“Being in IT is kind of like being a doctor with a patient who complains that “It hurts when I stick a fork in my eye.”
John C. Welch writes a quick intro for people new to being a SysAdmin
We, of course, being the logical sort, reply back, in all sincerity and earnestness, “Well, you should stop sticking a fork in your eye then.”
The user, or patient will then look at us like we really are the idiots they believe us to be and say: “No, you don’t understand…I want you to make it stop hurting.“”
I looked at Jack for a minute, like he was fucking crazy, until he said, “The whole problem with IT is that some days, we just can’t make the fork not hurt, and that’s always going to be our fault. It’s why so many IT people drink like fish.”
It’s always been my contention that being a good sysadmin is a vocation rather than a job. Working in IT is 70% personality and 30% technology. You have to fix the problem while, at the same time, making the end user realise that it wasn’t their fault.
And that’s true. If computers worked properly then there’d be no need for sysadmins.
But yes, when a senior manager reads the sentence “clicking this button will overwrite your profile with an older, saved version” and goes ahead, it’s not necessarily the computer’s fault. But when working as a low level IT employee, your manager will receive a call from that senior manager, it’s not the computer’s fault and it’s damn sure not the managers fault, it’s your fault.
Even if you weren’t there, it’s your fault.
You see, you failed to walk on water. You failed to do the impossible.
You suck.