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Wow, I work in a place where the machines crash at random, I am doing VB6 and classic ASP development on a Celeron 900 with 128 MB ram. The machine crashes at random 4 to 8 times a week, the network / exchange server is down so much, (without exaggeration) the internet / network is unavailable 10 to 15 hours a week, and my emails have an average delivery rate (coming and going) of about 50%. I actually purchased, out of my own pocket, without reimbursement, a new laptop to develop on, I figure the crash less frustration outweighs the cost. I also use my own personal email for work correspondences, I hate having a customer or vendor we no longer do business with having my personal email address, but it beats sending and waiting and re-sending and more waiting just to get my job done.
My company's industry is transportation, but we have an IT department of about 75. 25 developers and the rest help desk / tech support / hardware and network types. I know buying IT equipment takes a back seat to more trucks and more warehouse space and the like, but come on here. We get to work on crappy equipment that is fair to poor at best, and then beg for sub standard replacement parts as things die.
OK enough of a setup here... I just got to sit in a two hour waste of time “state of things” meeting where we learned that our income is up, our billing is up, our assets are up, our business is up in general, and I'm still developing on a Celery 900 piece of crap. WTF is going on here? The tech department I am in is located 20 minutes from our other offices and warehouses, and the place looks like a shady fly by night scam shop. We have furniture made of old shelving and milk crates! Am I supposed to feel better after this meeting? We are offered lame cook outs during work hours that might be able to pass for a decent soup kitchen a couple times a year, and a pathetic “family day” that is way under-attended and a general waste of time.
I guess the point is, if there is one other than just to rant, if you are a Mr. Bigshot, or Junior Executive Vice Mr. Big and have any real say at all in your company, PLEASE, take care of your damn employees! They are the reason your business is up. You really think you and the other suits are the reason things are going well at work? Think again. Take a look around you. Want to raise morale and acknowledge your employees, don't offer them crappy family picnics and lame cookouts that most respectable homeless people would shy away from, this only makes the matter worse, it's practically an insult. We even were offered a chance to form a committee, that I was on, to improve morale and the workplace attitude (that's how bad it got here), but 90% of our ideas were shot down. I am talking about reasonable ideas, nothing like “give everyone a huge raise” or “new Lincoln Navigators for everyone!”, and in the end, those few people who had a little enthusiasm left at all were left feeling more jaded that those they were trying to motivate. I don't even turn my work given PC on any more, there are bees in our office every spring and fall, the office looks like it was furnished out from an Ames going out of business fixture sale, the network / internet is about as reliable as an extended weather forecast, the deadlines are piling up and morale is down, but please, feel better already, because business is up and Mr. Big's bottom line looks great!
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