Saturday, January 31, 2015

Dear IT : Email is not your job

I notice a technical system problem in 2011.  I complain about it repeatedly, to the people who most directly deal with the problem (this includes peoples in several departments). I also complain about it to the IT liaisons assigned to my area.

Nothing changes.
There seems to be a failure to understand, or care, about the serious potential consequences of the problem.

Last week I see another example of the same problem. I send a note to some of  the same people who I have complained to many times before.  I get the same response back from them.  However, I also included one other person, a new "boss", who has a job mandate related to improving IT.  

This is followed by a complaint being sent to IT, from the new boss.

What follows is typical of email culture:

6 emails from IT, including several duplications, each cc'ing large groups of people. This includes 
a) my ticket #
b) a request for my contact information so they can get back to me.

This is NOT my problem. This is an institutional problem, you need not give me a ticket OR get back to me, IT.  Just Fix it for everyone's sake.

EMAIL is not your job.

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So you only pay attention requests that come from a higher level boss?
And you show that you paid attention by sending 6 emails?

What about just getting some results?

***********************************

Do I have a bad attitude?  Should I follow up on the ticket number on this issue, bugging them to see it through? Is it actually  my job to see that they complete their job?

*********************************************************

It seems that one person is assigned to my "ticket".   He sends me several more emails with a few questions, including to ask me if my problem was happening to anyone else (implication: if you can blame me as the only one with the problem then I am the problem, and they don't have anything to fix).  I write back with a brief summary of the issues, including the specific most recent  ticket (which is actually not really an IT issue - its an IT interface issue, interfacing with another department, not mine).

What follows is typical:

The IT person responds with an email answering my "Questions".  (I didn't have any questions, I had complaints).
He confirms that one of the system deficiencies is indeed not present (though he doesn't recognize it as a deficiency).
He notes that there are processes for handling of specific tasks by the other involved department, which is not an IT issue.

Did this address a solution to the original problem  in any way?

No.

Is this what I expected as a response from the current system "process" of dealing with problems?

Yes.






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