Dear Users... (A thread for Sysadmin, Technical Support, and Help Desk people)

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To sign out the key for the filing cabinet, you need to fill out Form 984/56(v.3), which is available from someone in the office building on the other side of the city.



Unfortunately this person is working from home now, and the key is in the office building.
 
I believe that the filing cabinet has now been moved into a disused lavatory, in the flooded basement, which is unfortunately infested with crocodiles, but the sign has been moved with it and attached to the door.
 
xterra said:
To sign out the key for the filing cabinet, you need to fill out Form 984/56(v.3), which is available from someone in the office building on the other side of the city.



Unfortunately this person is working from home now, and the key is in the office building.
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I've been straightening up the home office, and have uncovered half a dozen unknown keys you can try!
 
Trebuchet said:
I've been straightening up the home office, and have uncovered half a dozen unknown keys you can try!
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Please scan them all on both sides. Save as bitmapped files and import them into a Word document and email it to me. I'll see if I can recreate them with my 3-D scanner. TIA.
 
Gord_in_Toronto said:
Please scan them all on both sides. Save as bitmapped files and import them into a Word document and email it to me. I'll see if I can recreate them with my 3-D scanner. TIA.
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I followed your instructions to the letter. Except I used some toothpicks to get the keys to stand up while I scanned the edges. I saved the images as pdfs and then emailed to my friend Frank as we haven't spoken in a while adn I owe him an email. Please send keys asap as critical projects depend on it.
 
Someone decided to switch on the feature in Service Now that emails the original author of any "knowledge base" article whenever someone adds a comment to said article. I now get, a couple of times a week, an email letting me know that someone on the help desk added "used this article in resolution of Incident 2393220394702397" or whatever. That's great. The article in question reads "What to do if user complains of X: tell them they shouldn't be doing X, it's wrong." And I wrote it five years ago, for an application I supported three different jobs ago. Nice to know my influence lingers on after all this time.
 
TragicMonkey said:
Someone decided to switch on the feature in Service Now that emails the original author of any "knowledge base" article whenever someone adds a comment to said article. I now get, a couple of times a week, an email letting me know that someone on the help desk added "used this article in resolution of Incident 2393220394702397" or whatever. That's great. The article in question reads "What to do if user complains of X: tell them they shouldn't be doing X, it's wrong." And I wrote it five years ago, for an application I supported three different jobs ago. Nice to know my influence lingers on after all this time.
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Your writing does leave an impression scar.
 
So my training is in full swing. I'm learning new processes hand over fist. Last week it was New Starter Requests (ie, creating new accounts in Active Directory and Exchange). This week it's VoIP - creating phone accounts for those new starters. I just finished off my first.

It feels good to really get a handle on a process and to no longer have to refer to a SOP document at each step of the way.
 
arthwollipot said:
Someone literally just printed an email, scanned it, and emailed it to us as a PDF.

[imgw=300]https://i.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/original/000/004/592/misc-jackie-chan-l.jpg[/imgw]

In other news, today is my last day as a contractor! I start as a permanent employee of the Australian Public Service tomorrow! Yay! Flextime, I have my eye on you.
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Congratulations, arth.

Too many contractors in Australia employed for roles that are not limited term projects.
 
arthwollipot said:
It happened during the Howard years. A rapid downsizing of the Australian Public Service resulted in most IT jobs being outsourced. It was a terrible idea.
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Yes, we have periodic bouts of "let's replace felderal employees with contractors" in the US federal government too. It's always supposed to be a money saving measure, but the typical result is that the contractor gets paid as much as or more than the federal employees, but those employees are paid less, and are therefore generally lower quality. I'm pretty sure that the real motivation is pork for the businesses that do the contracting.
 
CORed said:
Yes, we have periodic bouts of "let's replace felderal employees with contractors" in the US federal government too. It's always supposed to be a money saving measure, but the typical result is that the contractor gets paid as much as or more than the federal employees, but those employees are paid less, and are therefore generally lower quality. I'm pretty sure that the real motivation is pork for the businesses that do the contracting.
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I dunno, you see the same trend in civilian markets. My suspicion is it's partly a matter of "business fashion", and also a risk management strategy. One advantage of outsourcing to someone else is that you also transfer the risk to that third party. My field is IT, so I know more about that than other areas, but the principle likely applies in most fields. For an IT example, when the risks of cybersecurity threats elevate (either in actuality or in perception), or the risks change and require new strategies/technologies, a common response is "it'd cost a crapload to do this in-house, retrain employees, and install new equipment. If we outsource it, that's all someone else's problem, and if we get breached it's their fault."

Not to say there isn't any pork barreling going on, mind you; in fact I'm sure that's a huge part of the choice of what particular contractor gets the job. But I dunno if that plays a majority role in the initial decision to outsource.
 
Hellbound said:
I dunno, you see the same trend in civilian markets. My suspicion is it's partly a matter of "business fashion", and also a risk management strategy. One advantage of outsourcing to someone else is that you also transfer the risk to that third party. My field is IT, so I know more about that than other areas, but the principle likely applies in most fields. For an IT example, when the risks of cybersecurity threats elevate (either in actuality or in perception), or the risks change and require new strategies/technologies, a common response is "it'd cost a crapload to do this in-house, retrain employees, and install new equipment. If we outsource it, that's all someone else's problem, and if we get breached it's their fault."

Not to say there isn't any pork barreling going on, mind you; in fact I'm sure that's a huge part of the choice of what particular contractor gets the job. But I dunno if that plays a majority role in the initial decision to outsource.
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It’s also where costs appear on the balance sheet.
 
CORed said:
Yes, we have periodic bouts of "let's replace felderal employees with contractors" in the US federal government too. It's always supposed to be a money saving measure, but the typical result is that the contractor gets paid as much as or more than the federal employees, but those employees are paid less, and are therefore generally lower quality. I'm pretty sure that the real motivation is pork for the businesses that do the contracting.
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It's not just government. Big corporations do the same thing, and not just for IT.
 
Trebuchet said:
It's not just government. Big corporations do the same thing, and not just for IT.
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In my experience to date, there are two cycles that perpetually occur:

1. "Let's outsource to save money!" and "Let's do it in house to save money!"
2. "Let's centralize everything to boost efficiency!" and "Let's decentralize everything to boost efficiency!"

When I started at my current company in 2012 they were in the process of in-housing and centralizing. Then we swung around and outsourced and decentralized, but already signs are showing we're about to enter the in-housing phase again, then someone will have the brilliantly original idea to centralize things.

It just miraculously happens that the cycles shift whenever there's a change in executives. I imagine each one always does the same thing, but changes employers so often they're unaware of the cyclical nature of the changes. There are centralization executives and decentralization executives, and outsource executives and in-house executives, and they're each oblivious to the fact that all they do is chase each other around different companies undoing each other's work.

The trick for us little people is to become adept at floating, and just let each new tide carry you to the place of current safety.
 
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