Negotiating

I am working with an IT company to put together a proposal of services to help support my church. I had interviewed several companies that are local and small enough to make it affordable to the church. My church has NO IT support and earlier this year, when their email server went down, there was no support and they were without email for over 2 weeks. It’s amazing how many people will email the pastors, rather than call. They had to announce it at every service on the weekends. I know if it was my company that would be completely unacceptable. We go down occasionally but it’s an hour or 2….anything more than that and we’re losing thousands every hour. It’s not an option. But we also have 24/7 monitoring and Service Level Agreements in place that make sure that doesn’t happen. But a small church doesn’t have that luxury.

Until now. The proposal is pretty fair in my eyes. I have a few concerns and I’m willing to put together the “list of demands” from everyone else so I can talk to the company about them and see what our options are. I have to admit that I think this is fun. This is what I do but on a much larger scale for my job. And I think that I may impress some of the people from the church because they really are not tech savvy or even business savvy. Running a business and running a church are 2 different things.

So I’ll be negotiating with the company to determine what concessions they’ll make and what we’re willing to pay. I like playing negotiator and keeping a poker face. I, obviously, cannot make decisions for the church but I do get to talk intelligently to this company about my expectations. I like being an adult sometimes.

Having interviewed and recommended this company, I have a pretty good feel for how they do business. I’m impressed. So impressed, actually, that I’m thinking of selling them my services. I think I would be a great addition to their company. They would be able to offer higher level project management and even vendor relations. I think I would be a good match to the company as it’s small and growing. It would enable me to have smaller projects (with smaller budgets) and I can be more one on one with clients. I honestly think a smaller company would be a better fit for me at this point in my career. I’m getting to be a little bit of a small fish in a big pond in my current company. Not that that is bad but I think I work better when I know I’m out performing others. It’s the competition. And I've been with my company almost 11 years.  I don't think there is much of a career path for me because it's my boss then the CIO of the company.  My boss is new, so not going anywhere and I'll never be the CIO because I don't have anengineering background.  So I'm kind of limited.

Of course, there are negatives to this. I’m not sure they can afford me. I can’t really take a reduction at this point. And insurance and such…all things I have perfectly balanced with my current job. So I would potentially lose some money, which I can’t afford. .

But I’m trying to think of a way to send my resume to the owner and sell him the concept of having me work for him. I think I have it thought out and I can just forward the resume and see what happens….but I don’t want to talk over his head but I also want to sound professional and eager. This will probably not happen; the offer of a job. But I think it’s a good start to doing something about needing change. Otherwise, I’m cashing out my 401K, moving to a MUCH cheaper place, going to school and then starting a new career.

And what career?  I have a few ideas but I think they are ideas because they seem fun but probably not profitable.  I'm getting a little of the Peter Pan syndrome.  I'd like to stop being an adult and just play with my toys.

Day 12 → Something you never get compliments on.

If I were to say something here it would come across as complaining and snippy. I have things that I think I do pretty well and I do get a little pissy when I’m not recognized for my efforts but that is probably when I should have been doing it without the thought in mind that I was doing it for the attention.



This one is just the most recent and so one that I’m obsessing about. I have donated my time and talents to my church (which is also a K-8 school) with no recognition. I wanted to do something to give back to the Church that has been so good to me. They didn’t ask me to help; I kept pushing them to do something. I kept asking if there was anything I could do to fix the situation. I just wanted to give back something because they had given so much. But, in reality, I did it because I was absolutely aghast about the fact that they did not have any formal IT support and I felt it was my duty to fix that. Now whether or not they wanted it, it was going to happen. So I went to a few companies, got some idea of what kind of support they would provide and then put a business case together for the recommendation to hire a certain company for on-going support. This took a lot of my personal time to do (not to mention several hours of my work day to interview them) but it was something that I felt needed to happen. The church doesn’t know any better; or even what the hell they have or need.



But they had a burning need. The “IT guy” they were using occasionally had gone shitty and wasn’t working appropriately with them. So they fired him and then the servers went down. A friend of a friend of a friend, etc…was called and he was able to get the server back up but he’s a server guy, not a printer guy or desktop support, so they were not working at optimal level.



So I did a walk through with the company (who are TechGuys in Overland Park; click HERE for their website) and I knew more about what the Church had then anyone that had been with that Church for years. And before we were even done, the Pastor was asking when they could start. They have since come out and did a scan of the issues; even fixing some without an official agreement with the Church; working in good faith that the Church will at least sign them up for some services.



I know one of the teachers at the school and she says that they were able to fix a problem that she has had for months. I think the teachers and office help are ecstatic because TechGuys are professional but also able to interpret the “geek speak” to the teachers and office people; helping them understand what it is they are doing or needing.



I did that…me….and I’ve been trying to stay content in the knowledge that I don’t have to be thanked for something that I should have given without the need to be recognized. And I don’t expect for the Church to hold up banners or even interrupt the service to have me come up and accept an award. I don’t think that they should single me out.



But I totally want them to single me out. I want a little paragraph in the newsletter, telling people what I did. I would like to at least get a Thank You when I go up to the Pastors after the service. It’d be great if they had me come to all the services and had me stand up in the middle of the service; to recognize my efforts. I want all of that…but I won’t get it and that is going to have to be OK because I’m supposed to do those things. That’s part of being in a Church family; just like in your personal family. You do things that you may not get recognition for. I have a friend that says he tries to do one thing a day that is going to help someone else and not get any recognition for it. I’m not that good…I’m pretty selfish I guess.



This all sounds really petty actually. Guess this is something I’m going to have to work on.

Toaster Analogy...do you get it?

I'm kind of out of things to say this week.  It's been one of those weeks where it didn't move fast enough but it also screamed by.

I think I have made a decision to start looking for a different job. I used to love my job. Everything about it. I got to make million dollar decisions, I managed people and expectations and I got a kick out of fixing things that were broken.  I especially loved the ability to create structure where there was chaos. 

But lately, it's been hard to not be bitter about the fact that I am totally unappreciated.  IT is never known for getting kudos and I'm OK with that. I understand that.  But every so often? It'd be nice to get a little acknowledgement...you know, throw me a bone....

It's hard for people to understand that the IT field is not known for getting a lot of praise. I equate a toaster to this analogy.  You use a toaster every day to toast your bagel.  Every morning, you get up and pop a bagel in the toaster, push the lever down and then walk away...knowing you'll get a toasted bagel at the end of the process.

Now, the lever pops up and your bagel is toasted.  You think nothing of it because that is what it is supposed to do.  Of course you should never expect anything different.

But one day...your toaster doesn't toast your bagel.  You push on the lever, you jiggle the plug, you might even stick a knife in it to jab at the heating elements...but still, no toasted bagel.

That is when the shit hits the fan.  Good Gosh Damn...what the hell?  Stupid toaster. Can't beleive that it would do this to me right now.  Especially when I wanted a toasted bagle.  Now I can't even have that.  This day is going to suck.  And you carry that shit around with you all day.  Snapping at co-workers...messing around with the office supplies instead of working.  Plotting your revenge on the guy that sold you the toaster.  Rallying against the fact that you couldn't have one FLIPPIN' bagle that morning.  You're whole day ruined.  All because one portion of your life, the one that you depend on every day, did not deliver.

So, you go buy a new toaster and your unceremonially dump the old one in the trash.  Never thinking about the mornings you shared over toasted bagels. Never realizing that, maybe, you should have treated the toaster a bit better.  You know, gave it a good nudge occasionally. Just to let it know that you appreciate its efforts to get you going in the morning.  Getting you in the right frame of mind to start the day. 

So, moral of the story?  Hug your IT guy/gal today and let them know you appreciate the fact that your computer, printer, server, copier etc....works 99% of the time.  Yes there are times when they don't work but can you really go forever with NOTHING breaking?

And you might want to announce your intent to hug so you don't get a punch in the nose.

One of those days...

I should have known...overslept, dogs took forever to do their "business", got to work about 30 minutes late and I had a day full of meetings.  Only to realize at 10:15, that one of my buildings is completely down with no network...at all.  Not even a few.  Like zero....

• And no, it's not a power outage because your computer is still on. 

• And no, I can't make our service provider come to your desk and type your work.

• Yes we've called them. 

• No, you don't need to call them. 

• OK, I appreciate your ability to tell me what's wrong with the network. 

• Please don't ask to get in my network room. 

• I bet you're angry about getting to stand around and talk to all your coworkers about how much of a screw up IT is.

• Yes I'm sure that we have the highest executives working on it.

• I know that your home internet is faster and doesn't go down all the time.

• I'm sure Time Warner would love our business

• Maybe you can go home but maybe you should ask your supervisor

• No, the security guard does not know what's going on

• Please don't give my phone number out to everyone on the 3rd floor so they can call me to ask what the status is

• I do understand you can't work....just as I am not able to work because I'm on the phone with all of the 3rd floor

• Well maybe you should go home

• I hope you are able to come in in the morning too

• I'll be sure and let the president of your division know that you are very upset with me and IT

• Yes I realize that it is now 3pm and you have not been able to work all day. 

• Maybe you should have listened to your supervisor when they told you to go home and work.

• Wow, look at that, the service came up.

• I know that our Service Provider should pay us for the productivity that you lost

• Please be sure and tell my supervisor that I just walked the floor and told people to be patient, he would love to hear that from you.

99.6% upage over the last year for our network and the 0.4% is when I get to hear the best advice I have ever heard.