Last thing you'll ever read…again
Archive for December, 2007
Annoyance of the day
Dec 20th
Today I got a call from a frustrated customer.
He couldn’t get outlook to work, his computer is pretty much lagging hardcore.
He’s raised many cases before and the same problem persists. After spending around 15 minutes on the phone with him trying to get his email to work online, and telling him that I’ll be sending the case to on site support he was like "can you fix my problem" and I was just like…okay…"what problem"? I shouldn’t have asked him that question obviously…but it was more of a "what problem have you got that I can actually fix?" and he was like "the problem we’ve been talking about" and I was just like "err…you’ve done a reinstall, you’ve defragged your computer, you’ve done a detect and repair…so i don’t think there’s anything more that I can do" and he was like "well you’re the IT expert I just thought you can do something more to fix the problem". Basically, this was an ignorant computer literate user. He knew a lot about computers (or at least enough to do all the troubleshooting steps himself) but he thought that there was some "magical" setting or fix that I can pull out of my butt to assist him. I dunno, I think I might have lost my cool a bit…due to the stacks of shitty calls I’ve received all day. Today was the day where I received the most "I don’t want to take this call" calls. Even the seemingly easy calls were problematic since the problem I was fixing wasn’t the problem…
Feedback of the day:
"Excellent support, it was embarrissing how easily John fixed the problem."
Makes me happy.
Also Diana got 99.70 for her UAI. She’s so great. Now her mum wants her to do Comm/Law. (Like I didn’t see it coming) Well honey, do whatever that makes you happy like me 
User Stupidity
Dec 19th
It’s okay telling people to stop doing something that is annoying you…but to do it yourself the same time is just stupid…
When I opened up my Inbox this morning I got the usual flood of emails from work…but generally my Outlook Rules filters out about 80% of all the emails so I generally I get to read about 5-6 emails per day. Today however I got around 20…so I was like "wtf?". I realised that it was pretty much like a conversation where 1 person sent an email to everybody else and somebody would reply to all and then somebody else would reply to that message. What got interesting was the fact that users began sending emails like "Can you guys stop replying to all?". And I’m just sitting there thinking "If you want people to stop replying to all the least you can do is stop doing that yourself…" So yeah…I got flooded with around 10 emails telling the original repliers to stop replying to all…
So that’s my technical stupidity story of the day.
Artificial Life
Dec 18th
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/16/AR2007121601900.html
Interesting article. I wouldn’t mind getting into that "business". If you guys can’t be bothered reading all 3 pages read the first couple of paragraphs and the last couple. I thought it was a pretty good finish.
Read and reflect…
Dec 12th
A professor stood before his Philosophy class and had some items in front of him.
When the class began, wordlessly, he picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and proceeded to fill it with golf balls.
He then asked the students if the jar was full.
They agreed that it was.
The professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them into the jar.
He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles rolled into the open areas between the golf balls.
He then asked the students again if the jar was full.
They agreed it was.
The professor next picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar.
Of course, the sand filled up everything else.
He asked once more if the jar was full.
The students responded with a unanimous "yes."
The professor then produced two cups of coffee from under the table and poured the entire contents into the jar, effectively filling the empty space between the sand.
The students laughed.
"Now," said the professor, as the laughter subsided, "I want you to recognize that this jar represents your life.
"The golf balls are the important things – your God, family, your children, your health, your friends, and your favorite passions – things that if everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full.
"The pebbles are the other things that matter like your job, your house, and your car.
"The sand is everything else–the small stuff.
"If you put the sand into the jar first," he continued, "there is no room for the pebbles or the golf balls.
"The same goes for life.
"If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff, you will never have room for the things that are important to you.
"Pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness.
Play with your children.
"Take time to get medical checkups.
"Take your partner out to dinner.
"Play another 18.
"There will always be time to clean the house and fix the disposal.
"Take care of the golf balls first, the things that really matter.
"Set your priorities.
"The rest is just sand."
One of the students raised her hand and inquired what the coffee represented.
The professor smiled. "I’m glad you asked.
"It just goes to show you that no matter how full your life may seem, there’s always room for a cup of coffee with a friend."
Please share this with someone you care about.
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Now that you’ve read it…it means I care…not necessarily you…but I care
Just kidding, I care about all those who read this blog…but that will make it rather "post-deterministic" since the only way you know that I care about you is if you read this blog…
Makes me happy
Dec 8th
I reckon the most important aspect of any job is that you get recognised for doing a good job.
Over at pizza hut there was this sticker system. If the on duty manager or supervisor felt like you did a good job you got a circular sticker to stick next to your name. If you get like 15 stickers you get a box of chocolate and then something else if you got like 30…and then the final prize was a $100 voucher for Westfield. Although…the rewards don’t come that often as it takes around 1 whole year to get that far…and it just gets a bit ridiculous…
Over at JAV I.T. nobody gives a crap about how lazy you are or how much faster you work…I remember one week where we blitzed through everything and we finished 1 whole day early…but we still got paid for it…made us happy. But then…it just takes one slacker to make the entire day seem slow. It doesn’t matter how much faster you work…if somebody doesn’t do their quota you ain’t finishing any earlier. So everybody tends to get a bit lazy…and yeah…you begin lazing around.
What made me happy today was that…I got a bunch of emails (5 to be precise) from the Alliance Customer Satisfaction Survey System. Basically, for every call/case you resolve a survey (bingo) gets sent to the client in which they fill out. Generally they fill it out for 3 reasons, 1) you provided an extremely good service or 2) you provided an extremely shitty service or 3) they were nice and decided to take the time to fill out a survey. So Basically in the end you get a score out of 5 for your service. As I’ve said before the people who do extremely well get an extra 4 hours worth of pay. I guess that keeps lots of people going.
But the thing is…for lots of other people it makes them feel happy just receiving these survey results for their clients. The 5 emails which I got today, 4 of them were full scoring bingos. The other I received 5 for every category except for one which I received a 4 which was "Ease of access to help", I had sent him an email with the solution and I guess a call would have been better.
But yeah…it makes me happy. Currently I have 7 high scoring bingos (a score of 5). We generally need a 4.7 average to meet CISCO standards.
I think this job is really getting to me now…I mean…the phone woke me up this morning and I was like speaking on it as if I was doing at work…in a soft…slow paced way…contrasting to the usual voice I have which is generally fast paced. And instead of saying "can you hold on for a sec?" which is generally what I usually say…I tend to replace "sec" with "moment".
I took a 4 hour nap today…yup I got up at like 10:00…and then I took a nap at 1 and woke up at 5. Catching up on sleep is always good 
But yeah…I was dreaming about answering calls 
I also hear a lot of "sure" in my calls…it’s like:
Me: Okay, it seems like your softoken isn’t working. I’ll need to rekey it.
Client: Sure
Me: I’ll just take control for a moment [Remote Desktop]
Client: Sure
Me: You’ll also need to reinstall VPN
Client: Sure
Me: I’ll help you do that
Client: Sure
Me: Can you provide me with unconditioned love?
Client: Sure…hey!
The last bit didn’t occur…
But I also caught up with some small talk on the phone…
When there’s silence and you’re waiting for something to say here are some excellent topics to talk about
1) So hows the weather over there at [insert city]?
2) Are you having a busy day?
3) So are you from [insert country...if country == India do not ask this question] ?
They tend to pass the time pretty easily.
Wow it’s been a long time since I made two posts on consecutive days. Hehe.
That’s it for now.
Laters y’all.
Cbbness
Dec 7th
Well…it was my blogs 3rd anniversary and I missed it. Due to a lot of reason…including the fact that rainlendar no longer alerts me when events are coming…thanks to ubuntu…but yeah…hurray for me. 3 years of blogging…
But anywho…I got my exam results all back…4 distinctions and 2 credits…I didn’t really care about psychology but I was only 1 mark off a distinction for statistics so that irritates me a little, not to mention that my average mark was 74.5…so that blows big time. Half a mark off a distinction average.
Ah well…on the bright side I topped my "class" in the test we had to sit for work…it doesn’t really matter if you pass or fail…but it’s funny how this one guy in my group is so keen to do everything…such a suck up…and I reckon today he was really close to ticking off this other guy.
Like I dunno, his personality is sooo weird…after the exam whilst we’re eating he’s like "So John, you topped it good work…" and I’m just like thinking "Weren’t we just having this conversation when we were inside?" and afterwards this other guy got really pissed off at him for something really small but the fact was the guy wouldn’t shut up…I was like thinking "dude…this guy is really pissed off at you…shut the fuck up!" At first it was just playing around…and then it got all quiet and then the dude started up again talking about something crap that nobody cares about ticking the guy even further.
And LOL at Peter. He didn’t sign off the call client so he got another call like 3 minutes before we were going to leave…and he was like "wtf"…it was even funnier when he was fixing the problem and had no idea what the hell the user was doing…so he went to a SME (subject matter expert) for help who told him to send it to OSS (onsite support)…Peter came back and was like "Okay we need to send it to Onsite support" and the guy was like "I am onsite support" and at that moment I began cracking up.
It’s like this:
GTRC: OH i’m sorry we can’t do any more *sends to OSS*
OSS: wtf…I can’t do this…*calls up GTRC*
GTRC: wtf you are a tool…*hangs up phone*
So yeah…will be working 4 hours each day weekday next week…I might pick up some overtime…1.5x is always nice.
I also have to buy a Christmas present for some person at my workplace who I hardly ever know…who I doubt knows me…meh. No idea what to get…probably just go to the gift shop and ask for something that I can get with 10 bucks.
I reckon this job is going to help me a lot…I mean…I can get free resources to all Cisco networking coursework so I can save heaps of money if I intend to complete a CCNA/CCNP. Should be fun…yesterday I had a call that lasted 1hr 15 minutes…and today I had a call that lasted 1hr 21 minutes…yesterday the guy wasn’t at office…he was in India and communicating to his manager via Skype…so that’s why it took so long…today the person was at home…had extremely slow internet connection and had a laptop that was 2 generations old, but in the end I fixed her problem…no the guy in India’s problem though…or more precisely…not yet.
Meh…I hate doing casework…they often have hard problems where you have no idea how to solve…and they don’t contact you…and due to the timezones it’s impossible for you to contact them…I hope I don’t get rated poorly…but since they didn’t even reply to me I doubt they’ll bother to rate my service. My current score is like 4.95 out of 5. Which is pretty decent in my opinion
Well anywho…I’ll catch you next time…ciao.
