It's the healing hands of guru Dabbs... again!
They're right, you're wrong (but you were right all along)
A colleague strides purposefully across the open-plan office to the production desk. She has the wrinkled brow and wild eyes of someone who is simultaneously baffled and angry. She’s on deadline but her computer is “doing stupid things” and she doesn’t understand what or why or how to stop it.
Then... her expression betrays rising panic of a different sort as she realises that her favourite User’s Little Helper is not at his desk, nor is her second favourite, nor indeed the extremely busy woman who’s actually in charge of the systems but most staff are too scared to approach. There is now a mix of terror and annoyance in the user’s eyes as she realises that the only person left to hear her plea for assistance is me.
Her heart sinks. She knows she is done for.
Today, I am not strictly speaking IT staff. I am only sitting next to IT staff. It is the only desk that’s free. Hot-desking, doncha luvvit?
However, the brain has a natural tendency to identify groups by proximity and people foolishly assume that, since I am located adjacent to clever people, I must be clever too. “Oh, isn’t Ranjit around at the moment? Could you be clever for him until he gets back?”
As Falkland Islanders wearily insist, proximity should not imply ownership. I tell this to colleagues but they won’t listen. They’re right, you’re wrong. Isn’t that always the way?
Anyone who has the misfortune to sit next to a photocopier knows what I’m taking about: everyone else assumes you’re happy to explain how to set the collation feature, know what to do about clearing feeder jams and don’t mind being asked “if there’s any more paper” every five fucking minutes.
Confounding the matter further, I almost certainly do not know how to solve any user’s computer problem. Yet I do exactly that every day. I saunter over to the user’s desk, and the problem melts away.
This infuriates users. They get cross with me for having fixed their computer problem. Possibly it’s the effortless manner of the fix; quite probably some of the users see me as part of the Hidden State that caused the problem in the first place. I was sitting next to some IT people after all.
I used to apologise. Just imagine: they get me to fix their computer although doing so is not my job, then they get angry about how simple the fix was, so I end up saying “sorry”. They’re right, you’re wrong, remember?
Not any more…
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