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Re:When Employees Use Software That IT Hasn’t Approved by lzol on Wednesday June 12, 2019 @09:00AM (#20164072)
This resonates so much and seems to be a major trend in non-traditional tech companies. I've mostly worked in the financial industry and the executives' knowledge of technology is almost always horrible. As you said, a couple buzz words and very set opinions on the ways to do things. It's like they get pet projects in their head from reading an article in a magazine and get locked into it.

I don't really have an issue with CXXs being ignorant about a subject. No one knows everything. What I do have an issue with is when they act like an expert ignoring all the people who are actually experts in a particular area. It'd be like me going into a room full of IT people and saying EBITDA a bunch of times claiming to be an accounting wizard ready to lead a major initiative. It's frustrating but I've learned all I can really do is smile and watch the show.

Re:When Employees Use Software That IT Hasn’t Approved by noir_lord on Wednesday June 12, 2019 @10:28AM (#20165001)
> It's like they get pet projects in their head from reading an article in a magazine and get locked into it.

It's not like that, it's often exactly that.

I'm extremely fortunate in that while my boss sets the goals he never specifies how they should be achieved.

That means I get to implement them as we need them.

I'll never underestimate the value of smart management :).

Re:When Employees Use Software That IT Hasn’t Approved by alecco on Wednesday June 12, 2019 @04:15PM (#20168815)
>> It's like they get pet projects in their head from reading an article in a magazine and get locked into it.

>It's not like that, it's often exactly that.

And it usually is sold also from within from know-it-all primadonnas who want to climb the ladder. Or at least put something "spectacular" on their CV.

Re:When Employees Use Software That IT Hasn’t Approved by noir_lord on Wednesday June 12, 2019 @04:24PM (#20168913)
Start a ground breaking project that will be amazing in 2 years.

Get promoted/leave for more money after 18mths.

2 years rolls around, everything is on fire but the guy with the matches is nowhere to be found.

Sounds very very familiar to me.

Re:When Employees Use Software That IT Hasn’t Approved by TeMPOraL on Wednesday June 12, 2019 @06:25PM (#20169989)
When reading these stories, part of me wants to give up and switch to the dark side. Instead of worrying about whether what we're doing is even useful for anyone, I could be earning money and prestige by leading large companies to deploy random SaaS solutions. What's not to like? I mean, except making your organization waste couple billion dollars and hundreds of man-years?
Re:When Employees Use Software That IT Hasn’t Approved by DataWorker on Wednesday June 12, 2019 @11:57PM (#20171685)
Or they just think “Tableau, Salesforce, data lakes, ERP, identity management, and "cloud" infrastructure each seem like useful tools if implemented smartly.”
Re:When Employees Use Software That IT Hasn’t Approved by snowwrestler on Thursday June 13, 2019 @10:46AM (#20175379)
Cute. We actually built a data lake (with Python and MySQL) and immediately found problems we weren't even aware of, like (as I mentioned above) people getting the same email multiple times in the same day.

When our sysadmin left, we migrated all our websites from leased hardware servers to cloud hosting and were able to use that head count to hire a developer instead, who has built great new web apps for staff and customers.

I understand the temptation to be cynical, but these really are useful tools. I say embrace change; it's fun.

Re:When Employees Use Software That IT Hasn’t Approved by ErikAugust on Thursday June 13, 2019 @01:22AM (#20172019)
I feel like Harvard Business Review articles are a form of keyword stuffing. Combinations of buzzwords when googled bring up a bunch of big consultancy websites.
Re:When Employees Use Software That IT Hasn’t Approved by avgDev on Thursday June 13, 2019 @12:28AM (#20171801)
I work with a guy, that can't code, is a DBA but I have to fix his queries but when it comes to new projects, he has all the answers on how to implement everything and has not written a single line of code in an application.

Recently, I even told him just to tell me what he wants to achieve because his implementations do not make sense and its my job.

At least my boss also let's me do it my way, still annoying.

Re:When Employees Use Software That IT Hasn’t Approved by alexhutcheson on Wednesday June 12, 2019 @11:49AM (#20165887)
You'd probably really appreciate this comedy sketch video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKorP55Aqvg
Re:When Employees Use Software That IT Hasn’t Approved by deanCommie on Wednesday June 12, 2019 @05:21PM (#20169441)
Clients don't know what they want and don't know how to describe what they do want.

That doesn't mean they're wrong.

Actual experts get to the root of what they need, and find ways to solve the requirements, even when they seem impossible.

Mandatory response viewing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7MIJP90biM

Re:When Employees Use Software That IT Hasn’t Approved by pimlottc on Wednesday June 12, 2019 @09:14PM (#20171025)
That’s definitely a clever way to meet all the stated requirements, but in no way does it attempt to get to the root of the real user requirements.

Which, of course, involves talking to actual users.

Re:When Employees Use Software That IT Hasn’t Approved by yellowapple on Wednesday June 12, 2019 @11:48PM (#20171656)
> That doesn't mean they're wrong.

Perhaps not, but it does make it substantially more difficult to be right.

Re:When Employees Use Software That IT Hasn’t Approved by geomark on Wednesday June 12, 2019 @09:03PM (#20170973)
That's even more amazing.
Re:When Employees Use Software That IT Hasn’t Approved by alecco on Wednesday June 12, 2019 @04:16PM (#20168833)
Re:When Employees Use Software That IT Hasn’t Approved by lzol on Wednesday June 12, 2019 @02:20PM (#20167658)
This is amazing! Thank you