Random Thoughts - Part Deux [NO POLITICS]

[humfrz]

Originally Posted by Sapphireho

Eagle Lake near Susanville.

Beautiful!

Looks to be about full ...??

Yep, ya'll got up and out there fer sure .......


humfrz

[Sapphireho]

Originally Posted by humfrz

Beautiful!

Looks to be about full ...??

Yep, ya'll got up and out there fer sure .......


humfrz

It was so much fun. My oldest son and his girlfriend, and my youngest son were with us. We went shooting, fishing, pulled the kids on the tube (I think I have more fun driving the boat trying to toss them off the tube than they have), had cocktails, great food, and played board games, told stories and watched movies till late night. It was awesome.

Believe it or not, the lake is still very low. It went up 6 feet, but we stil need a couple more years like this year.

[Ultramaroon]

Originally Posted by Sapphireho

It was so much fun.

Nothing beats dedicated time with loved ones. Sounds wonderful.

[soulreapersteve]

Originally Posted by krayzie

They all keep a laundry list to dish it out at the very end.

Sometimes I feel bad for the call center folks they have like some sort of timer to keep tabs on them and it appears on these big ass TVs hanging off the ceiling.

Originally Posted by ScoobsMcGee

I do not miss end user support. Although now my interaction with users is a lot more... eh screw it, vindictive.

Me: "User ID blargh attempted to install the malicious file from cnet.com pretending to be a free video converter 8 times between 18:01 and 18:06 UTC."

Blargh: "I didn't do that!"

Me: "Here's the screenshot of the detection on your computer, as well as your user ID running Chrome.exe. Additionally, here is the access log for proxy authentication, and proof that you tried changing the file name the last four times you downloaded it from the same link."

Blargh: "..."

Me: "By the way, if something is malware the first time you try to download it, it will continue to be malware the following 7 times."

Blargh's Manager: *glares at Blargh*

I'm going to stop asking if they need any help with other stuff. I'll just ask them to put in another ticket.

Supporting users for one company isn't that much of a headache because you'll know the ins and outs of the set up.

I'm supporting users from 60+ different environment. I pray whenever viewing a ticket that documentation is up to date lol

[Tcoat]

Originally Posted by soulreapersteve

I'm going to stop asking if they need any help with other stuff. I'll just ask them to put in another ticket.

Supporting users for one company isn't that much of a headache because you'll know the ins and outs of the set up.

I'm supporting users from 60+ different environment. I pray whenever viewing a ticket that documentation is up to date lol

From the other side if the fence:
Please do not turn into one of these ****head call centre guys that plays the "oh do anther ticket for that" card all the time. What you IT guys laugh at as dumb requests are far from dumb to the people making them. If we could figure everything out on our own you would not be needed. It sometimes takes some guts to call you up and say " I am baffled" and the last thing we need is for some person on the other end to imply we are stupid when we call. If sombody has more than one issue that you can help with why should they do each separately just to make your job easier? Would you want to have to Iredell each course of your dinner from a different person? The people calling have no idea how many places you have to deal with and frankly we don't care anymore than you care how many tables a searcher has to deal with if your lunch takes to long. You got into a service industry and that means serving no matter how much of a pain in the ass it may be.

[Ultramaroon]

Service is all about empathy.

[soulreapersteve]

Guess I'll just deal with SLA breaches of the other tickets in my queue, breaches that could cause the company large sums of money, while I tend to one user.

If it's an urgent issue where they can't access the network resources (one example), of course I'll assist. If it's something small, I tell them to ask for me when they create a new ticket.

[Ultramaroon]

Originally Posted by soulreapersteve

Guess I'll just deal with SLA breaches of the other tickets in my queue, breaches that could cause the company large sums of money, while I tend to one user.

If it's an urgent issue where they can't access the network resources (one example), of course I'll assist. If it's something small, I tell them to ask for me when they create a new ticket.

I hate that business model. It's not, or shouldn't be your responsibility to deal with management's failure to staff adequately.

Sometimes my whole day goes to resolving one user's issue but it's a fairly esoteric gig.

[krayzie]

Originally Posted by soulreapersteve

I'm going to stop asking if they need any help with other stuff. I'll just ask them to put in another ticket.

Supporting users for one company isn't that much of a headache because you'll know the ins and outs of the set up.

I'm supporting users from 60+ different environment. I pray whenever viewing a ticket that documentation is up to date lol

Holy shit 60+ different environments but are they at least remotely related?

Back in the day the worst I've heard was one supporting 4 different companies with completely different backgrounds and environments from someone that used to work for one of our main competitors (who later merged with another big competitor).

Originally Posted by Ultramaroon

Service is all about empathy.

This is very true. My old environment had around 20,000 users but a lot of them remembered me by name cuz I went out of my way to help them. But in the end, it was the people that told users to keep calling in new tickets that survived the layoffs, cuz that artificially made their numbers look real good to management in terms of creating more unnecessary work for everyone else.

[krayzie]

Originally Posted by Tcoat

Please do not turn into one of these ****head call centre guys that plays the "oh do anther ticket for that" card all the time.

Originally Posted by Ultramaroon

It's not, or shouldn't be your responsibility to deal with management's failure to staff adequately.

I think the main problem is how some if not all call centers are operated like modern sweatshops. I used to hear this all the time from our colleagues at the helpdesk who passed tickets to us resolver groups, their turnovers for n00bs just kept getting higher over the years as they got more micromanaged.

So whenever I call into some helpline for anything I try to be very nice cuz I know how tough these call center jobs are at times. Self-served web portals are trying to phase them out like McD's kiosks.

[Teseo]

Originally Posted by Ultramaroon

Service is all about empathy.

Thats why prostitutes are better than a girlfriend

[ScoobsMcGee]

Originally Posted by soulreapersteve

I'm going to stop asking if they need any help with other stuff. I'll just ask them to put in another ticket.

Supporting users for one company isn't that much of a headache because you'll know the ins and outs of the set up.

I'm supporting users from 60+ different environment. I pray whenever viewing a ticket that documentation is up to date lol

Does the helpdesk system you're using have a time tracker so you're not penalized for taking 20 issues on one call that was entered as an account unlock? If so, I wouldn't worry too much about it since the pay is the same no matter what you're doing. If not, I would talk to your boss about what the official practice is for those situations. Either way, I wouldn't brush off someone on the phone and ask them to enter another ticket. In my experience it just leads to a combative relationship between the user base and support, which never ends well.

Originally Posted by Tcoat

From the other side if the fence:
Please do not turn into one of these ****head call centre guys that plays the "oh do anther ticket for that" card all the time. What you IT guys laugh at as dumb requests are far from dumb to the people making them. If we could figure everything out on our own you would not be needed. It sometimes takes some guts to call you up and say " I am baffled" and the last thing we need is for some person on the other end to imply we are stupid when we call. If sombody has more than one issue that you can help with why should they do each separately just to make your job easier? Would you want to have to Iredell each course of your dinner from a different person? The people calling have no idea how many places you have to deal with and frankly we don't care anymore than you care how many tables a searcher has to deal with if your lunch takes to long. You got into a service industry and that means serving no matter how much of a pain in the ass it may be.

While I agree with this to a point, sometimes an asshole is just an asshole. On either side. When I did work (and manage) helpdesk it was pretty frequent that people wouldn't call until they were very frustrated with the technology, and a good part of the job was calming them down to get to the root of what the problem was. Still, there were the very few users who constantly made the same mistakes, never listened to directions on how to not repeat them, and flat out berated whoever was unfortunate enough to take their call. I don't care if you've taken a job in a service industry or not, no one should be treated like that.

In those situations I would take the call personally, document the crap out of everything, and then have a chat with the person's manager. Usually the person would calm down (at least on the phone) afterward. On one or two occasions the person ended up no longer working for the company. To be fair, that's because the person treated everyone like dirt, not just IT.

That said, to avoid the pitfall of becoming disgruntled due to all of that nonsense, I've always remembered the phrase "If you encounter an asshole in the morning, you've encountered an asshole. If you encounter assholes all day, you're the asshole."

[bcj]

Originally Posted by humfrz

Comments ......
humfrz

That some sort of Fresnel arrangement?

Reminiscent of John Akroyd with a pair of oranges and a nylon stocking ...
"Look! I'm a BUG!"

[humfrz]

Originally Posted by bcj

That some sort of Fresnel arrangement?

Reminiscent of John Akroyd with a pair of oranges and a nylon stocking ...
"Look! I'm a BUG!"

....... just little girls messen wich their younger sister ......


humfrz