in together to speak about the guys’ problem. He has had several managers (no directors or above . . YET) come speak with him about it. I have been altering our surf blocker to block the sites the guy goes to so that he can’t surf as much. My boss just called me into his office to chastise me for doing so. He explained that tensions do not need to be raised between us. I explained the whole situation again to which he replied “I’ll keep an eye on him” . This has been the canned response our Director has given everyone for the months the guy has been employed. I really don’t want to take this up the chain but that’s the only way I know how. I know eventually someone will come down hard on my boss for not doing something about this. What should I do? I really can’t stand the four of us doing hard work while the fifth is getting away with murder.

 

[LadySlinger]

Wow...Sounds to me like maybe this Help Desk guy got hired in by "knowing someone". Did he, or are you unsure/definitely know he did not?

I can't tell you how many times I've been sat down in the past and told to adjust my attitude. I know that a big portion of this was my age at the time.

Ignoring the guy isn't going to help. If you have strict computer use policies regarding the internet, then the command to restrict his access comes down from the chain of command...which I take is, unfortunately, not you (the Director).

Begin to keep a record of all the phone calls he takes, sites he visits and any other extrenous things he does at work between yourselves. When things defnintely do not change bring this to the front of your Director again. If nothing is done still, ask him. If users begin to suffer and feel neglect or mistreated, then they need to address their complaints to the Director as well. My thoughts of numerous voicemails all with similar messages will get to your Director and something will be done.

If not, then I would talk to someone maybe in HR or another Director regarding this. If you don't, I'm sure someone else will.

 

[Grenage]

No workplace is perfect, things like this will always happen.

Are you of equal rank to the lazy employee? If so, did you seek permission to start choosing what he could and could not view on the internet? While I'm sure you're right, and it was in the interests of the company, it's not your place. Your departmental manager/director is there to deal with his employees.

Going "over your boss' head" is rarely a good idea, either. If you've raised your concerns with your boss then there is little else you can do. If deadlines are not being met or there are 500 complaints about the lazy employee's attitude then eventually something will get done.


Carlsberg don't run I.T departments, but if they did they'd probably be more fun.

 

[LadySlinger]

FYI, if you're in charge of monitoring the firewall and internet access, I would just play around with his access. If I see a certain person spending "too much" time on say "YouTube" then I just go in and set the block to last only 5 minutes.

The site isn't officially blocked without anyone's permission and to that user it would just appear to be a blip in server connections.

Sometimes though this stuff can take a long time. Believe me, I've worked at places where it took 10 years before the drug-addict got fired. That was after her she fell down after taking relaxers for the countless time.

 

[kHz]

It appears management knows about it and you are now overstepping your boundaries. It isn't your problem and your boss IS right. You have NO authority to have anyone block anything.

Keep it up and you might get what's coming to you. A pink slip.

 

[JCreamerII]

jhill7000,

Send your boss an EMAIL saying your sorry if you over stepped your authority but you were just doing what you thought was right. Let him know that you will await for his instructions on this type of matter going forward. Wait til this blows up & it will, and you have your rear covered. As long as your boss wants to keep his head in the sand that's his issue, just document thru EMAIL's, not just verbally, what the issue is and he'll be on the hook for any lack of response. Don't worry about him bring down the departments image, that will take care of itself when this issue comes to a head.

Jim C.

Thanks,

 

[jhill7000]

I love the corporate world. How can I stay out of the politics w/o being thrown under the bus?

 

[onoski]

jhill7000

As someone rightly wrote above it is not your business to track this lazy staff. All four of you hard workers have aired your view of this lazy staff so now sit back and do your job and eventually management would do something about it.

Unfortunately, the grass is not always greener on the other side would have suggested you start looking for another position elsewhere. This is what I'd advice just do your job to the best of your ability and stay out of office politics its not worth the hassle. There is no perfect workplace or even colleagues for that matter. There is a nuisance where ever you work. Trust me am writing this from past and present experience.

 

[LadySlinger]

I agree with onoski about the grass not always being greener. Be glad its one nuissance rather than 5 or 10 of them.
Or you look at the Careerbuilder commercial with the monkeys and suddenly the place you work makes sense...

 

[JCreamerII]

LadySlinger,

The grass may indeed be greener, but it may just be spray painted green.

Jim C.

 

[finalee]

I think you need to step-back, or leave if you can't do that.

Tough situation.

Legal IT Jobs:

http://www.legalitjobs.net

 

[IT4EVR]

Grenage,

Your comments make a lot of sense.

I think the worst mistake you could make at this point would be to tinker with this guy's internet access. By all means stay out of the fray!

I learned the hard way but this is what I practice at work. I no longer worry about what other people do on the job. If they want to be lazy, that's their problem. If they want to talk on the phone for 4 hours, that's their problem. It's ok to mention this to management once, but if they don't do anything, then you've done all you can do.

Even if you have the best interests in mind, you'll come across as a tattle tale to the boss if you rat on someone continuously. I've seen some odd things in the workplace and unless it falls under something like gross misconduct, it's better to leave it alone and let management take care of it.

The boss has already sent you a clear signal to stay out of it. If you go any further with it, you could end up being the one with the bad repercussions.

Frankly, I think you are fortunate to have 4 other hard workers among you. Most companies don't have that high of a % of productive employees. Ok, I'm sounding cynical...

 

[rosieb]

Either your director has some reason to protect this guy, maybe he doesn't want to admit he hired a disaster, or maybe he just doesn't want to go through a disciplinary procedure - some managers just can't do that until forced.

A lot depends on how work is assigned in your group, how are call response times monitored? If calls are specifically assigned to him, he'll have to respond within an acceptable time.

Describing users as "morons" suggests he's totally unsuited to IT support.

All you can do is make sure that work is assigned equally, then wait for the users to complain - just don't clean up his messes!

Rosie
"Don't try to improve one thing by 100%, try to improve 100 things by 1%

 

[pbunyon]

If you work so hard how do you have time to notice him?
And why notice him if he displays the attitude you note? Do your job and quite gossiping you'll never get anywhere pointin g out others fault. You'll just get the finger pointed back at you.

Paul

 

[gbaughma]

jhill7000:

It does get frustrating, when you're trying to go that "extra mile", and you see a slacker that's not only making more work for you, but giving your proud department a black eye.

There's also an old saying "No good deed goes unpunished".

I know that it's hard to let someone else "hang themselves", but sometimes that's what you need to do. It stinks, I know.

I remember one time getting the company's "Thinking outside of the box" award for innovative things that I had done to make life, in general, easier. They had a big awards banquet to which I was flown to receive my award, etc.

When I got back to my home branch, my supervisor's response was "Congratulations. Now go get back in your box."

(Yes, those were his exact words.)

I think that one enters the workplace, especially if it's a job that they are passionate about, they want to do big things, not become one of the drones, really make a difference etc.

I used to be like that; I would actually go around and visit the different departments. "Hey, how's the computer working? Are there any special reports you need written? That new mouse still working OK?" Stuff like that.

People would see me "out of my box", and report to my supervisor that "All he does is wander the halls with his coffee cup!" (Which was B.S.)

So, now, the last of my youthful optimism has been wrung from me. I stay in my office, I write my code, I only leave if I am specifically going somewhere to help someone who has requested help, and I count down the days to retirement.

I have been beaten down by the corporation.

The entire point of the conversation is to not get yourself dragged into the undertow. You've gone out of your way, as have your co-workers, to tell the guy he's a lazy putz. You did your bit. Let the chips fall where they may with him now. Concentrate on your own job performance.



Just my 2¢

"In order to start solving a problem, one must first identify its owner." --Me
--Greg

http://parallel.tzo.com

 

[Welshbird]

Greg: PLEASE! C'mon - climb out of your box. Or look for work somewhere that will appreciate your ability to do that and enable it.

Maybe you could ask to be tranferred if that's possible - the company as a whole obviously appreciated how you worked if they don't locally.

I hate to see an innovator hushed.

Fee

The question should be [red]Is it worth trying to do?[/red] not [blue] Can it be done?[/blue]

 

[gbaughma]

willif:
Unfortunately, it would be a 1200 mile relocate for me.



Just my 2¢

"In order to start solving a problem, one must first identify its owner." --Me
--Greg

http://parallel.tzo.com

 

[Welshbird]

It's a shame though.

If you could re-locate further we'd love to have you over here!

Fee

The question should be [red]Is it worth trying to do?[/red] not [blue] Can it be done?[/blue]

 

[gbaughma]

willif:

Aww... shucks.

Thanks.



Just my 2¢

"In order to start solving a problem, one must first identify its owner." --Me
--Greg

http://parallel.tzo.com

 

[NickFerrar]

Yeah I'd have to agree with the people telling you not to take this over your Director's head and not to play about with blocking Internet access.

I'd just take a step back, make sure any future discussion about him to your Director is documented (e.g. via email) and if you have a user complain about him to you then encourage them to take it up with the Director themselves. The Director might not care about your complaints but if he starts getting a few complaints from different departments I'm sure ass-covering mode will kick in.