Thought I’d start it off with small stuff, not get into the full blown crazy that is the company I work for… yet. There’s bits and pieces of the insanity in here (mainly because I can’t tell a linear story, sorry) but the main point is the technology.
Also – before I get to too far I want to note this: I’m fortunate to have a job in a pandemic, I and I’m not downplaying that. This is merely where I can vent about my frustrations. And of course, due to the aforementioned pandemic, I’m not really in a position where I can leave said job right now.
So starting small: the technology we use. When I came to this company from a competitor, as this is the much larger/arguably more successful company, I (wrongly) assumed they’d be up to date on their technology like company 1 was. Couldn’t have been more wrong.
We still work on desktops, with WINDOWS 7. Do you know when windows 7 was released? 2009. So lets ignore the desktop part of that equation for a minutes and highlight that we’re working on an operating system from eleven years ago that’s not even supported by Microsoft anymore. This is directly from Microsoft’s website: “The specific end of support day for Windows 7 was January 14, 2020. Technical assistance and software updates from Windows Update that help protect your PC are no longer available for the product.” (https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/windows-7-support-ended-on-january-14-2020-b75d4580-2cc7-895a-2c9c-1466d9a53962#:~:text=The%20specific%20end%20of%20support,longer%20available%20for%20the%20product)
I’m sorry, are we serious? Not only that, but the system I pretty much use exclusively to do my job, is also behind. The “official” reasoning is that they like to be at least one version behind due to bugs. in new versions, I personally think they’re just cheap. (The spending priorities at this company will have to be an entire other post.) Even so, Windows 7 is two versions behind so that story doesn’t really fit, does it? But I digress.
A couple of years (yes, years) ago they started rolling out laptops for those they deemed important enough. Now, of course that was the slowest rollout ever and naturally the vast majority of the company never saw them. And even then, I’ve heard there’s a lot of work from home issues with connecting to the network anyway. So even when they try to fix something they can’t even do that right.
Our “phone” is an app that barely works. So much so that I actually give my cell number out to use instead of my work phone number. Good thing we’re not in the 90s where you had to pay for cell minutes… If someone calls you on the app you have at least a 5 second delay before you can start talking and they can hear you, if they can even hear you at all. It cuts in and out all the time, and nine times out of ten I have to hang up and call the person back. And if you wanted to make a meeting in outlook and set up a call number? No can do. Company is too cheap for that one. At company 1, I used to create an outlook calendar event and at the top I could click a button and it would automatically create a call in. At company 2, that feature is disabled. You need to email an executive assistant to get a call in, and if you have to change the time, email her back and make sure that number is still available since they reuse the same ones and you might accidentally later call into the CFO’s call (it’s happened).
But going back to the desktop portion… Because we work on desktops, we have to use a VPN to login and route all actions THROUGH the desktop to whatever we use at home – incredibly slow. The IT team had to panic build more servers once it became clear that COVID was serious in order to have the ability to host the whole company as it was. Now, every night after like 6 or 7pm the system comes to a crawl and good luck being productive. On my team, we have incredibly tight turnaround times, so not only are we using an ancient operating system, but now we’re relying on a process that could be seriously cut down if we just had laptops and were only logging into a network. I’m expected to hit deadlines, sometimes within the hour, but I’m bogged down by my devices, not even the work itself.
Luckily for me, on my team I’ve had the ability to work from home a couple of times a week pre-COVID. Initially it was a perk, then as the office got fuller it was a requirement because they didn’t have office space for everyone. However, company 2 neither supplies nor reimburses employees for the materials necessary to do their job. For instance, my college laptop which hadn’t been touched in many years, was the only computer I owned (had a laptop at company 1 if needed but I mostly used an iPad prior). I had to go out and buy a laptop to do my job. Initially it was more or less like well this is a perk so if you don’t want to buy a computer, don’t enjoy the perk. Which is annoying in it’s own right, but less arguable. As the work from home became mandatory, of course their tune didn’t change. During the pandemic, for comfort I also had to go out and buy a monitor, keyboard, and mouse in addition to that computer. It wasn’t until MAY (we’d been working from home since March) that the company finally reached out and asked if anyone needed supplies. Well guess what? I’ve already purchased mine and yet again, they did not offer to reimburse. The keyboard and mouse were cheap so let’s exclude them for now – did I absolutely need a monitor? I guess not. But were my eyes straining on a 13″ screen and the major program I use not scaled down to really fit on the screen? Yup! So maybe not absolutely essential to them, but felt pretty necessary to me.
Not that I even have the ability to double screen anyway. Even in the office, they only allow certain positions to have two monitors, but because we route our work from home system through the desktop in our office, we can’t connect to an external monitor at home. At company 1 I was provided a laptop and all desks had a monitor to attach to should you want to. Especially as an assistant, I can’t even properly explain how beneficial having two screens was. I asked for one on my first day at company 2, not understanding how it worked, and they told me it would have to get approval from the SVP, which even on day one, I knew was better not to try.
Fast forward to working from home with personal laptops for a few months. Initially they didn’t bother much with video conferences, we just kept using our annoying af phone system app that only half works. The longer quarantine went on, however, the more they pushed for video calls to be mandatory. As they started reopening the office, they posted space limits on conference room and asked to still use video call as much as possible for social distancing/the people still at home. And their solution to people in the office needing to join video calls? At first it was now bring your laptop into the office, but eventually turned into buying everyone webcams. Instead of continuing to invest in laptops, they went out and bough everyone webcams…
Like I said, the financial decisions will have to be for another post, and this truly is just the beginning of the idiocy I see on a daily basis, but it’s a start. And it feels damn good to get this off my chest…
average desk worker 