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<blockquote data-quote="RealAlHazred" data-source="post: 9382332" data-attributes="member: 25818">Let me stop you right there: I don't know how to read. As should be obvious from my responses here.Also, I've had a variety of these methods from management at various jobs in the last 30 years. And it always comes down to, it doesn't matter what sort of efficiency training you give me, I'm not the one making the ultimate decision about equipment. Case in point: customer retains our services for one month, and then calls us out for an issue with server; this was in 2012-2013 sometime. I arrive onsite to find a SuperMicro server (‽) running Windows Server 1998 (‽‽‽) with some implementation of dBase that some guys with downtime during Y2K had worked up a bunch of macros for and packaged them for the company. I call my boss to tell him that literally every piece of hardware and software I can find is either End of Life, or the company that made it is out of business. There are multiple hardware issues with drives, memory, and one of the cards; there may be issues with the software, too, but I'm not familiar with any of it.Boss: &quot;Let me pull you into a conference call with &lt;Customer&gt; to explain this.&quot;Me: &quot;... Oh-kaaay.&quot;&lt;Customer&gt; joins&lt;Customer&gt;: &quot;What is the issue?&quot;Boss: &quot;My tech will explain.&quot;Me: explains all the issues&lt;Customer&gt;: &quot;So? What's the problem? Just fix it!&quot;Boss: &quot;But we can sell you a better system that will break down less often!&quot;&lt;Customer&gt;: &quot;I don't want to spend the money.&quot;Boss: &quot;But I haven't even calculated the charge!&quot;&lt;Customer&gt;: &quot;It doesn't matter, it will be more than the one-month charge for technical support you sold us.&quot;Upshot, I managed, by a miracle, to find a memory stick at home that fit (because I never throw anything out), and my boss managed to find a replacement for the faulty card which another coworker couriered to me. The hard drive was no issue. Got all the hardware back together, apparently the hard drive was a data drive that restored from backup, and at the end of the month the customer dropped our services. My boss ended up mad at me, for no real reason other than he was hoping to upsell the customer, despite it being obvious that was never going to happen.Doesn't matter how efficient I am if I'm not the one making the call.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="RealAlHazred, post: 9382332, member: 25818"] Let me stop you right there: I don't know how to read. As should be obvious from my responses here. Also, I've had a variety of these methods from management at various jobs in the last 30 years. And it always comes down to, it doesn't matter what sort of efficiency training you give [I]me[/I], [I]I'm[/I] not the one making the ultimate decision about equipment. Case in point: customer retains our services for one month, and then calls us out for an issue with server; this was in 2012-2013 sometime. I arrive onsite to find a SuperMicro server (‽) running Windows Server 1998 (‽‽‽) with some implementation of dBase that some guys with downtime during Y2K had worked up a bunch of macros for and packaged them for the company. I call my boss to tell him that literally every piece of hardware and software I can find is either End of Life, or the company that made it is out of business. There are multiple hardware issues with drives, memory, and one of the cards; there may be issues with the software, too, but I'm not familiar with any of it. Boss: "Let me pull you into a conference call with <Customer> to explain this." Me: "... Oh-kaaay." [I]<Customer> joins[/I] <Customer>: "What is the issue?" Boss: "My tech will explain." Me: [I]explains all the issues[/I] <Customer>: "So? What's the problem? Just fix it!" Boss: "But we can sell you a better system that will break down less often!" <Customer>: "I don't want to spend the money." Boss: "But I haven't even calculated the charge!" <Customer>: "It doesn't matter, it will be more than the one-month charge for technical support you sold us." Upshot, I managed, by a miracle, to find a memory stick at home that fit (because I never throw anything out), and my boss managed to find a replacement for the faulty card which another coworker couriered to me. The hard drive was no issue. Got all the hardware back together, apparently the hard drive was a data drive that restored from backup, and at the end of the month the customer dropped our services. My boss ended up mad at me, for no real reason other than he was hoping to upsell the customer, despite it being obvious that was never going to happen. Doesn't matter how efficient I am if I'm not the one making the call. [/QUOTE]

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