Shark Tank: So you're having no problems?

06.02.2006

Consulting outfit brings in out-of-town help for a client's desktop migration. "On Monday, we go desk to desk to make sure things are running smoothly," says a pilot fish on the project. "One sociable guy from out East who's helping knows the employees here only by their name placards but quickly makes friends as he solves one minor problem after another. At the front desk, he makes some small talk with the woman there, then asks, 'So is your Outlook working OK?' She stares at him in silence for a long, awkward moment, then with a confused expression replies meekly, 'I'm delivering flowers.' "

Now!

Human resources manager calls pilot fish to authorize installation of the payroll system for a new HR employee as soon as possible. "I clear the request with the payroll department and ask the desktop team to push the software," says fish. "Desktop team requests the PC name. HR manager replies that the user doesn't have a PC." OK, fish thinks, let's get him one. He calls the hardware team to install a PC at the new employee's desk. HR manager informs him that the user doesn't have a desk yet -- and won't have an assigned location for another month. Mutters fish, "We'll get right on it."

It's There, Too

User's hard drive crashes, and even though support pilot fish sends it to a data recovery service, it's beyond help. "This hard drive had over 11,000 hardware errors on it, and the data was unrecoverable," fish says. "After telling the user that we could not get the data off the hard drive, she then proceeded to tell me that she didn't need the data off the hard drive -- she needed it off the desktop. Make it happen! I explained to her in gentle terms that the desktop was on the hard drive and that it, too, was inaccessible."

Let's Try Social Engineering

Phone-sex charges start to show up on the phone bill for the modem on a system this pilot fish supports. "Someone was unplugging the line from the modem and into a telephone to do his disgusting business," says fish. "I asked our phone support guys to make the line incoming only; couldn't be done. I looked into soldering the cord into the back of the modem -- didn't find anything that would work." Finally, fish prints out a sign and tapes it to the back of the modem: Notice: Do not unplug these phone lines. These phone lines will not permit outgoing calls. Says satisfied fish, "We never saw another phone-sex item on the bill."

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