Lazy people at work

anything I don't mind

anything I don't mind

anything I don't mind

Permabanned
Joined
28 Dec 2009
Posts
13,052
Location
london
I work in IT doing 1st/2nd line but it seems most jobs that i have had, the 3rd line guys hardly do any work. Where i am at the moment there are two 1st/2nd line guys and this other guy that does project work who is on site two days a week. I said that he should get more involved in the site and help us out with ordering and the admin tasks that we have to do. The guy got realy ****ed off and started a big argument about it, most of the time me and the other guy are realy busy dealing with all the work that comes through. We have to go to weekly service review meeting, do all the stock orders, build all the machines, support all the servers, including all permissions, updates and deal with all requests that come through even if require server work. Most of the time the 3rd line guy as he is called does absolutely nothing. Occasionally he has a project to work on, but even then he does not do that much work with it, because we have 3rd party support contracts and a infrastructure department that deals with server upgrades.

What kind of annoys me is that i am paid as a 1st/2nd line guy and imo do 3rd line work and that guy is paid more and hardly does anything. I have found this sort of scenario in several places where i work, the 3rd line guys pass everything on to the 1st/2nd line guys. But on one hand i like to get exposure to 3rd line stuff but i just think they are taking the **** and i kind of feel exploited and that i am being taking for a fool.

Was i wrong to ask the 3rd line guy for some help and do you think that it was unwarranted that he got his back up and now he is not speaking to me etc.
 
Last edited:
Yes you were wrong, but only in the way that you approached it.
As a member of the general team it would be wise to be involved if you are sat there doing nothing, but sometimes you need to know what the person is doing or scheduled to be doing, which means speaking to their manager or resource person who deals with them.
 
Some people have a better work ethic than others :)

If he doesn't do basic admin (as I wouldn't expect a 3rd liner to do) then I can understand his reaction. Who are you to tell him he should get involved in your work more?
 
I'd probably be somewhat agitated if a 1st/2nd line kiddy tried to tell me to do more work.

What work do you do that you would class as 3rd line?
 
Yes you were wrong, but only in the way that you approached it.
Click to expand...

Well we work in the same office and are very friendly with each other as we have worked together for 8 months, always having a laugh etc. So i didn't want to go "tell on him" to the boss. So first thing i did was ask him directly to help us out a bit and that is when he went off on one and tried to start an argument. I tried to tell him that i was not asking him to do my job, just to help with some of the stuff that i consider to be 3rd line. Then i left it and then the managers came back from the meeting and i mention it to them with him in the room and they kind of took his side some what. They asked him what i thought the guy could be doing extra and then i gave a few examples. But i don't think the managers got what i was saying. The guy knows he does no work. I just thought of it like if he is doing nothing all day and sees us realy busy he could at least help us out with a few things, give him something to do.
 
groen said:
Well we work in the same office and are very friendly with each other as we have worked together for 8 months, always having a laugh etc. So i didn't want to go "tell on him" to the boss. So first thing i did was ask him directly to help us out a bit and that is when he went off on one and tried to start an argument. I tried to tell him that i was not asking him to do my job, just to help with some of the stuff that i consider to be 3rd line. Then i left it and then the managers came back from the meeting and i mention it to them with him in the room and they kind of took his side some what. They asked him what i thought the guy could be doing extra and then i gave a few examples. But i don't think the managers got what i was saying. The guy knows he does no work. I just thought of it like if he is doing nothing all day and sees us realy busy he could at least help us out with a few things, give him something to do.
Click to expand...

Ah cool. Well, if you are doing work that is not what you should be doing you have a choice:

If it is detrimental to your normal work - tell your manager, let them deal with it
or
if it is not detrimental and you are learning from it - get on and do it, but learn to do it better than the 3rd line people :)
 
You gotta plan these things, dont ever just ask people because 90% of the time you will be told to **** off.

How can you make him do more work? -> Brainstorm possible options
 
Be grateful that you are doing that kind of work.

I'm at a place now where i'm purely 1st line support and i have nothing to do with servers or anything other than desktops. This frustrates me as i want to learn all about servers etc.. and i can't.

At my old work place, i was 1st/2nd and i did loads of 3rd line stuff and i loved every second of it. Yes, i wasn't paid with money for doing it, but i got paid in knowledge.
 
groen said:
I said that he should get more involved in the site and help us out with ordering and the admin tasks that we have to do.
Click to expand...

groen said:
I tried to tell him that i was not asking him to do my job, just to help with some of the stuff that i consider to be 3rd line.
Click to expand...

Do you consider "ordering and admin tasks" to be 3rd line support?
 
I'd probably be somewhat agitated if a 1st/2nd line kiddy tried to tell me to do more work.
Click to expand...

Sure in some places where i have worked as a 1st line guy only, i would not dream of going to the 3rd line guys and telling them to do more work. But in this current job, there is only 100 users and no other IT departments.

Some places where i have worked most of what i do was restricted to 3rd line, so that whole 1st/2nd/3rd line non sense just is not clean cut.

In some places anything to do with a server would be 3rd line. Where i work now, we do everything apart from major project work. But even then I had to upgrade our dictation software and i had to get involved with it, fair enough. But i am doing normal support work on top of this, trying to find the time to focus on the server upgrade. Then after wards i had to formulate all the issues after the upgrade and do all the permissions and deal with the supplier support to fix the problems. I just thought that is something the 3rd line guy should be doing.
 
Do you consider "ordering and admin tasks" to be 3rd line support?
Click to expand...

I do think that the 3rd line guy should be more involved in the site, even if he is only here two days a week. He should go to the meetings and deal with all the orders and admin tasks etc.

But what it looks like is that i was hired as 2nd line guy but am expect to do 3rd line work. If they want me to do 3rd line work, shouldn't i be paid more for that ?
 
It sounds like you need to speak to your manager and clarify what your role is.

It does sound like 2nd line work, and if your 3rd line guy is ringfenced projects then his workload will vary massively.

groen said:
I do think that the 3rd line guy should be more involved in the site, even if he is only here two days a week. He should go to the meetings and deal with all the orders and admin tasks etc.

But what it looks like is that i was hired as 2nd line guy but am expect to do 3rd line work. If they want me to do 3rd line work, shouldn't i be paid more for that ?
Click to expand...

Were you told when hired what role you'd play in the company and what level you'd be paid at? If so, no, you shouldn't, because that is what you accepted to do the work.

I wouldn't have my 3rd line teams doing 'ordering and admin' unless you mean administration and support. Simple admin is not a 3rd line function.
 
It's unclear if you were right to ask or not. Any place I've ever worked there always is a them and us culture to a greater or lesser degree. The fact of the matter is that each department will always develop a slightly skewed opinion of the value of what they do, and how hard they work. You will develop it about yourself vs your colleagues and your department vs others, you need to know it's there so you can deal with it.

But assuming you are right and they could do more, it sounds as if you picked the wrong time and or the wrong way to address it.
 
whitevogelscheisserpyra.png
 
There is two sides to this story here.

1) Doing a 1st/2nd/3rd line support gives you opportunity to learn.

2) It's very annoying that 3rd line support don't do their job. Meet with your line manager to discuss that you feel this way and why are you doing 3rd line support and not get paid for it.

I no exactly how you feel, I am in the same boat. Where I work there will be major redundancies soon, 3rd line/managers.....Just remember the type of work your doing...
 
3rd line is there to resolve the issues that are beyond 2nd line's remit. Suppose he did take some of your workload just to be helpful and then an urgent issue that had been escalated to him had been missed, he would at best get management on his back and at worst lose his job.
The fact he is only there 2 days a week suggests that management have decided the expected workload for 3rd line is more than sufficient. I would expect the other 3 days he is working on another site perhaps for a different customer.
If he is a contractor then by definition he will never be 100% part of 'the team' and not under the same expectations perhaps as permies are to 'muck in', in hope of positive appraisals and promotion.
 
Also remember that you should be nice to people on your way up, lest they crap on you on your way down :D
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom