I'm done playing the lotteryPrev Topic Next Topic

New Topic New Poll

GiveFive

Florida's West Coast
United States
Member #92,603
June 10, 2010
7,150 Posts
Online

Jan 8, 2026, 10:11 am

Quote: Originally posted by OhSoClose on Jan 8, 2026
I was in tech for over 30 years, on a much, much smaller network than yours, but I learned quickly that it's a sad fact that the big boss sees you as nothing more than an overpaid janitor. Zero clue what you do, the problems you are equipped to solve, and how often you put out fires before anybody even knows there's a problem. In my case, the big boss really hated me because I negotiated a better salary than they wanted to pay. Three times, the big boss assigned somebody to watch me for days at a time to figure out what I did because he thought I was expendable. The third guy sat beside me for 3 days straight and when he reported back to the big boss, he told him that he still had no idea what I was doing but he did know one thing: they needed me. Big boss grudgingly left me alone after that and a couple years later, I negotiated a million dollar windfall for him and that's when I finally got a little respect.

Retired after 23 years in that position and the rules said they couldn't even hire my replacement until after I was gone. The little boss told me to write up project notes in detail which I did. Step by step stuff and about 30 pages of it. I turned it in to the little boss who looked through it and nodded. The organization has a history of calling retirees in after they've gone and asking them to spend a week with the replacement to get them up to speed. They expect this to happen without compensation and surprisingly a lot of people comply with that request. When I left, I told them that if they called, they should be prepared to have a purchase order to reference. The phone did not ring. Rule number one: Know your worth.

I had guys that I worked with come to me and say "I can't believe they're letting you go. You lave forgotten more than anybody will know, but management obviously does not understand that." My response was always the same - "Who cares? I don't."

I also was fully aware that at some point in time they would realize the knowledge I possessed had value, but I was never called back. I did return to IBM as a contractor, BUT!! I made darn sure the job I took was a clerical position with zero pressure. That job was in the very same data center and a lot people that I formerly worked with knew I was there. The very first day on my new no brainer job I made it very clear to them that there would be absolutely no way I would bail them out. So they knew better than to show up at my desk and try to pick my brain. I hated being nasty like that to my former colleagues.

As an IT professional yourself, you very likely have a fine appreciation of something that happened to me before I was let go while I was leading a "Disaster Recovery Test." Prior to the disaster drill, my boss called. He said "It's very important that this recovery test be successful. It can not fail." I gave him my standard reply of "No problem." (That's because even if the test failed, which it ultimately did, I had the means and knowledge of how to sweep any issues/problems that happened during the restoration of the mainframe under the rug.)

So the test is almost complete, and problems had surfaced while restoring the computer that were definitely not good. But we LEARNED about them in a TEST environment and promptly fixed them all so that if a real disaster ever wiped out our LIVE data center, it would be impossible for those problems to ever occur. My thinking was better to find them during a disaster DRILL rather than when things would really matter and a boatload of "chips" were down on the table.

Of course I hid all of those nasty problems from my boss... I even told him "the test was wildly successful". He bit. I laughed. But he did get to tell a lot of execs that "everything went exactly as planed, just as it was supposed to happen". The execs loved it and everybody was happy. No endless follow up "Problem Root Cause Analysis" meetings. No exec ever got to say to me "Guarantee me this problem is never going to happen again." I knew it would never happen again because I had the right people on my team fix the problems.

I never understood managements warped thinking that a Disaster Recovery Test could be a "failure". The very reason you test is so you can find the problems and fix them before they bite you in the a$$ during the real deal. To my mind it is impossible for any disaster recovery test to fail. But what did I know? I wasn't in management, therefore my opinion didn't count. G5

Play Smart! That's IF there is such a thing as playing smartly!!
OhSoClose

Tyrone, PA
United States
Member #198,209
May 15, 2019
305 Posts
Offline

Jan 8, 2026, 10:30 am

Yes, we're on the same page with preparedness. I always tried to fix things before they became a problem. Others in IT told me I was crazy. They said it was much better to let things happen and then fix them quickly. That way, upper admin knew you were doing your job. I wasn't built that way. Couldn't let things burn if I knew about them. I recall once a lady in HR called me and said she was having some problem, could I help? HR wasn't part of my responsibility but I wasn't in the middle of anything else, so I said sure. Went over and had her problem fixed within 10 minutes. She said thanks and I leaned in and said, you know I'm not the guy you're supposed to call for this sort of thing. She smiled and said she knew that, but she'd called the right guy twice and he never showed up and she also knew that if she called me, I'd get it done. Never hurts to have advocates in HR.

I used to say, if they didn't have problems, they wouldn't need us, but I wish sometimes they didn't need us so much.
GiveFive

Florida's West Coast
United States
Member #92,603
June 10, 2010
7,150 Posts
Online

Jan 8, 2026, 10:38 am

Quote: Originally posted by OhSoClose on Jan 8, 2026
Yes, we're on the same page with preparedness. I always tried to fix things before they became a problem. Others in IT told me I was crazy. They said it was much better to let things happen and then fix them quickly. That way, upper admin knew you were doing your job. I wasn't built that way. Couldn't let things burn if I knew about them. I recall once a lady in HR called me and said she was having some problem, could I help? HR wasn't part of my responsibility but I wasn't in the middle of anything else, so I said sure. Went over and had her problem fixed within 10 minutes. She said thanks and I leaned in and said, you know I'm not the guy you're supposed to call for this sort of thing. She smiled and said she knew that, but she'd called the right guy twice and he never showed up and she also knew that if she called me, I'd get it done. Never hurts to have advocates in HR.

I used to say, if they didn't have problems, they wouldn't need us, but I wish sometimes they didn't need us so much.

We IBM'ers used to call your excellent attitude as "Being Proactive". That never cut any ice with management. Congrats anyway.

I think managers wanted/needed us not to be proactive just so they could "manage" something and justify their very existence.

I had one arrogant slob of a manager tell me "managers handle problems with dexterity and skills not possessed by others." How'd he do that when he had no absolutely no idea of what I did or even how I did it??? G5

Play Smart! That's IF there is such a thing as playing smartly!!
OhSoClose

Tyrone, PA
United States
Member #198,209
May 15, 2019
305 Posts
Offline

Jan 8, 2026, 11:20 am

Indeed. Managers are the same everywhere it seems. I was in a meeting once with my direct boss and people from other departments. One lady brings up a database project and says how helpful it was and how much she appreciated that my boss got it done. And, of course, the project she loved was 100% my project and the boss had zero work in it. He looked at me a little sheepishly after she lavished praise on him. I just smiled.

I told one of my guys what he'd done and my guy said, I'll bet you're really mad. No, I'm not mad. Getting mad serves no purpose. Then he winked and said, oh I get it, you'll get even. Nope. Getting even just risks blowing back on me. So what are you going to do? Move on to the next project. I didn't do it for them. I did it for me.
GiveFive

Florida's West Coast
United States
Member #92,603
June 10, 2010
7,150 Posts
Online

Jan 8, 2026, 11:53 am

Quote: Originally posted by OhSoClose on Jan 8, 2026
Indeed. Managers are the same everywhere it seems. I was in a meeting once with my direct boss and people from other departments. One lady brings up a database project and says how helpful it was and how much she appreciated that my boss got it done. And, of course, the project she loved was 100% my project and the boss had zero work in it. He looked at me a little sheepishly after she lavished praise on him. I just smiled.

I told one of my guys what he'd done and my guy said, I'll bet you're really mad. No, I'm not mad. Getting mad serves no purpose. Then he winked and said, oh I get it, you'll get even. Nope. Getting even just risks blowing back on me. So what are you going to do? Move on to the next project. I didn't do it for them. I did it for me.

Wanna hear about one IBM second level managers particularly bad behavior?

I was one of six guys riding in a car coming back from a New York jets football game in what was once Shea Stadium that was driven by a very drunk manager of IBM managers. He side swiped an on coming car that spun around and ended up in a farm field. The car I was riding in stopped (heading in the original direction it was headed) on the shoulder of the road.

An IBM first level manager who was a direct report to the drunk behind the wheel, screamed at the drunk "Sam, you get this car outta here!" Sam floored it.

We got back to the parking lot where we all had met prior to the game as we had made plans to carpool to the Jets game. Sam screamed at us passengers, "Get the 'eff' out!" As I stood there in the parking lot after exiting Sam's car, he burned rubber and flew up the highway at a high rate of speed. My hands and knees were literally shaking. I got in my car and drove home.

This incident happened in the late 1970's . To this very day, I still cant forget it. Sam never got caught. G5

Play Smart! That's IF there is such a thing as playing smartly!!
OhSoClose

Tyrone, PA
United States
Member #198,209
May 15, 2019
305 Posts
Offline

Jan 8, 2026, 12:17 pm

My best roadtrip story was when they sent me and my buddy, Brian, to Chicago for a tech conference. We had some time on our hands and decided to take a little walking tour of downtown Chicago. We're walking along, just soaking it all in and I realize that there's two guys following us about half a block back. I wasn't sure at first and I didn't want to spook Brian, so I said when we got to the next intersection let's go that way and at the following intersection let's go that way just to see if the two following made the same turns and they did.

When we got to the next intersection, I said to Brian, let's just wait here for a minute. I turned around to face the guys who were following us and watched them get closer. I'm 6'4" and was a good 250 lbs at the time so as they got closer, I made eye contact with both of them and nodded. They just kept walking. When they were out of earshot, I said to Brian, those two were following us. He suddenly got the urge to go back to the hotel.
GiveFive

Florida's West Coast
United States
Member #92,603
June 10, 2010
7,150 Posts
Online

Jan 8, 2026, 12:46 pm

Quote: Originally posted by OhSoClose on Jan 8, 2026
My best roadtrip story was when they sent me and my buddy, Brian, to Chicago for a tech conference. We had some time on our hands and decided to take a little walking tour of downtown Chicago. We're walking along, just soaking it all in and I realize that there's two guys following us about half a block back. I wasn't sure at first and I didn't want to spook Brian, so I said when we got to the next intersection let's go that way and at the following intersection let's go that way just to see if the two following made the same turns and they did.

When we got to the next intersection, I said to Brian, let's just wait here for a minute. I turned around to face the guys who were following us and watched them get closer. I'm 6'4" and was a good 250 lbs at the time so as they got closer, I made eye contact with both of them and nodded. They just kept walking. When they were out of earshot, I said to Brian, those two were following us. He suddenly got the urge to go back to the hotel.

Thank goodness I never had anything like that happen to me.

About being proactive. There is another side to that equation. I knew a guy who used that side of the equation to his advantage.

Roger was a programmer, and darn good one at that. Always thought highly of him because I thought he was so smart.

One day Rog told me he was aware of what he termed as a "festering problem". He saw it coming from a mile away but nobody else was even remotely aware of it. He explained the problem to me and I was very impressed with his keenness of insight. So I said to him "You're gonna fix it, right? To my utter amazement he replied "Not today. I'm gonna fix it after it blows up and is out in the open. I've already crafted a fix for it."

It quickly dawned on me he was planning to be a hero. As he so often said to me "Visibility is key. Being proactive and fixing a problem before anybody knows there is a problem sometimes doesn't do me any good. 'Viz' is a very good thing because managers can actually see what it is that I've accomplished."

Roger's career moved along very nicely. And those so called management experts had no clue had badly he was playing them. Gotta hand it to Rog. G5

Play Smart! That's IF there is such a thing as playing smartly!!
OhSoClose

Tyrone, PA
United States
Member #198,209
May 15, 2019
305 Posts
Offline

Jan 8, 2026, 1:19 pm

Sounds like Rog was smarter than me. I recall once being in a meeting in the superintendent's office along with 4 other higher-ups. The super says he wants to do XYZ, what do you guys think? First guy says, great idea, boss! 2nd, 3rd and 4th guy, same thing. They get to me. I said you could absolutely do that but to implement correctly you'd want to avoid problems by doing ABC first. I sit back like aren't I the clever fellow but when I look around the table, everybody else is looking at me like I just took a dump. I was right and we ended up doing exactly what I said, but it turns out when it's time to say great idea boss is not the time to be helpful. They never invited me back.

Your mailbox is full, BTW.
Ney1

Houston
United States
Member #255,587
September 22, 2025
74 Posts
Offline

Jan 8, 2026, 2:01 pm

Quote: Originally posted by GiveFive on Jan 7, 2026
True enough. I guess I too didn't think it was worthy of telling people about it because I thought it was no big deal.

Most people who never met Joe Heller couldn't possibly know he was an ogre. They'd all very likely "look for the best in people" only to be disappointed by friendly old Joe. But if you were Paul Simon or Mario Puzo, then he'd talk to you. I know that because my niece and her husband attended a party at Joe's apartment in NYC with those two particular celeb's in attendance (among many other celebrities) and told me how Simon and Puzo ignored them after Heller's wife introduced my niece and her husband to them.

Heard that little ditty from many of my fellow "Beemers" too many times to count. G5

That's pretty common behavior among celebrities. They do tend to stick to themselves than socialize with us "commoners" 🤭 And it's for good reasons: they can get sued for trivial b.s. that wasn't intended for. All those Hollywood types, NBA Ballers, NFLers etc., are taught to avoid "common people" and move differently as a celebrity. You'd be surprised how ordinary people will scheme for a way to get a celebrity entangled with them and then sue 'em. Its why most travel with security or some kind of spokesperson to give them legal advice when they out in public around "commoners." Its why I'd never want to be a famous person. I rather win the lottery. Become a millionaire and remain anonymous.

I Don't Guess Numbers. I Create Smart Filters To Draft My Numbers.
GiveFive

Florida's West Coast
United States
Member #92,603
June 10, 2010
7,150 Posts
Online

Jan 8, 2026, 2:54 pm

Quote: Originally posted by OhSoClose on Jan 8, 2026
Sounds like Rog was smarter than me. I recall once being in a meeting in the superintendent's office along with 4 other higher-ups. The super says he wants to do XYZ, what do you guys think? First guy says, great idea, boss! 2nd, 3rd and 4th guy, same thing. They get to me. I said you could absolutely do that but to implement correctly you'd want to avoid problems by doing ABC first. I sit back like aren't I the clever fellow but when I look around the table, everybody else is looking at me like I just took a dump. I was right and we ended up doing exactly what I said, but it turns out when it's time to say great idea boss is not the time to be helpful. They never invited me back.

Your mailbox is full, BTW.

Thanks. My mailbox shouldn't be full now. I just deleted every single message in it. G5

Play Smart! That's IF there is such a thing as playing smartly!!
GiveFive

Florida's West Coast
United States
Member #92,603
June 10, 2010
7,150 Posts
Online

Jan 8, 2026, 3:23 pm

Quote: Originally posted by GiveFive on Jan 8, 2026
Thanks. My mailbox shouldn't be full now. I just deleted every single message in it. G5

It's sad but many times my management only wanted to hear what they wanted to hear. Or they wanted answers to the questions they were specifically concerned about, and rejected answers/comments about the potential ancillary problems to what they had originally proposed or asked about. I did have good managers that weren't as egotistical as other managers. That's because they were in possession of excellent listening skills.

I wouldn't say Roger was smarter than you. He NEVER flaunted his superior intellect to anybody. He just used it to his advantage. Isn't that we all should have been doing?

My personality/attitude was in a large degree like yours. If somebody talked like they were "The Expert" (as many mangers did) and I knew they had no clue of what they were talking about, then I deliberately let them have their way. When the 'you know what' hit the fan because we did as they said to do, they rarely if ever came to me to ask what I would have done differently.

I had a genius boss that told every single one of his direct reports in a department meeting in the conference room "Come see me if you have a problem and need my help. Together we'll get the problem resolved." At a later point in time, I had a problem that I just couldn't get fixed so I knocked on his office door, explained the issue, and asked him what he recommended be done. His response was "I don't know. You tell me. You're the expert, not me." Never bothered with that moron ever again.

The troops in my department got a big kick out of that story. It turned out a woman I knew told me about a guy that had worked where I did, but he had moved on to a different job in IBM. So out of desperation we called him and told him what we were struggling so mightily with.

"Oh yeah! That happened to me way back in the 80's! I had a b*tch of time getting that fixed. But here's how to fix it." G5

Play Smart! That's IF there is such a thing as playing smartly!!
OhSoClose

Tyrone, PA
United States
Member #198,209
May 15, 2019
305 Posts
Offline

Jan 8, 2026, 4:48 pm

Many, many similarities. I tried to learn from every interaction. Sometimes you learn what to do and sometimes it's what not to do. Frustrating when somebody you're forced to interact with doesn't have their head on straight. Early on, a vendor failed to meet an installation deadline and I had to go the finance guy to request an extension on the old vendor. He looked at me and said, you didn't think this through very well, did you? I knew he was trying to bait me into an outburst, so I just looked at him and said Henry, I'm just playing the cards I was dealt the best way I know how. He looked back at me, nodded, and said What do you need me to do? He had my back every step of the way after that. But if I'd snapped at him or gotten defensive, it would have gone a whole different direction.

New Topic New Poll

Subscribe to this topic

I'm done playing the lotteryPrev TopicNext Topic

I'm done playing the lotteryPrev Topic Next Topic