Embarrassed & Netbookgate
“Finally, a week or two later, he was hauled in front of some bigwig and told that he would only receive an official reprimand, and that this was his one and only pass.”
You've embarrassed us so we're gonna bollock you due to our screw up.
I had experience of this way back in 2009 in the NHS, the fuckers. I was at a Trust's site with an ex-engineer in another department. He knew all the passwords as nothing had been changed, they were even still using the remote connection software he created for connecting to PCs. Anyway, that Trust didn't like the IT department that had been created to support all local Trusts and were trying to break away and do their own thing. The ex engineer was helping them due to now being employed by the Trust. He asked for help putting some new netbooks on the network that they were trialing as they didn't want to use the HPs that had been forced on them (due to the HP being a bit of a shady deal between HP and the director of IT they didn't like, neither did I, he was a pure cunt). I helped him to make sure all was done securely, as I told him "Well you know the passwords so I'll help to make sure they are done properly". Once done, I informed the stakeholder for the site about the netbooks and being a temp, I was ignored. Not even a "Thanks for letting me know".
Roll on 3 months later we all get an e-mail "Does anyone know why these netbooks are on the network?". Yes, I told you about them 3 months ago. Why they were on the network and why I helped.
All hell broke loose. I was reported to the CEO of the IT Department who said "Get rid of him" (she was also an arse and had been milking her high wage for years). But our head of IT and Networking heard and tried to calm the situation down. She said I'd done what I'd done with all the best intensions AND I'd informed them at the time but had been ignored. It changed from "Get rid of him" to "Can you come and have a chat with me about what happened" from the Head of Service (who was also a nasty fuck). When I told my manager he was pissed and called the Head of Service, informing him "You know you can't just have a random 'meeting' with him, you have to allow someone in the 'meeting' with him, he's allowed representation". So we go into the meeting and I explain again what happened, all that was already in my original e-mail. I said "I told you all ages ago that when an engineer leaves all admin passwords should be changed but they never are. So there was a risk he'd just put them on the network himself". The head of service admitted he was partly at fault as it was supposed to be his project that passwords were changed. They then took away the network share we used for all software and utils. I refused to apologies as I did nothing wrong, my manager said it for me and after the meeting said "I knew you weren't going to speak because you were so annoyed so I did it for you otherwise they'd have just let you go" I didn't last much longer, my contract expired again and they didn't renew it. The arse ex engineer from the Trust never bothered to try and help with the situation either.
It was a clear example of them fucking up (the stakeholder ignoring my e-mail 3 months earlier) and choosing to throw me under the bus instead of admitting their mistakes.
I've long moved on but sadly, the bitterness has bugged me for years. The IT department eventually got disbanded as the new government came in and they all moved on. I, sadly, hold grudges and when heard 5 years ago that the ex Director of IT had cancer but had survived it, I couldn't hold it my distain for him and spurted out "Shame he never died of it". I hate him with a passion. Something is very wrong in a company if staff end up hating a manager that much. You're clearly a poor manager if your staff hate you that much.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
