For Friday, at least. My day working both roles went mostly well. It ended with a meeting by our regional account manager (RAM) outlining the changes that are coming our way in the organization.
Long story short, we used to work for company A and when company decided to outsource IT, we were absorbed by company B. We stayed. The few employees still left (telecoms guys) with "A" left the building, "B" assumed the lease and we worked as usual (albeit with a second network connection to "B". Mostly everything stayed the same except the name on the paycheck. The past four years have not really given me a taste of what working for a top 5 IT company is actually like because we still do most of our activities like we were with "A".
By the end of the month, that will begin to change.
The guys who provide DLS (Deep Level Support ... the really smart guys) will move (structurally) into "B"...it only took four years and the rest of us (account specific) will remain. I most likely will have a new boss (my fear is that Teflon will be chosen) and since I am officially in my new group Monday, a new job.
The meeting was comical in a couple of areas. The first is that the RAM did a hard sell on why it is good to go to this new model (for the people moving into the "regular" organization of the IT company) but failed to give a "warm and fuzzy" to those who remain. Half of those who are remaining are managers of decent standing (although not overly learned of the way or why we work) and the rest of us are "lifers" who have been in service for the company for at least 8 years (most are in the 10-12 year range). I guess those (which includes me) really do not need a warm and fuzzy but mgmt usually gives a token showing of it anyway... but not this time.
The change will be transparent to our customer (company A) except there will be a larger talent pool to draw from. Drawing from "economies of scale" (buzzwords are the theme in IT), "A" will get all the expertise of the BIG, established "B". People who will be moving into the normal structure will get to work on other accounts, ergo gain more knowledge.
The change will be hardest on about 5 of us (approx half, the non-mgmt part). We are the ones who coordinate tickets and have a preferred contact list of people we can ask quick questions to when needed. Teflon has a habit of dropping low severity bombs on my team and disappearing and having those contacts helps. Of course Teflon also has a habit of not giving us pertinent e-mails until after they have been sitting in his inbox festering for two weeks as well, but that is a completely different topic.
After the meeting we all chatted about the changes (the meeting was a ConCall -- conference call for all you lucky non-corp folks) and we all agreed that we are just going to roll with the changes. There was an underlying sense of "absorb and spit out" of the talent once this takes place, but know one knows for sure.
The other interesting thing is the timing of this. The contract we have with "A" is up for renewal in July of 2008.
"So what? That is over a year away?" You quip.
Contracts of this size are usually worked on for more than a year...the details are mind boggling. Company B actually "owns" all of IT, even though we do not control it and it is provided by at least three other companies besides us. There is a help desk component, software support, desktop support, local area network, wide area network, process mgmt, account mgmt, security, storage, server support (unix, windows, mainframe, etc)...this kind of thing takes time. We all have been made aware of the give and take that the parties work with and the final product will not be known until a couple of months before the current contract expires. We are not even guaranteed we will get an extension.
Enough rambling about that. A dinner of grilled Caribbean-style chicken (jerk seasoning), fresh corn on the cob and fresh (albeit leftover) string beans was prepared and enjoyed. Dishes were washed and a little rest was taken before a two mile walk with the three dogs was started. As usual the mosquitoes were thick but we managed it. All along the walk my wife was laughing at my impersonation of the guy from "Man versus Wild" on Discovery (Bear Stylls, I think). I love the Brits, so my impersonation was not derogatory. Their pronunciation of aluminum, glacier, and crevasse is quit amusing to a Yank's ear. Of course my wife will laugh at things I do not find as overly amusing...take my comment I made about Jazzie, the very puppy-ish retriever we are pet sitting. She is not leash trained and tends to do some very silly things while we are (make an attempt at) walking. Last night, I remarked, "Jazzie, I am going to donate you to the Bat family and change your name to Ding". My wife must have laughed for a 1/5 of a mile...I was worried she was going to have an asthma attack.
Me made it back home without incident (no snakes spotted) and watched a tad more TV while I munched on a Klondike bar (Reese's flavored) and browsed the web on the new(er) Omnibook 900b (I am beginning to like it a lot...but it does not provide as much lap warmth as the 4150b did). A little after 10:00 PM, I hit the sack...and surprisingly enough, so did my lovely wife. Sleep came quickly.
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