Re: [SAGE] Help! Multiple platforms in a Dell Shop

[Brad Knowles <brad@stop.mail-abuse.org>]

At 3:48 PM -0800 2006-01-11, Strata R. Chalup wrote:

>  I don't think encouraging people to consider themselves a soulless cog in
>  a machine is very appropriate or professional.

	You may not like what I said, but that doesn't make it any less accurate.

	You may be in a position of great power wherever you work, but 
99.99% of the rest of the community is not.  Like it or not, anyone 
working in this business will tend to have a lot more responsibility 
to make sure that certain things happen certain ways, but a lot less 
authority to actually do it -- especially when it comes to 
interfacing with management or other powerful users.

	I don't think it's unprofessional to recognize or point out that 
fact, and I think it's highly unprofessional of you to claim 
otherwise.  I am greatly offended that you would even consider 
leveling that charge at me.


	My wife has been group General Counsel and Secretary to the Board 
of the worlds largest firm handling settlement and clearing of 
European stocks and bonds.  Hundreds of billions of dollars (and 
Euros) pass through their hands on a daily basis.  The company has a 
strict no-smoking policy inside the building, save the smokers 
lounge.  Yet the Chairman of the Board insists on smoking his cigars 
wherever he damn well pleases, and neither the CEO nor my wife were 
in a position to try to make him quit.  Cajole and wheedle as they 
might, they can't fire his ass, so there is not a damn thing they can 
do to stop him.

	My wife has been probably one of the most powerful female lawyers 
in the country, quite possibly all of Europe, and she was powerless 
to do this one single little thing, despite the fact that she hates 
cigar smoke more than just about anything else in the world.  That's 
something she just can't change, and she's had to learn to accept 
that fact.


	Fundamentally, if you cannot fire the person (or get them fired) 
for violating company policy, then you're unlikely to be able to 
force them to stop violating that company policy.

>  Enforcing company policy, at the personal employee level, is a
>  responsibility of every company or organization employee.  For an
>  employee such as a sysadmin, the de-facto job description includes
>  attempting to enforce compliance with technical policies set by the
>  company.

	The best that any employee can ever reasonably hope to do is to 
make sure that their own actions are in accordance with the company 
policies, that all the people who work for them (directly or 
indirectly) likewise follow the company policies, and that you do 
what you can to encourage everyone else to do the same.

	But that "encouragement" may or may not get you very far.


	You have to change the things you can, accept the things you 
can't, and you really need to be able to tell the difference between 
them.

	I've tilted at more than a few windmills, including some of the 
biggest in the world -- the Department of Defense and AOL included. 
Trust me, it doesn't work.  And any self-satisfaction you might get 
probably won't last very long.

-- 
Brad Knowles, <brad@stop.mail-abuse.org>

"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little
temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."

     -- Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790), reply of the Pennsylvania
     Assembly to the Governor, November 11, 1755

  LOPSA member since December 2005.  See <http://www.lopsa.org/>.