[kwlug disc.] "people don't respect what they don't pay for"

[Raul Suarez]

Read disclaimer at the end.


--- Kyle Spaans <3lucid at gmail.com> wrote:

> Forgive my youthful naivety, but why do businesses
> seem to resist having technical support entirely in
> their own shop?

Most of it is because THEIR BUSINESS is not technical
support. They are bussy enough running their business
as to have to also manage a tech support department.

> 
> When the business man asks "Who can I call for
> support/complain to?" - why does that have to be a
> company? Why can't it be the LAN/System
> Administrator? If they are already an employee, why
> can't they be held responsible? Pockets not deep
> enough?
Time is money. If your in-house guy is going to take 3
days (ignoring their actual job) fixing the problem,
it is better to have an "expert" do it in a day.

> 
> Or is it possible that support contracts can be
> cheaper than having a knowledgable in-house
tech-guy? 

That too, if you consider that the actual cost of a
full time employee is about 100% more than his/her
salary (Office space, benefits, training, equipment,
etc)

> Is it too much to expect from one [or
> a small number of] person to be able to solve ALL of
> a businesses' technical needs?

Depends on the size of the business.

> Or are those people simply too hard to find - thusly
> making them too expensive?

> wait for the IBM guy to fly in and tinker with it.
> But WHY? Why can't
> they just have one guy in-house who can take care of
> it?
For the same reason not everyone "self insures" their
house or car. There is a cost associated with
transferring the accountability to someone else, but
if it is done in house and something goes wrong the
company must assume 100% of the loss.


Disclaimer:
I was such a person in a small company that became a
group of 4 medium sized companies including a
manufacturing company and an office suplies chain
store with locations across Mexico. I was working 12 -
14 hours every day for 10 years. I did everything from
evaluating HW, SW and services to negotiating with the
vendors, to developing software (actually a huge
business workflow app), to designing the network to
servicing the computers, administrating the Netware
and windows servers, teaching the users, banning
smoking and attending vendor product launches and
conferences and designing business processes for all
areas.

So from Manager of Information systems to the cable
guy, you get the idea.

I learned a lot, really, I had to be on top of
everything. But the thing I really learned is: The
company could have grown faster had we let someone
else service the computers, network , communications,
etc while I focussed more on finding ways to be even
more efficient in our operations. Actually I started
doing that the last couple of years I was there.

Oh, and I learned that one must also have a life! 

_________________

http://rarsa.blogspot.com/ 
An eclectic collection of random thoughts


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