If I were in the OPs situation then how I would react would depend on two things. How the higher ups at the company view me already and how much I wanted to progress. I've recently been given a promotion (at the expense of someone else getting a demotion) purely because I don't have a "that's not my job" mentality. At work you should be flexible enough to do what's best for your company but that doesn't necessarily mean any work you do that's not in your job description has to be extra work. If you're taking odd work like this on then just point out to your manager that it'll have to be at the expense of something else and ask what they'd like you to focus on.
Am I in the wrong here?
- Thread starter grimm
- Start date
Implying troubleshooting a computer is anything like doing mechanic work.
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A bit of odd help is fine, for a whiel I became the unofficial PowerPoint guru, it sounds like they are pushing it though. And giving you hassle!?
In these situations I adopt a blank face, say 'i think', 'maybe' and 'could be' a lot, apologise for not beign much help and they end up ringing IT.
In these situations I adopt a blank face, say 'i think', 'maybe' and 'could be' a lot, apologise for not beign much help and they end up ringing IT.
If it's not your job then don't do it. Point out its not in your job description, if they fire you for that then that's an easy route to a tribunual 
although they may be able to make a gross misconduct disciplinary stick if you accidentally crashed a few servers while tinkering and its not a documented part of your role to be doing anything in that area..
Point out that you don't know how the outsourced IT company has set things up and doing things yourself could result in a large bill in them coming out to fix it when it goes wrong.
Personally (and not aimed at the OP) I hate it when people outside of IT who "know a bit about computers" start faffing around with stuff that doesn't concern them, it normally leads to twice as much work for IT (so leads to them being tied up fixing stupid little problems and not doing what they should've been doing, which gave them the reputation of being slow in the first place so "we won't call IT because they're rubbish at doing things when we want"). It snowballs like that generally.
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although they may be able to make a gross misconduct disciplinary stick if you accidentally crashed a few servers while tinkering and its not a documented part of your role to be doing anything in that area..Point out that you don't know how the outsourced IT company has set things up and doing things yourself could result in a large bill in them coming out to fix it when it goes wrong.
Personally (and not aimed at the OP) I hate it when people outside of IT who "know a bit about computers" start faffing around with stuff that doesn't concern them, it normally leads to twice as much work for IT (so leads to them being tied up fixing stupid little problems and not doing what they should've been doing, which gave them the reputation of being slow in the first place so "we won't call IT because they're rubbish at doing things when we want"). It snowballs like that generally.
(Rant over
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It is - it's a set of skills that the vast majority do not possess. Why should I offer this for booze?
