Overwhelming Bureaucracy in the IT Department? 591
Nedry57 asks: "I am in the somewhat unique position of being a technology worker, who lives outside of the IT department in my company (a very large organization in the US). By far, the biggest challenge I face is getting anything done due to the bureaucracy that exists, within IT. There are certain tasks (i.e. anything that happens in the data centers) that I don't have the access to do. Even a simple task, like installing more memory in a non-production server, can take nine months and massive mountains of paperwork (no exaggeration), thus costing many times more than it should. The lack of agility is maddening, because I know we are missing significant business opportunities. My management is extremely supportive and despite our excellent track record of success in creating robust/secure applications--our work has passed audit numerous times with flying colors--we get no support from IT. Even senior management can't break through the barrier. I am very interested in hearing the experiences Slashdot readers have had in similar situations." How do you get your technology work done, when your IT department is more hindrance than help?
Business Cases (Score:4, Informative)
Middle management as a disease (Score:2, Informative)
I've always hated this concept... (Score:2, Informative)
It is easier to beg forgiveness than it is to ask permission. Do what needs to be done, apologize later.
Just don't screw something else up in the process.
Get on your knees and take a shot in the mouth... (Score:1, Informative)
I think you work there too.
I spent 8 months building a J2EE application stack, framework, data aggregation, system integration, etc. The darn thing can easily change the way that hospital runs, as it aggregates data from all their major systems into a coheasive, normalized, well formed data base with a clear, orthogonal object model on top of it. We used it to write a "system critical" application. It was beautiful.
Then it came time to pony up cash for the hardware and software to run all this. This place will drop -millions- on an IBM mainframe and _really_shitty_ HR software and consultants to make it work, but they would barely budge in making a major infrastructure and integration investment, when the entire campus was clamouring for it. The place is now able to deliver highly integrated, damn slick applications (thanks to me and my two cohorts who worked on it) but they dont -- because of the bureaucracy.
They also treat their employees like shit.
Never the less, after negotiating prices with vendors, we got the total cost for hardware / software to under $60k, (nearly 1/3rd the list prices for the software/services!!) and I was still walking around the office literally saying, "How many dicks do I have to suck to get $60k of funding around here?"
No kidding, I said it, out loud, repeatedly. At that point, I was actually -trying- to get fired. I knew the place was a hell hole, even if I did learn a ton, and really enjoy most of the work.
Eventually, we managed to get our funding without having to "take one for the team." And yes, I did in fact tell my coworkers that if it would let me get some goddamn work done, "I'll happily take a shot or two in the mouth if it means we won't have to put up with this bullshit for another three months."
Oh, and once we did get hardware, it took EIGHT MONTHS for the admins to get a STABLE INSTALL OF REDHAT AS on it.
NO KIDDING. EIGHT FUCKING MONTHS. I had to reinstall our software stack FOUR times because they were SO INCOMPETANT at INSTALLING A FSCKING OS. GAH!!!
(Ed Anderson, you're not incompetant, but you've become totally complacent. Thanks for at least trying for a while.)
However, David Massey, Mike Smith, Jerra Anderson, you should all be fired for being stupid fscks. Oh, and Steve Roberts, don't forget to say a prayer of that coffee that you charge your subordinates to drink, even though according to the CIO, "there's money in the personell budget I can't spend because I have no where to put it." Meanwhile, they want to pay Sr. Application developers 36k/yr to live in that shithole of town. Guh.
So glad I'm out of there.
Re:Perhaps you should try (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Conflicting Goals (Score:3, Informative)
That's the job of IT and development. If they can't do it, something's wrong with the organization. IT needs to know how to bring newly developed systems up to their production standards. Conversely, of course, if the developers are bringing up a new prototype, and they know it may eventually go into production, it's their job to coordinate with IT and make sure that it's not rickety and conforms to IT's requirements.
But in the early stages, it may be perfectly reasonable to prototype the system trying out new hardware or OSes or network layouts on a daily basis. So it makes eminent sense for some kinds of projects to be managed initially by the dev team, and if your company can't handle that--either because the developers have a "hack it until it works and then throw it to IT without comment" attitude, or because IT has a "we didn't build the system so we're not responsible for it" attituce--then you're in for a lot of missed opportunities and failed projects.
Re:IT (Score:3, Informative)
It usually took about an hour (or half a dozen emails) to actually convince them that something was wrong and they needed to do actual work, and weeks to get basic documentation. I constantly got the impression that they neither cared about the problems in the applications they supposedly supported, nor understood what I was saying. I had to rewrite major sections of code just to get their revisions to properly execute and interface properly with the database.
The entire experience soured me on ever working with outsourced developers or tech support -- particularly, I guess, if they are foreign. I hate it because I know it's a rather bigoted view, but since it's my only experience with it it's all I know. I suspect that the job actually did go to the lowest bidder, since I certainly can't imagine paying anybody actual money for the time they wasted. A co-worker of mine who worked on the project with me and still works at that company tells me they finally scrapped the entire application a year or so after I left and hired some in-house developers to do it right and have some accountability.
Part of the problem -- most of the problem, I'd say -- was also that management just didn't care that these developers were useless. They hired them, and they were going to get them to develop this tool or die trying. So with no real application development knowledge base, only two guys who had their own projects to handle, and management that wasn't willing to pay for the results they demanded it was just an ugly, ugly situation that I was glad to get out of when I did.
Help them help you (Score:5, Informative)
In my current position I've seen some of the worst behaviors (in system administration, application development, etc.) practiced by tech people outside of IT who then expect IT to automagically make everything work and clean up any messes the non-IT folk created. On the other hand, there are also times when our IT department really does drop the ball.
This has created deep-seeded animosity between some non-IT departments and IT, I think. The non-IT folk believe IT are bureaucratic obstructionists who don't know what they're doing; while IT believes the non-IT folk are disorganized, loose cannons who don't know what they're doing. Unfortunately, to some extent, I think they're both right.
That said, my best advice to you is to help IT help you. Try come to some agreement or understanding with IT and define what it is they they need in order for them to be more responsive to your needs. Respect their needs as much as you want them to respect yours.
Also, don't undermine or bypass policies and procedures defined by IT. It might seem like you can get around IT's requirements and do something your own way, but that just perpetuates the problem. If you think IT is being unreasonable with their policies, find out why their policies are the way they are. You might discover that there is a good reason for it.
Think of IT as a finite resource -- don't squander it. I've never met (or worked in) an IT department that wasn't overwhelmed with things to do. Keep in mind that any system you implement may require some amount of time and effort for IT to support and/or maintain it. And keep in mind that there is always a Y2K or Service Pack N+1 or something like that around the corner keeping IT busy. So, as much as possible, budget your IT-time wisely. And, of course, plan ahead.
You may already be doing all of this, which makes your situation a more bitter pill to swallow, in which case I'd suggest helping other non-IT departments do the same, if they're not already.
And, of course, doing all of this doesn't guarantee that your IT experience will improve. But, I think it's a case of "you catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar" and "you who are without sin may cast the first stone."
I feel your pain (Score:3, Informative)
You want RAM in a server. That company currently has over 2,000 server and they have a service level agreement that is currently not being met with the business. They also have people that use to take servers down to just do "one thing" and not document why they were doing it, then when someone else went to update the server later it was not in the state they believed it would be and it created more problems and thus the server was unstable after their upgrade or the downtime was far greater than expected.
So the I.T. department gets judged by the business on uptime and other service level agreements. They do NOT get charged on helping the business out. So they are very cautious on any change to the environment. They are so cautious that it has gotten ridiculous for any change to occur.
So what can be done? Well I would need a ton more information than you provided to make more suggestions. I will NOT believe that everyone in your I.T. department is a bunch of idiots and lazy. I bet that around 80% are average to good, 10% suck and the last 10% rock (Like every large company).
Now a few questions.
1. Do you have a CIO?
2. Where is the majority of your I.T. department located?
3. How does your I.T. department prioritize its' project?
Those are just the first three that come to mind. In short I need to understand the constraints on the department before any real suggestions can be made. It is far too easy to say "fire them all", and in most companies that would be a huge mistake.
Lastly, I can say that I have seen a company that making any changes to ANY router took forever. It flat out sucked, however the reason is that this company was part of a bunch of other sister companies and one parent company, and those same router guys use to make changes on the fly (quick), but then it would take down a sister organization for a day or so, until they realized the mistake they made. So because of the major impact to the other businesses those same router guys were not allowed to make a change without a ton of paperwork under the penalty of being fired.
Re:They DENY you for a reason (Score:3, Informative)