Got fired for "Performance Issues" at IT job. Are all IT jobs like this?
April 17, 2018 9:48 PM   Subscribe

Long Story I got fired from 2 temp Jobs in IT for the same reasons " Performance Issues" . The jobs I was hired for was IT desktop support jobs . I need something more Slower Pace or figuring out if it's me or the company?

So lately I been having some problems with keeping a job. I recently got fired from 2 IT jobs from companies that moves very fast and has high turnover.

Both of them say the same thing. " Performance issue" while your quality of work is good you don't move fast enough and can't do the same quality work.

First to start all I have nothing against help desk or customer support work I enjoying working with the end users.

The real problem starts with expectations from Management.

I am expected to juggle several things at once

- taking care of the ticket queue and having to keep the ticket queue below 10.

- meeting deadlines for projects like Deployments, office moves, new user setup, conference room support, sometimes without any help.

- if a conference room is in process, i have to drop everything because they are urgent as well.

Pretty much everything is almost an emergency and i got burned out and overwhelmed fast.

The way I organize myself I try to priortize users who are down first, then conference rooms, then users with network issues, and then projects.

Then comes issues i need to resolve and while some issues i can resolve on the spot some take time and i either have to google it, look at the KB, attempt to look at the physical layers first then last ask for help.

The managers i had dont seem to like it when i ask for help while im still learning in the environment like if I don't the answer and tried to google it, what am i suppose to do?

Pretty much these last 2 jobs have stressed me out and overall i failed to catch up with the workload.

So now I am asking if overall i am the problem?

And also if IT jobs that are more slow paced or more at a reasonable pace exist?

If i take another fast pace IT job in 3 months i can bet ill be fired yet again

I try to work as fast as i can but apparently my bosses dont like me
posted by iwantworklifebalance101 to Work & Money (16 answers total)
 
Can you talk to some of your former colleagues and get a sense of what you can improve on? Prioritizing and multitasking are fundamental tasks in IT but it does take some getting used to. Are you sure you weren’t idling while things were in progress? Ask yourself what you can do to better meet the expectations of your superiors.
posted by furtive at 10:03 PM on April 17, 2018 [1 favorite]


So, here is a hint you are working jobs with high turnover. If you are not perfect or fast enough, they'll just let you go. It's really that simple. Most people don't stay. Those that do are the exception.

These are high stress, low reward jobs.

You may have enough training on the systems now that the 3rd job may work out for you. But it might not. It's hard to tell from what you've said.

You may want to look for a job in a smaller corporate environment that will have a smaller work load. You may want to look into other types of computer jobs instead.
posted by AlexiaSky at 10:04 PM on April 17, 2018 [22 favorites]


I can't say whether your skills have any bearing on this, I just want to say that the way you describe these companies raises a lot of red flags for me. It sounds like you're choosing disorganized companies. It may be that these companies are the ones who use temp agencies for IT, but by no means is it the rule.

Keep at it, you're getting these jobs, so you can't be that bad.
posted by rhizome at 10:20 PM on April 17, 2018 [1 favorite]


Response by poster: < Can you talk to some of your former colleagues and get a sense of what you can improve on? Prioritizing and multitasking are fundamental tasks in IT but it does take some getting used to. Are you sure you weren’t idling while things were in progress? Ask yourself what you can do to better meet the expectations of your superiors. >

The only thing my colleagues would say is just thinking more faster on your feet. Besides that they complimented my work and enjoyed working with me.

Idling? Doubt it. Right from the start of the day it was just taking care of tickets, resolving emergency conference room issues, catching up on projects like E-Waste and offices moves etc. Yea i had no time almost for breaks and had to get things done. And this is for both places.

When I was terminated their complain was just " look she's not a bad person, but she unable to handle stress and high pressure and can't multitask effectively" well in a way yea but I still tried but otherwise i was still fired
posted by iwantworklifebalance101 at 10:26 PM on April 17, 2018


Do you actually LIKE working in high-stress, multitasking roles? It doesn't really sound like they're a good fit for your strengths and temperament. You sound methodical and process-oriented and I bet you are a fantastic asset when you're in a role where those traits are valued. Maybe seek out a different job where the pace of the job is a better match for your natural pace?
posted by pseudostrabismus at 11:28 PM on April 17, 2018 [20 favorites]


I'm someone who has at various times in my life both done your job and managed the people doing your job across several different environments.

What you describe *is* the job - your description of what's going on at its core doesn't seem either uncommon or out of line for a client-side IT position. In almost any larger corporate environment, there will be issues, deployments, and setups, and all of them are time-critical because in today's day and age, technology is generally necessary for folks to just plain do their job. Those things are managed in a ticketing system, and it's the job of the client-side IT person to manage the queue, prioritize tasks, and fix as much as they can any given day.

The thing that stands out to me is this:

The managers i had dont seem to like it when i ask for help while im still learning in the environment like if I don't the answer and tried to google it, what am i suppose to do?

It sounds like you're getting positions in companies that are large enough to have a substantial IT workload but a small staff who is expected to solve many types of problems. In this type of environment, the IT buck does indeed stop with you - those managers hired you to provide definitive solutions to many types of problems, even ones that you were not explicitly trained on, without the need for additional support.

This is similar to many other professions which specialize in solving problems - a family or primary care physician has to meet with different patients and resolve several different health problems each hour, the auto shop owner has to diagnose and fix several cars every day, and in both cases, there's no real way to get up in the morning each day and know exactly what work will need to be done or what kind of problems will need to be fixed. Nevertheless, patients and car owners are relying on them, and everyone has the expectation they can walk in and have their problems solved no matter how deep.

The problem is that any organization (or patient, or car owner) will have strange problems that aren't procedural, where the answer isn't necessarily sitting there in a manual. People can be trained to solve common problems, but one-off problems inevitably happen that nobody is explicitly trained for. That's where the need to think fast on your feet comes in.

You can't really be trained to think fast on your feet; it's some mix of experience and disposition. It's the ability to create a mental list of solutions in order from most likely to least likely the moment you hear about a problem, and then be able to work on them or explain them as quickly as possible. If you don't have a plan of attack - not necessarily a solution, an explanation of what you're going to do to determine what the core problem is and fix it - almost immediately after hearing most problems, that will be interpreted as idling or the inability to solve problems efficiently. In this type of position, the approach of "I need to get someone else to help me fix this" should always be the last resort for a highly specialized problem or for something you don't have access or permission to fix, not a common outcome of being presented with a problem.

It sounds like you may want to be in a planning position more than a tactical, troubleshooting position. There are plenty of those types of positions, from sales engineers to systems architects, where there are fewer individual problems, longer timeframes, and deeper solutions. However, virtually all IT positions go back to a core of finding solutions to novel problems; generally, if there is a problem that occurs frequently enough that it can be trained on, that problem can be eliminated either in software or hardware changes.

There is always the pressure in IT positions of being responsible for solving new problems. It's a classic game of Tetris where there's no point at which you win, the pieces never stop falling from the sky, and how well you do depends entirely on how quickly you can put all those random pieces together in a way to get some of them off the board to make way when the others fall. Me, I'm the kind of person who gets bored if I don't have new problems to solve, and I've been around long enough I can quickly prioritize which solutions help people the most and doing those first. But that's not everyone, and if the idea of a cascade of technical problems always coming down the pipeline doesn't appeal to you, or if you freeze up when you hear about a difficult problem rather than naturally create a plan of attack, client-side IT just might not be for you.

I hope this helps.
posted by eschatfische at 6:12 AM on April 18, 2018 [12 favorites]


Some companies use metrics and demand super efficient, super productive, super accurate performance every second. Assess the accuracy of your work. Assess your knowledge. Are you able to work in an environment that can be fast-paced, requires broad knowledge and competence? Are you able to deal with constant distractions and changes of direction? Can you actually multitask? Those are things a helped will require; I used to manage a helpdesk. You may want to expand your skills in a specific area, specialist have a different environment.
posted by theora55 at 6:20 AM on April 18, 2018


I understand that being fired does a number on your self-esteem but it's the job, it isn't you. They always say "performance issues" when they let people go from that role.

I'd look for helpdesk jobs at smaller companies.
posted by DarlingBri at 6:44 AM on April 18, 2018


Try looking for jobs in higher education IT, generally much more relaxed. I’ve been doing it for 20 years.
posted by porn in the woods at 6:56 AM on April 18, 2018 [6 favorites]


"The real problem starts with expectations from Management"

Alas, this is the case for almost all working people.

But yeah, in your case, it sounds like management has been especially unreasonable.

At my last job, one of our desktop support guys' workload was so light that he spent most of his day at my desk showing me YouTube videos. (This would actually get me in trouble, since my workload wasn't so light.) My current IT department (four guys) seems to spend most of their time in the break room drinking coffee and looking out the window. But they constantly get company-wide shout-outs from management, so they're obviously not slacking off.

My point is that it's possible to have a desktop support job with down time, where management respects you. Possible, but not always easy.

The key, IMO, is to find a job with an established company with a large (i.e., not one or two people) IT department with low turnover. (On preview, the higher ed suggestion is a good one.) These are things you can and should ask in a job interview. Remember, an interview is a two-way process. The company isn't just interviewing you to see if you'd be able to do the job; you're also interviewing them to see if you'd want to work there. You obviously have to be a little sly in the questions you ask; if you say "how much down time can I expect?", you'll give the impression that you're a slacker and they won't hire you. But ask about things like "how long have my colleagues been with the company?" and "what is the training like?" and "what are the expectations for productivity?". This should give you an idea of what the work environment is like, and how management treats its workers. You could also ask to speak with one of your prospective colleagues to ask them directly. (If they'll only let you speak to a manager or HR rep, that's a sign you may not want to work there.)

These jobs do exist; you just have to find them.
posted by kevinbelt at 7:17 AM on April 18, 2018 [2 favorites]


also if IT jobs that are more slow paced or more at a reasonable pace exist?

I've recently retired after working one of those for twelve years: part time IT technician / network administrator in a medium sized rural primary school.

Money was woeful by IT industry standards but I had almost total autonomy, my work was valued and appreciated, the teaching and administrative staff were all great people, I felt I was making a real contribution to helping kids get an education, and I thoroughly enjoyed my time there.

The main thing that tipped me over the edge into retirement was the inexorable drift of school IT away from proper flexible capable ergonomic reliable multiuser desktop computers to dumbed-down locked-down short-lived glued-together personal touch-screen fondleslabs, which I absolutely loathe working with. If that's not an issue for you, and you can get by on just enough to keep the bills paid and the larder stocked, I strongly recommend investigating school IT support positions.
posted by flabdablet at 8:45 AM on April 18, 2018 [1 favorite]


Right, so pretty much what everyone else has said makes sense. I have been in IT for 20+ years, and I like the end user support role, especially the variety of desk-side, phone based and remote support. Saying that - I hate call center or high volume help desk jobs. I have only worked those types for a few weeks to months while I was looking for more interesting-to-me jobs.

Some people thrive in high stress/high volume environments - you sound like you don't. That's a good thing to know about yourself when you go interview - like was said above, be honest with the interviewer and with yourself afterwards. Taking jobs which you know you won't like, and are likely to be fired from is a really good way to wreck your self-esteem, so, unless you really need a job right away, don't do that.

The job market is hot enough right now that you can afford to be a little picky. You are looking for desk side support, 2nd level suport, or similar jobs.

IT support is rewarding, but it certainly isn't for everyone.

By the way, I wouldn't look at your job history that negatively if you told me in an interview that high volume help desk jobs aren't for you. Lots and lots of people move from gig to gig, especially if they work for a contracting company.

Good luck, good IT jobs are out there, I promise.
posted by Ecgtheow at 9:00 AM on April 18, 2018


Can you look into similar IT jobs at a university? Universities definitely have "help desk" staff, but the pace isn't nearly as nuts as it is at for-profit companies.
posted by mollymillions at 9:07 AM on April 18, 2018


Also, temping is Strike 1 before you even turn up on site. Lots of people seem to think they have a perfect right to treat temps like shit on their shoe.
posted by flabdablet at 9:31 AM on April 18, 2018 [1 favorite]


I don't think this is a bad job or you are a bad employee; I think it's just a bad fit for your skill set. IT jobs like this require a skill set of excellent reading comprehension, the ability to pour through gazillions of google search results quickly (while you are researching answers to tough questions you haven't seen before), creative troubleshooting (for when it is a problem you haven't seen before and there is no manual or flowchart on what to try next to solve it), customer service skills (so you can finesse the end users while they wait for you to solve the problem), among other skills.
posted by TestamentToGrace at 1:21 PM on April 18, 2018


What TestamentToGrace says is true, but I would add that managing IT workers who do jobs like this requires a skill set that includes being able to schedule around the immutable fact that some problems, by their very nature, are just going to take longer than some arbitrary mandated maximum time to fix but are well worth fixing all the same.

I gave up a nominally similar job at a different school (I had actually been working both schools on different days) mainly because the new deputy principal had hauled me into his office to complain that I had on several occasions taken longer than 15 minutes to fix an issue, on the basis that any issue that took longer than that should simply trigger replacement of the computer concerned. He was particularly annoyed that I had spent most of the previous day sorting out a laundry list of completely legitimate network-related problems raised by the music teacher, whose working hours very rarely overlapped mine.

It had apparently escaped this guy that it takes one person longer than 15 minutes to break down and pack up an outgoing computer and then unbox, physically install and reimage a new one, even not taking into account the loss of staff time involved in adapting to the new machine, or that I was charging them for my time at a rate that would have allowed me to spend days fixing a problem before I cost them anything even close to the price of a new computer.

His actual beef was that before he'd been promoted to deputy principal, it had often taken me longer than half a day to respond to one of his issues. And this was because I'd taken to pushing him well down the priority list on the basis that nine out of ten of his issues had always turned out to be completely fucking imaginary and/or fixed by one of his ten-year-old students before I got there and/or directly caused by his ongoing failure to take my repeatedly given advice about clicking Safely Remove before unplugging the fucking camera or making sure there was paper in the tray when the printer showed an orange flashing light.

Pretty sure that his idea of an ideal IT support worker would have looked more like Jacob than me.
posted by flabdablet at 9:51 PM on April 18, 2018


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