I'm constantly amazed by things, all sorts of things. I think the world is full of wonders and oddities that make it interesting. I love to find these and they usually amaze me. They aren't always great things, sometimes annoying things, but anyways. The current thing that amazes me is how simliar my issues with IT departments are, no matter the scope of the job or the size of the company. The IT solutions at all seven companies (General Cinema, Taco Bell, Toys R Us, NetMarket, Stacey's Greenhouses, Decipher, and RC2) I've been employeed by have all been crap in one way or another. IT should provide, within cost and reason, tools to help the employees to their jobs. Not create things which force employees to spend time doing instead of their jobs.
Currently I want to be able to easily update from the road pictures and event write ups. I also would like a website design to allow such things to easily be displayed. I have neither. RC2 actually has a decent web team but since I'm in Charlotte and they are in Chicago I'm sure there is a little out of sight out of mind. Our website is actually one of the better ones in the TCG industry, it just doesn't do exactly what I want it to do.
But hey, I'm a smart guy (at least my mom told me that once), I can figure it out. So guess what, I'm just going to use Blogger! A free service that does exactly what I want and I can avoid stressing out about it and arguing why it is a good idea. So in case you want to visit and see the coolness that is Fullmetal Alchemist TCG events (really, it isn't that cool but I have a good time) check out my other blog. fmatcg.blogspot.com
That brings me to another thing that amazes me in the not good way. Why can I find a free solution for an IT problem that is better than the one that my company is no doubt paying a lot for. We have email issues, big graphic attachments, a redundant server set up to avoid losing emails, not enough space. When our local email server gets full the redundant system just stops sending us email and keeps it in Chicago. This problem happens about once every six weeks so now we're supposed to keep our inbox down to 20 megs. I get 6 gigs of email space from google for free and I have an expensive thing at work that I have to keep under 20 megs. Amazing.
4 comments:
You call it amazing, I call it typical. Typically the IT decision makers (and often the worker bees, too) are far enough removed from the front lines to truly feel the impact of a faulty "solution." Not only that, but I've seen enough software "solutions" cause more problem than solution that I'm now convinced "solution" actually means "set of dice" because sometimes you get lucky, sometimes you crap out, but you're always holding your breath.
Software solutions = oxymoron. IT/software companies, stop tryin' to sound smart and just gimme something that fixes the damn problem and doesn't cause any new ones.
I feel your pain TMac, but the blogger solution is a good one. The site looks awesome!
Keep in mind, too, that we (the TCG group) are probably the only part of the company that has any need for "updates from the road" functionality. Which means someone would have to do that just for us. And you know what the chances of that happening are.
You're violating blogging laws by so openly naming your company. :)
I will say that at my company, the IT guys (there's only 4 total) are awesome. At "The Company" it took 7 guys 18 months to get almost nothing done, while these guys can belt it out in a few weeks. Great stuff.
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