IT: Fortitude, perseverance, and rational thinking: Three things this industry needs more of
There are a lot of kooks, quacks and practitioners of voodoo medicine in the IT world Everything works great as long as the magic holds out. When it all goes south.. well that's when IT becomes my problem.
Technology can bring out the best and the worst in people. Recently my team released a few upgrades that laid the ground work for a future overhaul. Though the change was minor we couldn't make it without affected some users. Despite the impact, the change was deemed more important than the temporary discomfort of a few folks and the was given the "green light" for release.
Changes rarely go 100% as expected and this change was no different. In the end a few key features were unavailable for longer than we'd anticipated though ultimately information was not lost, only delayed. This was still unacceptable to a few who vocally made their displeasure known. Of these "complaints" only two were truly related to the problem with the rest falsely correlated with the upgrade. In other words most of the problems weren't a result of our change but that didn't stop people from blaming it anyway.
Users are funny like that and we in the IT development and support field find it comical at first, but it can quickly become a nightmare if you don't set the record straight immediately. In our case a quick email blurb informed everyone that the problem was isolated and would only delay things, not destroy them. For most this was enough, unfortunately for a few others it did little to reassure them nor to reinforce my belief that users actually read system status bulletins. In my opinion if it isn't a 5"x7" flashing yellow warning sign that pops up when you first log in someone will miss the "memo".
Few things are more uncool than when you mom or dad latch on to the latest slang phrase or start leaving comments on your MySpace page. The following is much worse my friends. It's an attempt by corporate mofos to sound hip and to start something viral. This video was a nominee for "Best Song" according to last year's Pwnie awards. Take that for what it's worth:
Yes, that's Dan Finnerty (aka the wedding singer at Will Ferrell's wedding in the movie Old School). He's about the only redeeming thing in this video since the words are no more than oddly placed industry jargon and lamo rhymes. Hell I'm in the industry and still didn't understand what they were trying to say. Hardware/Software based security? Not if it's put together by the same guys that made this video.
Despite the responsibility there are few life and death scenarios. Though we occasionally get a wake up call at 3am, unlike doctors we IT people rarely deal with situations where life hangs in the balance. Sure a server may crash and burn but no one is going to be injured unless they happen to be sitting atop the unit when it goes.
The downside, pay grade aside, is that unlike doctors we do not have a fully stocked medical supply closet from which we can produce any tool we need or so desire. Scarcity of resources is one of the most frustrating things about working in tech. There are never enough computer cycles, system memory or hours in the day to get everything done. Technology is often left in service well beyond its expected life and is often retrofitted instead of replaced so as to save money in the short term.
Still despite the downside I still look forward to coming into work and rarely dread the impending crisis of the day. If only I could have the same attitude when home electronics or automobiles fail.
Work 
