Categories: uncategorized
Date: 28 August 2007 10:28:25
The company I work for claims to be one of the world's leading providers of professional, technologically-based consultancy. We are cutting edge. And we know how to make a profit.
One key aspect of this profit-making is outsourcing everything. Catering. Computers. IT support. If we want something we generally pay per person per month. So, if someone happens to go on maternity leave for three months their computer login is disabled and the company saves approximately 4p by not having to pay for a computer or any IT support services for them for those few months. The aforementioned person then returns to work. The local admin assistant spends half an hour (at a cost of £some/hour) sending a few e-mails to get the computer account re-activated. The returning new-mum spends half an hours (at a cost of £some more/hour) trying to get the newly issued login to work. The new-mum then spends almost an hour on the phone to the helpful IT support guys getting to password re-set (twice) before she can finally access her computer desktop. At the end of the first week the new-mum attempts to enter her timesheet on the computer system so the client can be billed for all the time she's spent doing highly-productive work. But the login to the timesheet system isn't working either. Another hour on the phone to IT support. More unproductive time.
I'm currently wondering how saving 4p by shutting down my account and then wasting £millions while I try to reactivate it (OK those amounts might be an exaggeration) actually results in the company making a profit.
But perhaps I'm just not cutting-edge enough to understand it.