deaf ears
Why does nobody listen to me?
Do I look stupid? Do folks feel that my bachelor’s degree and years of professional experience are insufficient qualifications? Do they think I’m just making all this stuff up?
Last week was the crap with Windows Updates… This week we’ve got an assortment of issues at one client that could easily have been avoided if folks had just listened to me.
We’ve got two new printers that were supposed to be installed today. When we ordered the printers I said that we needed to make sure they had both a NIC and a parallel port. When I un-boxed the printers today I discovered that they have neither. Just a USB port. So we’ve got to order in a couple USB JetDirects.
We also have two new computers that are supposed to be installed today. They’ve got a domain, so obviously the need Windows XP Professional in order to join the domain. When I fired up the new computers I discovered that they have Windows XP Home installed. So those machines are now on the bench being reloaded, and we had to sell this client two XP Professional licenses.
We were also supposed to be switching over to new bandwidth today. I told them repeatedly that we needed two static IPs – one for the private network and one for their public WiFi. We don’t manage the WiFi, some other company does, and they’ve got a dozen or so VPNs connecting to their router. I have no idea why they need all those VPNs, but they do. Last time we were playing with bandwidth their WiFi guys had a fit because they were given a dynamic address…and eventually they had to be switched over to static to make everything work. Today we get there and we’re told that there’s one static IP address and the two of us are going to be hiding behind a router to share the bandwidth. Needless to say, as soon as the WiFi guys heard this it was all over. There’s apparently no way they can make their system work that way.
All three issues could very easily have been avoided if folks had listened to me. I warned people. I told them to double-check everything. I knew we’d have trouble if we weren’t careful. And nobody listened to me.
So, today, we drove an hour south into the mountains… Unpacked everything at this resort… Started plugging things in and powering stuff up… And then discovered that we were completely unable to accomplish anything that we were supposed to. We wasted about three hours today and accomplished nothing. Now it is all scheduled for Wednesday… And all of Wednesday’s work has been bushed to Thursday… And I’ll spend tomorrow scrambling to get everything reloaded and ready.