The snow was still spottily falling to earth this morning. The accumulation of last night was unpleasant to shift but shift it I did. I had hoped that the snow would mean another light day of limited attendance but that didn't work out. People had too much to do before next week to spend another day teleconferencing in. It also meant that no one wanted to stay too long in the meeting. However it did not mean that they didn't want to talk.
I ran through the numbers for everyone with the assistance of some colorful slides. The number of calls we'd received was close to average for the first four days back from a break, project or not. For being after a break where a project had been accomplished, the number of calls was somewhat below average, not much, and I offered up yesterday's 'snow' day as the reason before anyone else could do so for me, trying to make me look like a cheat. People like to say that numbers don't lie but they can certainly be encouraged to fib a bunch. I've busted people before for 'changing the parameters' of a test in order to achieve their goal and was aware of how I could have been 'caught'.
'Oofy' grumbled and introduced himself, again not recognizing me, before telling the assembled about how his group had been so inconvenienced by the upgrade and the multiple issues surrounding it. As expected, there was no mention of my offer to provide detailed updates that he had not taken me up on. Before I could say anything to open up the conversation or rebut his comments, Professor Dell coughed, sputtered, and started droning.
Professor Dell is a nice enough man. He is painfully calm and collected, his voice rarely wavering or changing in pitch. He taught at one point but has moved onto a supervisory role in the Science department now. I took his class when I was in school. It was some of the most restful sleep I ever got while in school.
"Problems are what we saw as well, looking around the department, were the problems to see. Computers that didn't turn on, people unable to log in, printers that didn't print, the problems were easy to see, you see." Now, looking back, it amuses me that he kept saying that he 'saw' these problems, only because I don't believe his vision is very good. He looks over his glasses more than he looks through them and he does need them to see. At the time, he just gave me a headache. Politely I reminded him that the power was off on his end of the floor on Monday. "Ah!" he said gently. "That was still part of the project, was it not?"
It really wasn't. Facilities had done some work in the labs over break and a circuit breaker had accidentally been switched off at the end of it. No big deal apart from the fact that it took them an hour to figure it out. It had nothing to do with my project but, from the Professor's point of view, all projects done in his area were related, no matter who accomplished what. I tried to stop arguing but Professor Dell continued to politely insist. Dean Cuthbold eventually broke it up and we were able to move on.
Thankfully by then no one really wanted to be in the room anymore. We zipped through some closing Q&A and I successfully scampered back to my office to hide for awhile.
I brought the leftover donuts with me from the meeting. Don't worry; I shared with the interns. I really don't need THAT much sugar.
Friday, January 8, 2010
Thursday, January 7, 2010
Snow Day
What a mess. More snow in Milwaukee and, of course, dim witted driving results from it.
I don't live that far from work and headed in as normal, doing my best to set a good example. Most of my interns live on campus so they had no excuse to not show up. A number of people did call in or worked from home which was good and bad for us. It was good because it allowed us to catch up. It was bad because there were some tickets we couldn't deal with because the customer was unavailable.
Still, things started to settle down. I had a chance to start getting numbers ready for tomorrow's meeting during the day instead of scrambling to do them tonight, as I expected. That was nice. I'm not done with the presentation yet but it's getting there.
Shoveling was no fun. I was smart enough to call my folks before running over there again. My brother did use his new snow blower again so I didn't need to shovel there as well. Yay!
I can't wait until tomorrow's meeting is done...
I don't live that far from work and headed in as normal, doing my best to set a good example. Most of my interns live on campus so they had no excuse to not show up. A number of people did call in or worked from home which was good and bad for us. It was good because it allowed us to catch up. It was bad because there were some tickets we couldn't deal with because the customer was unavailable.
Still, things started to settle down. I had a chance to start getting numbers ready for tomorrow's meeting during the day instead of scrambling to do them tonight, as I expected. That was nice. I'm not done with the presentation yet but it's getting there.
Shoveling was no fun. I was smart enough to call my folks before running over there again. My brother did use his new snow blower again so I didn't need to shovel there as well. Yay!
I can't wait until tomorrow's meeting is done...
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
Busy Bee
As expected, the return to work has been a mess. Monday was a busy day but Tuesday was an absolute mess. I think a number of people took Monday as a vacation day and first returned to work yesterday. My team has been doing their best to respond but there was just such a flood of calls that we couldn't keep up. Serious problems, annoying problems, irritating problems, problems related to the project over break, and normal would-have-happened-anyway problems. Any body that could stay past their shift and work a bit longer was encouraged to do so.
Somewhere around two in the afternoon yesterday I retreated to my office as I realized that I'd yet to eat any lunch and it was no longer a task I could put off any further. I was hungry and tired and just needed a moment to think.
I had just barely sat down and begun to unwrap my sandwich when there came a knock upon my door, a nervous rapping at my chamber door. John, one of my interns, poked his head inside and started stammering about not wanting to interrupt me but he felt he had to do so. “Mr. Pedrina's on the phone and wants to talk to you.”
“Oofy?” You know how sometimes when the pressure is on that your mental filters don't work as well as they normally do? That's what happened to me and was the reason behind my question. The thought just slipped out. John started laughing immediately. This put me in an odd position, both pleased that I caused some amusement and a bit embarrassed as I'd said something I shouldn't have said.
As I tried to explain to John that he shouldn't repeat what I'd just said, John looked for further understanding. “Oofy? Why Oofy?”
“Well,” I had no good answer to this question, “he looks like an Oofy, doesn't he?”
In that John was forced to agree with me. I'm not sure that either of us could define an 'Oofy' if asked but Jeremiah Pedrina was clearly an 'Oofy'. I think, with time, you will agree.
I headed outside, hoping that taking the call in public would prevent me from further speaking without thinking. It also gave me an extra moment or two to get my brain ready for the conversation. Upon picking up the phone, I did my best to sound bright and cheerful instead of hungry and tired. “Yesh, ish thish the manager of the department?” asked Oofy. The man has a talent for not being able to recognize me, either on the phone or in person. Upon hearing me confirm my role, he continued. “I've been hearing of a number of computer related problemsh being experienced by the membersh of my department. When will they be resolved?”
The brevity of his question caught me off guard and we sat through a brief silence while I waited for him to say more. When it became clear that he was waiting for my response, I began to scramble. “I don't want to sound flippant but we always try to resolve open problems as soon as we can. Is there a specific situation on which you need an update?”
“No, no, I don't think so,” Oofy replied. “There just seemsh to be a lot of complaining going on in my department and I wanted a statush.”
My head began to hurt more. I wasn't sure what he wanted to hear or what information he was looking to obtain. It was difficult to respond. “We do have a high volume of existing problem tickets at the moment, which is not uncommon for the period after a break. We're doing our best to resolve them promptly as we know everyone has a great deal of preparation to do before next week. If you have a list of problem tickets that you want a specific update on, I'd be happy to provide you with that information.”
“Not right now. When is the AAR scheduled?” he checked.
“Currently the After Action Review is scheduled for Friday morning.” It's customary after a project like this to invite the affected department heads together to review how the project when from everyone's perspective. This can be rough.
The problem is that everyone that speaks their piece at one of these meetings can say something different, can even say things that sound contradictory, and yet everyone can be right. It can be a difficult thing to listen to someone expressing themselves and trying to turn your thought patterns over to their way of thinking, but that's what you have to do. The bulk of the work we do directly supports the customer and understanding how to help them is critical for success.
If you get lucky, no one will get chatty. You get up, point to a few slides, say a few words, everyone grunts in agreement, and I can scamper back to my office and relax. That's what I was really hoping would happen. Of course this call was guaranteeing that it wouldn't happen like that.
I heard him clicking around. “Ah yesh, I see it now. Thank you for your assistance.”
“We are always glad to help. Feel free to email me a list of ticket numbers for your group if you need detailed updates.”
“Thank you.” The call ground further to a halt at this point with us exchanging a few more pleasantries before actually terminating the call.
After it was done, I just leaned up against the cub wall and sighed, moving only when John coughed, indicating his need to return to his desk. “You start a ticket for that call?” John responded in the affirmative. “Good man. Close it, saying that I talked to him and answered his questions.” I sighed again and headed back to my office. “Can't wait for Friday.” I punctuated this with a weak and unenthusiastic 'Woo-hoo'.
Somewhere around two in the afternoon yesterday I retreated to my office as I realized that I'd yet to eat any lunch and it was no longer a task I could put off any further. I was hungry and tired and just needed a moment to think.
I had just barely sat down and begun to unwrap my sandwich when there came a knock upon my door, a nervous rapping at my chamber door. John, one of my interns, poked his head inside and started stammering about not wanting to interrupt me but he felt he had to do so. “Mr. Pedrina's on the phone and wants to talk to you.”
“Oofy?” You know how sometimes when the pressure is on that your mental filters don't work as well as they normally do? That's what happened to me and was the reason behind my question. The thought just slipped out. John started laughing immediately. This put me in an odd position, both pleased that I caused some amusement and a bit embarrassed as I'd said something I shouldn't have said.
As I tried to explain to John that he shouldn't repeat what I'd just said, John looked for further understanding. “Oofy? Why Oofy?”
“Well,” I had no good answer to this question, “he looks like an Oofy, doesn't he?”
In that John was forced to agree with me. I'm not sure that either of us could define an 'Oofy' if asked but Jeremiah Pedrina was clearly an 'Oofy'. I think, with time, you will agree.
I headed outside, hoping that taking the call in public would prevent me from further speaking without thinking. It also gave me an extra moment or two to get my brain ready for the conversation. Upon picking up the phone, I did my best to sound bright and cheerful instead of hungry and tired. “Yesh, ish thish the manager of the department?” asked Oofy. The man has a talent for not being able to recognize me, either on the phone or in person. Upon hearing me confirm my role, he continued. “I've been hearing of a number of computer related problemsh being experienced by the membersh of my department. When will they be resolved?”
The brevity of his question caught me off guard and we sat through a brief silence while I waited for him to say more. When it became clear that he was waiting for my response, I began to scramble. “I don't want to sound flippant but we always try to resolve open problems as soon as we can. Is there a specific situation on which you need an update?”
“No, no, I don't think so,” Oofy replied. “There just seemsh to be a lot of complaining going on in my department and I wanted a statush.”
My head began to hurt more. I wasn't sure what he wanted to hear or what information he was looking to obtain. It was difficult to respond. “We do have a high volume of existing problem tickets at the moment, which is not uncommon for the period after a break. We're doing our best to resolve them promptly as we know everyone has a great deal of preparation to do before next week. If you have a list of problem tickets that you want a specific update on, I'd be happy to provide you with that information.”
“Not right now. When is the AAR scheduled?” he checked.
“Currently the After Action Review is scheduled for Friday morning.” It's customary after a project like this to invite the affected department heads together to review how the project when from everyone's perspective. This can be rough.
The problem is that everyone that speaks their piece at one of these meetings can say something different, can even say things that sound contradictory, and yet everyone can be right. It can be a difficult thing to listen to someone expressing themselves and trying to turn your thought patterns over to their way of thinking, but that's what you have to do. The bulk of the work we do directly supports the customer and understanding how to help them is critical for success.
If you get lucky, no one will get chatty. You get up, point to a few slides, say a few words, everyone grunts in agreement, and I can scamper back to my office and relax. That's what I was really hoping would happen. Of course this call was guaranteeing that it wouldn't happen like that.
I heard him clicking around. “Ah yesh, I see it now. Thank you for your assistance.”
“We are always glad to help. Feel free to email me a list of ticket numbers for your group if you need detailed updates.”
“Thank you.” The call ground further to a halt at this point with us exchanging a few more pleasantries before actually terminating the call.
After it was done, I just leaned up against the cub wall and sighed, moving only when John coughed, indicating his need to return to his desk. “You start a ticket for that call?” John responded in the affirmative. “Good man. Close it, saying that I talked to him and answered his questions.” I sighed again and headed back to my office. “Can't wait for Friday.” I punctuated this with a weak and unenthusiastic 'Woo-hoo'.
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