I am a computer technician, not a janitor, or a teacher

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Chronos
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18 Feb 2018, 4:52 pm

VIDEODROME wrote:
I think both sides can meet halfway a little. If trash is an issue, the customer could make a container available right next to the work area. I mean how hard is it to toss trash like packaging wrappers if a box is right next to you.

The chit chat or bugging the tech is a grey area. I think a customer can ask concise important questions, but really shouldn't 'Shoulder Surf' the tech bugging them and dividing their attention. I used to know a guy that owned at PC Repair shop and customers would but him with endless questions or conversation. He did talk to them out of politeness, but they cost him time while he was trying to catch up on other customer repairs.

As for tidying up, I would prefer a fresh installation of equipment didn't become damaged as soon as someone tripped over a power cable or network cable causing something to unhook or yanking a flat screen to the floor requiring a call back to the site or to a competitor to fix something.


When paying for an installation service, either explicitly or implicitly, customers typically expect their home or office or other applicable environment to be left much as it was before the technician rendered the service, with the exception of the presence of that which was rendered. The idea of paying for these services is that the customer doesn't have to do the work.



affablestranger
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18 Feb 2018, 4:58 pm

You also do not exist in a vacuum. As an IT professional and former office administrator, I would fire you as well, quick, fast, and in a hurry for behaving in such a way. Now if employers required you to mop the bathroom, clean the foyer, help manage the carpool, then I would be in full support of your rejection of those extra duties. Simply requiring you to clean up the messes you make during the performance of your stated and agreed to duties is not remotely out of line. As far as intellectual superiority goes, you know what you know. That's the default for everyone. Maybe we can see and understand easily things NTs can't/won't, but the converse is true also. There's the rub.

Jobs you can get that have no interpersonal stuff? Alas, no. [See the vacuum statement earlier.] Even if you take a job running cables by yourself, you'll still answer to someone if you don't clean up after yourself and if you don't appear to take any kind of pride in your work or demonstrate professional behavior. That sort of behavior loses clients, and that's not what businesses want their employees, however brilliant those employees may be, to do for them. They also don't want employees who get on customers' or other employees' nerves and cause problems for management. I learned those lessons the hard way over the years. Lost jobs. Lost promotions. Damaged relationships with peers and colleagues. (Professional relationships I legitimately needed to stay afloat, I mean.)

If you're good with routing and switching you could try finding a network job where your main duty is remoting into systems to unclog jams or set up or reset things. Or work in-house only doing repairs/reconditions on PCs/mobiles/servers at the bench. I struggle hard still with other people, the chaos of them. It's a tough ride. Alas, there's not much good news for you.



Chronos
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19 Feb 2018, 3:57 am

affablestranger wrote:
You also do not exist in a vacuum. As an IT professional and former office administrator, I would fire you as well, quick, fast, and in a hurry for behaving in such a way. Now if employers required you to mop the bathroom, clean the foyer, help manage the carpool, then I would be in full support of your rejection of those extra duties. Simply requiring you to clean up the messes you make during the performance of your stated and agreed to duties is not remotely out of line. As far as intellectual superiority goes, you know what you know. That's the default for everyone. Maybe we can see and understand easily things NTs can't/won't, but the converse is true also. There's the rub.

Jobs you can get that have no interpersonal stuff? Alas, no. [See the vacuum statement earlier.] Even if you take a job running cables by yourself, you'll still answer to someone if you don't clean up after yourself and if you don't appear to take any kind of pride in your work or demonstrate professional behavior. That sort of behavior loses clients, and that's not what businesses want their employees, however brilliant those employees may be, to do for them. They also don't want employees who get on customers' or other employees' nerves and cause problems for management. I learned those lessons the hard way over the years. Lost jobs. Lost promotions. Damaged relationships with peers and colleagues. (Professional relationships I legitimately needed to stay afloat, I mean.)

If you're good with routing and switching you could try finding a network job where your main duty is remoting into systems to unclog jams or set up or reset things. Or work in-house only doing repairs/reconditions on PCs/mobiles/servers at the bench. I struggle hard still with other people, the chaos of them. It's a tough ride. Alas, there's not much good news for you.


Actually there are some jobs that require no interpersonal skills, but most of them are factory jobs in China where people are not permitted to speak while working, and are expected to be human machines.



VIDEODROME
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19 Feb 2018, 7:01 am

Chronos wrote:
affablestranger wrote:
You also do not exist in a vacuum. As an IT professional and former office administrator, I would fire you as well, quick, fast, and in a hurry for behaving in such a way. Now if employers required you to mop the bathroom, clean the foyer, help manage the carpool, then I would be in full support of your rejection of those extra duties. Simply requiring you to clean up the messes you make during the performance of your stated and agreed to duties is not remotely out of line. As far as intellectual superiority goes, you know what you know. That's the default for everyone. Maybe we can see and understand easily things NTs can't/won't, but the converse is true also. There's the rub.

Jobs you can get that have no interpersonal stuff? Alas, no. [See the vacuum statement earlier.] Even if you take a job running cables by yourself, you'll still answer to someone if you don't clean up after yourself and if you don't appear to take any kind of pride in your work or demonstrate professional behavior. That sort of behavior loses clients, and that's not what businesses want their employees, however brilliant those employees may be, to do for them. They also don't want employees who get on customers' or other employees' nerves and cause problems for management. I learned those lessons the hard way over the years. Lost jobs. Lost promotions. Damaged relationships with peers and colleagues. (Professional relationships I legitimately needed to stay afloat, I mean.)

If you're good with routing and switching you could try finding a network job where your main duty is remoting into systems to unclog jams or set up or reset things. Or work in-house only doing repairs/reconditions on PCs/mobiles/servers at the bench. I struggle hard still with other people, the chaos of them. It's a tough ride. Alas, there's not much good news for you.


Actually there are some jobs that require no interpersonal skills, but most of them are factory jobs in China where people are not permitted to speak while working, and are expected to be human machines.


To some extent, this also applies to truck driving.



ibmat5170
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19 Feb 2018, 4:41 pm

Its just so irritating to have to deal with "NTs". I'd much rather spend all day alone with computer hardware, and maybe one or two people I get along with than have to deal with the public. The amazing display of stupidity I have to deal with on a regular basis is annoying enough, but a customer complaining because I did not wire tie the cables behind his desk neatly together or take boxes out to the dumpster seems like bull to me. Aesthetics is NOT what I am concerned with. The core "meat" of the job is to make it work. I don't give a crap if you don't like how it looks and as far as I am concerned, as long as you pay your invoice, you can sit in your desk chair with your thumb up your butt, literally.

Go and try to find someone else who knows how to do things that I can do: Install a SATA hard drive or an AGP video card for example. Who else are you going to get to configure the IRQ on your sound card or ISA modem? Whoever mentioned the bench tech job, I'd rather be doing bench work but desktop repairs have slowed down a lot since all of the sheeple want tablets now. Even though my i7 Rig could run circles around their junky $100 tablet. Their feeble minds can't grasp the concept of the sheer power a desktop has over a portable piece of junk tablet.

The problem is if desktop work keeps slowing down because of these stupid sheeple, I may be out of a job.



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19 Feb 2018, 5:48 pm

stupid double post.


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Last edited by Sweetleaf on 19 Feb 2018, 5:50 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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19 Feb 2018, 5:49 pm

VIDEODROME wrote:
I think both sides can meet halfway a little. If trash is an issue, the customer could make a container available right next to the work area. I mean how hard is it to toss trash like packaging wrappers if a box is right next to you.

The chit chat or bugging the tech is a grey area. I think a customer can ask concise important questions, but really shouldn't 'Shoulder Surf' the tech bugging them and dividing their attention. I used to know a guy that owned at PC Repair shop and customers would but him with endless questions or conversation. He did talk to them out of politeness, but they cost him time while he was trying to catch up on other customer repairs.

As for tidying up, I would prefer a fresh installation of equipment didn't become damaged as soon as someone tripped over a power cable or network cable causing something to unhook or yanking a flat screen to the floor requiring a call back to the site or to a competitor to fix something.


Provide a container and then what, take it to the dumpster to throw it away themselves as well? When the tech person could have just cleaned up their own trash and removed it from the home? Its best to just clean up your own mess...I mean imagine you hire someone to come paint your house and they just leave paint chips all over your yard, and just toss their used brushes out on the lawn? Same concept here even if packaging would be easier to clean up than paint chips and dirty brushes. Also I've been taught from a pretty early age it is best to leave someones house as clean as it was, better to leave it cleaner than it was if you're doing anything that will make a mess.

Also I can see it would be annoying having a customer wanting to chat the whole time, but then politely tell the customer you need to concentrate, or that you have a lot of other locations to get to and don't have time to talk much. Basically there are polite ways to tell the customer they are being too chatty....a lot of people can take the hint, certainly better than just ignoring the customer/pretending you don't hear them. I would say also people should be aware if you have someone coming to do work...give them some space to do it that is what I do when people come to fix stuff. But not very realistic to expect that from every customer, just isn't going to happen.


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Sweetleaf
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19 Feb 2018, 6:02 pm

ibmat5170 wrote:
Its just so irritating to have to deal with "NTs". I'd much rather spend all day alone with computer hardware, and maybe one or two people I get along with than have to deal with the public. The amazing display of stupidity I have to deal with on a regular basis is annoying enough, but a customer complaining because I did not wire tie the cables behind his desk neatly together or take boxes out to the dumpster seems like bull to me. Aesthetics is NOT what I am concerned with. The core "meat" of the job is to make it work. I don't give a crap if you don't like how it looks and as far as I am concerned, as long as you pay your invoice, you can sit in your desk chair with your thumb up your butt, literally.


Well clearly your employer prefers their installers to do a professional job including arranging wires in an orderly fashion and picking up your trash when your done. If you can't even do that then I don't see why they shouldn't fire you. If you cant clean up your mess you leave in a customers home you should not have a job that involves going into peoples homes.

Go and try to find someone else who knows how to do things that I can do: Install a SATA hard drive or an AGP video card for example. Who else are you going to get to configure the IRQ on your sound card or ISA modem? Whoever mentioned the bench tech job, I'd rather be doing bench work but desktop repairs have slowed down a lot since all of the sheeple want tablets now. Even though my i7 Rig could run circles around their junky $100 tablet. Their feeble minds can't grasp the concept of the sheer power a desktop has over a portable piece of junk tablet.

The problem is if desktop work keeps slowing down because of these stupid sheeple, I may be out of a job.[/quote]

Well than all the more reason to swallow your pride and pick up your trash huh?

Also I don't know how to do those things because I am not a computer tech but I doubt you're the only computer tech that knows how to do those things...why shouldn't they hire someone else who can do those tasks as well as pick up their own trash?


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ibmat5170
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19 Feb 2018, 7:51 pm

I was told by my psychologist that my arrogance is caused by my ASD, therefore people have to put up with it, that I cannot be fired for it.



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19 Feb 2018, 9:47 pm

TL;DR version: You have to accept the fact that your job includes both glamorous and mundane tasks. You also need to carry yourself more humbly and communicate politely with the people you're helping. A depot repair job will offer conditions closest to your current mindset, but even that job still still require the above two parts.

Full version: ibmat5170, as one aspie to another, and as an IT guy like yourself, I can tell you this: you have no idea how off-base you are! Your grievances are like those of someone NTs call a "snowflake". And you're 33; that's way older than the typical "snowflake" age. I know because I'm almost the same age as you, and I used to harbor a mindset like yours, although not to the same extent. Don't get me wrong: there are times when it's right to complain. But this isn't it.

Removing the leftover trash from where you worked on a computer is part of any technical job. It's not a task delegated to "someone else" (who?) because you feel it's beneath you. Ditto with making the cables look neat. You are the technician. And a technician does all parts of his/her work, not just the "glamorous" ones, like inserting the Nvidia display expansion card and configuring the IRQ ports for it. There is no such thing as an assistant when you're an entry-level tech. For trash, you will typically use the bin of the person you're helping. But in some cases, you will need to pack the trash and take it back to your bin.

Also, realize this: computer are no longer mystery machines, like they were in 80's and 90's. Today, most people under 70 have at least a basic understanding of how computers work. So there is no need to feel overly proud of knowing something other people don't know. (Unfortunately, some people know enough to do damage, but not enough to fix it; but dealing with them is part of your job as well.) Anyone with enough motivation to learn can get A+ certified and fix computers themselves. Not all people have that motivation, but still.

Not liking someone looking over your shoulder, I get it. I hate it too. But you can politely tell the person: "Excuse me, I need some privacy to do my work. I'll be happy to give you a step-by-step description after I'm done." Better yet, before you start, offer to give a brief overview of what you'll do, so the person won't be tempted to look over your shoulder while you work. And if someone suggests a silly idea, like "try a different power cord", you can tell a white lie and say: "I"ve seen these situations before. Changing the power cord didn't help." Most people will back off at that point. If not, just humor them; changing the power cord usually takes less than a minute.

At this point, your best bet is a depot repair job. People ship their broken computer to your facility, a specific computer gets assigned to you, you fix it, and it gets shipped back. You work alone. But even then, you have to provide status updates to your boss or even to customers, and you have to do it in the wording they can understand.



ibmat5170
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19 Feb 2018, 10:23 pm

Aspie1, I know you are right. But needing to feel superior is part of my self esteem. I need to feel like I am doing something nobody else could do. Its how I place myself above everyone else. Despite having ASD, I am a better human being than X because I can install RAM. Because I know how to properly park in angle spots (Don't pull thru, its one way only). I drive the correct car to drive (A V6 sedan), not an underpowered piece of 4 cylinder junk, nor do I drive a hillbilly pickup truck. An despite being cursed with being born with a penis, I still dress effeminately, shave my face and my body, and never engage in "manly" activities. I use an iPhone. I don't use prepaid cellular carriers, I use AT&T. When I make a purchase of an electronic item, I make sure to get the best model, not some budget-minded base-model crap. I make sure to not know just about computers, but about cars, about the credit & banking system, about the software used by major corporations to generate billing statements, about the letter of the law, the details of how insurance companies work, and for all this..... I feel I deserve to adorn myself with pride and feel like I am above the common, uneducated, ignorant sheep.

Yet it seems to keep me from holding a job and I don't know why.



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19 Feb 2018, 10:34 pm

ibmat5170 wrote:
Aspie1, I know you are right. But needing to feel superior is part of my self esteem. I need to feel like I am doing something nobody else could do.

Are you doing a task that nobody else could do? If you have an indispensable skill that nobody else has then they couldn't fire you because they need that skill. Having a rare skill can be the best job protection, it even forces employers to overlook arrogance.

If you get fired it suggests that your employer doesn't think your skills are extremely rare and that he could easily find a replacement with the same skills.


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19 Feb 2018, 10:58 pm

Nothing wrong with “knowing” how superior you are.

But it’s not smart to let your employers and clients KNOW THAT YOU KNOW how superior you are to them.

Just keep the notion of your superiority within your self. And do your job well, and with ethics.

This is how you keep jobs.


Also: your psychologist is an idiot. An employer can make any excuse to fire you (especially if you’re in the US, where the “at will employment” concept prevails). They can legally fire you for nary a reason at all, most of the time. You can also legally quit, without repercussions.



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19 Feb 2018, 11:09 pm

ibmat5170 wrote:
Aspie1, I know you are right. But needing to feel superior is part of my self esteem. I need to feel like I am doing something nobody else could do. Its how I place myself above everyone else. Despite having ASD, I am a better human being than X because I can install RAM. Because I know how to properly park in angle spots (Don't pull thru, its one way only). I drive the correct car to drive (A V6 sedan), not an underpowered piece of 4 cylinder junk, nor do I drive a hillbilly pickup truck. An despite being cursed with being born with a penis, I still dress effeminately, shave my face and my body, and never engage in "manly" activities. I use an iPhone. I don't use prepaid cellular carriers, I use AT&T. When I make a purchase of an electronic item, I make sure to get the best model, not some budget-minded base-model crap. I make sure to not know just about computers, but about cars, about the credit & banking system, about the software used by major corporations to generate billing statements, about the letter of the law, the details of how insurance companies work, and for all this..... I feel I deserve to adorn myself with pride and feel like I am above the common, uneducated, ignorant sheep.

Yet it seems to keep me from holding a job and I don't know why.

The stuff you described seems like pretty normal adult knowledge: computers, cars, banking, laws, etc. And most men do shave, so it's not effeminate at all; not everyone can sport a beard and/or mustache look. Speaking of iPhones, the IT world is polarized between iPhone fans and Android fans, and most of my colleagues prefer Androids. (Windows Phone users exist, but they're too few in number to have critical mass.) Another thing: if you want to attract women and get respect from men, it's best to be similar to other men, rather than different.

It took me decades to realize that packing my brain with information is less important than knowing how to conduct myself socially. As well as striking a balance between being humble and being confident. I know it sounds weird coming from an aspie, but this is the NT world we live in.



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19 Feb 2018, 11:11 pm

If we lived in a world filled with Aspies with a superiority complex, nothing would get done.



Chronos
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19 Feb 2018, 11:14 pm

ibmat5170 wrote:
Its just so irritating to have to deal with "NTs". I'd much rather spend all day alone with computer hardware, and maybe one or two people I get along with than have to deal with the public. The amazing display of stupidity I have to deal with on a regular basis is annoying enough, but a customer complaining because I did not wire tie the cables behind his desk neatly together or take boxes out to the dumpster seems like bull to me. Aesthetics is NOT what I am concerned with. The core "meat" of the job is to make it work. I don't give a crap if you don't like how it looks and as far as I am concerned, as long as you pay your invoice, you can sit in your desk chair with your thumb up your butt, literally.

Go and try to find someone else who knows how to do things that I can do: Install a SATA hard drive or an AGP video card for example. Who else are you going to get to configure the IRQ on your sound card or ISA modem? Whoever mentioned the bench tech job, I'd rather be doing bench work but desktop repairs have slowed down a lot since all of the sheeple want tablets now. Even though my i7 Rig could run circles around their junky $100 tablet. Their feeble minds can't grasp the concept of the sheer power a desktop has over a portable piece of junk tablet.

The problem is if desktop work keeps slowing down because of these stupid sheeple, I may be out of a job.


I think your issue is, your idea of what your job responsibilities are differ from your employer's idea of what your job responsibilities are, and it's your employer who defines your job responsibilities...at least within within the constrains of the law. If I were you, I think I would limit my job applications to repair or installation jobs with no customer service.