Whose Fault Is It?
By Bob Plankers on Jun 10, 2008 in Featured, General Rambling, People Stuff
Whose fault is it?
It doesn’t matter. Get the problem fixed.
You can figure out who is at fault when you’re discussing how to prevent the problem in the future.
4 Comment(s)
By Michael Janke on Jun 10, 2008 | Reply
Or - when explaining a problem or failure:
No bullshit.
No excuses.
By Bob Plankers on Jun 11, 2008 | Reply
Yeah, usually people are much happier when you’re being totally straight with them. Even if that means admitting that something was your fault. Own up to it, fix it, prevent it in the future, move on.
By Kevin Shafer on Jun 16, 2008 | Reply
As a manager of sys admins, it has always amazed me that there is so much CYA’ing among certain sys admins. Hey, we all know how complex these systems are and that problems will - not can - occur. Then again, it is probably my ilk that caused the problem in the first place by demanding perfection from people who are forced to support imperfect systems.
By Bob Plankers on Jun 16, 2008 | Reply
Kevin, while your statement about “we all know… that problems… will occur” might be true for sysadmins it definitely isn’t true for our customers. Which, when you think about it, is why they hire us. Sometimes they decide to not listen to our advice because of other reasons (often financial), and their alternate solutions are actually big risks in the long term.
If I can’t convince them that they are taking a big risk I have to cover my duff, because I need the people that made the bad decision to take responsibility for it when their imperfect systems melt and can’t be restored. It’s nice that your employees have a boss that understands these issues, but for a lot of folks out there, especially consultants, that just isn’t the case. And for two companies I’ve worked with as a consultant legal liability was the only thing that ever got their attention.