[AccessD] OT - My union grievance

I would like to start my statement with a little story...a true story.  I
was stationed on the USS Carl Vinson.  The day I first boarded her, the
Chucky V had just returned from San Diego.  When they hit port in San Diego,
M-Div (Mechanical Division, we ran the engine rooms which supply propulsion,
electricity, water, etc....the utility plant of the ship...) was preparing
to go ashore.  While everyone was getting ready for shore leave, the M-Div
berthing became a little bit of a clutter.  An Air-Dale cheif (Air-Dale's
are the fellas that work on the planes), went on a rant on how messy the
birthing was.  In reality, the birthing had just passed an inspection (with
flying colors) a few hours before, but everything is so cramped, that when
100 guys are getting ready for some fun in port, things get a little messy
for a while.  The Air-Dale cheif forced everyone in M-Div to stay onboard,
for another inspection at 11pm, forcing everyone to lose a day of shore
leave. 

Needless to say, this did not make M-Div happy.  It made them so unhappy,
that on the way back to Alameda, from San Diego, the potable water for the
ship just didn't leave the engine rooms.  When someone in M-Div or the
Reactor department (M-Div is about half of the Reactor Department) wanted
water, they called the plant, and the water was mystery turned on for a
little bit.  Everyone held together, from the lowly grunts all the way up to
the Reactor Office.  The Reactor Officer (third in charge on the ship) told
the CO that his guys were too flustered from the lunatic Air-Dale cheif, to
figure out what was wrong with the water.  Not to mention how little much
needed R-R they got.

Well, after a few days of not showering, the CO forced the Air-Dale cheif to
make a personal apology to M-Div.  Soon after the water started flowing, and
everyone was happy again!

Just a fun little story.

Now, to your actual post.  I am in an IT department, we are pretty small, so
I get to do a lot of different things.  If you have seen the Matrix
reloaded, there is a scene where the leader of Zion hits this nail right on
the head.  He shows Neo the machines that support Zion, and explains that no
one knows anything about them, nor do they care to know anything about them
until things stop working.  That is the never changing role of a support
group.  No one cares you're there until something breaks!  Unfortunately,
this leads to an EXTREMELY bad issue.  The better you do your job, the less
people care.  That is absolutely true.  Before our company had a ton of
layoffs, our network was attrocious.  Things were failing left and right,
databases were way out of wack, it was a miracle anyone got anything done on
a computer.  Right before the begin of our lay-offs, we got our Network
Admin fired, and my co-worker and I took over everything.  Now the network
runs like a fine tuned engine.  Databases almost never have problems, and
what problems do occur are usually do to situations beyond our control
(power issues, user errors, etc.).  We have problems solved usually before
anyone knows there is a problem.

In reality, we are providing perfect support.  However, because things are
running so smoothly, because of our diligent efforts, and continuous
monitoring, no one thinks twice about what is involved in the background.  I
get 'seniority' calls all the time, where I have a Senior Management member
put a rush on one project or another, thinking that I can drop everything
and spend 24/7 on their project.  The line I get is 'Don't interupt this
project unless something goes done.'  This philosophy has evolved because
they think everything runs smoothly on it's own now, not that my co-worker
and I are constantly planning ahead, and keeping things running right.

Unfortunately, a lot of IT shops don't run so smoothly.  My co-worker and I
have the distinct advantage of being close friends, with complimentary
skills.  He's exteremly good with my weak points, and vice versa.  A lot of
shops get caught up in either power struggles, or worse yet, they get
compartmentalized, where only So and So can do a specific task, either
because they have horded the knowledge, or no one takes the time to learn
whats going on outside of their little area of expertise.

My co-worker does wonders with our network routers, switches and cabling.
But I keep abreast of what he's doing, not to take over, but to be a backup
when he needs it.  He does the same with most of my stuff too.  It does help
that we go to lunch together almost every day, so we are in constant
contact.

However, these same IT related issues also envelope the IT role in most
companies.  Either IT is too much of a control freak, not letting anyone get
anything done on their own, which only hinders a company, or they are
completely incompetent, because they don't take the time to learn anything
outside of their micro world.  (Both of those are behind the IT claim that
Access is not a 'real' or 'good' database).  

To truly have a well oiled organization, both sides have to work as as
team...the company, and the IT department.  Just like in the Navy, the
Reactor Department may have been the heart of the ship, but the eyes, brain,
arms, etc were other departments.  Sure, nothing is going to work if the
heart stops beating, but what good is a heart all on it's own?  In a very
small company, you may be able to get away with having IT develop everything
the company needs.  However, in small company (maybe 100 employees and up),
that is just not going to fly.  No one IT fellow can possible have the
expertise to understand all aspects of the company.  I consider myself a
pretty knowledgable fellow, but within my company, there are a lot of things
that I just plain don't have the time to learn.  That's when you either have
to have a specialized developer come in, or you have to upgrade a user to a
psuedo developer.  We do both.  On a lot of our 'test' equipment, we
outsource a lot of the development, to people that make their living on
developing 'test machine' packages like what we need.  However, WE (IT) have
the final approval.  We get to look at the code, and database designs, to
make sure that if something goes wrong, we aren't going to have to mire
through the thing.  On the other hand, we also allow our users to make up
their own systems.  What our general policy is, if you wrote it, you fix it.
If you want our support, then we need a lead time, before the system goes
online, so that we can ensure it meets our standards.

Of course, this is not a perfect company.  We struggle a lot to keep things
in balance.  But over all, our system works pretty well.

Sorry for the long post, been out for a little while, guess I had a lot in
my system! <grin>

Drew

-----Original Message-----
From: John Clark [mailto:John.Clark at niagaracounty.com]
Sent: Monday, July 07, 2003 11:34 AM
To: accessd at databaseadvisors.com
Subject: [AccessD] OT - My union grievance


First I'd like to let you know where I am coming from. I have to be a
union member...I work in a "closed" shop...but I am not a huge supporter
of the union...<snip>