Ethics in Today's I.T. Workplace? What is an experienced professional to do?
As for myself, I enjoy my new career as a self employed graphic designer. I should have done this years ago, but due to financial reasons over the years, I compromised my dreams and talents to continue doing what everybody else does, all for the sake of that regular paycheck.
Early on, my former career was very rewarding. I enjoyed it and many of the people I met and knew. During those years, I travelled, saw most of the U.S.A., developed and authored many programs and suites of tools. For a while, I enjoyed a reputation as an expert in my field, and was sought by many recruiters. Those times are over, and very few good people can be found anymore. I do enjoy knowing that some are still using the fruits of my labor, and that some of my work still exists in tools evolved from it. A small legacy, but satisfying nonetheless.
I am much happier and better off now, and have moved beyond the discouragement and anger that brought about the original version of the writing below. However, I decided recently to publish this revision. The name of the company and the people mentioned are slightly altered only because there are some good folks at the company I want to name. Some of them (including human resources) are oblivious to the sort of people their co-workers are.
This is generally about the sad state of the I.T. workplace. As demonstrated by my final job in my former I.T. career, this particular company is my "poster child" representing such.
The new I.T. - Septic pools of noxious cubicle dwellers
Amid all the furor over politics, morals, schools, teachers, kids, online social media, I want to ask: What has happened to the dignity and ethics of what was once the professional I.T. (information technology) workplace? Why does a company let ethical people go, while retaining the unethical and untrustworthy?
The state of our economy continues to worsen, and I allow that it has much to do with my not getting many interviews or any job offers since my last "position was eliminated" early in 2010. I also allow that at times I have a degree of paranoia (experience) that whispers defamation and age discrimination.
I invested some time working for a company which devolved into a big disappointment, largely due to its people. The way things turned out resulted in hindered opportunities to apply my ignored experience and unacknowledged expertise. Thus, I've not much to show for it, and little worth my resume for my time there. You see, I cannot trust anyone with whom I worked directly for any meaningful professional or personal references. In particular, one should be able to refer to his former manager and to his former immediate peers. I cannot, and that is why those individuals are mentioned below.
This recent job in my former I.T. career was the last in a string of experiences in which I've witnessed the decline and fall of what this industry used to be. I am now returning the favor, turning my back on an industry now defined by unethical and unprofessional practices, useless office face time and back stabbing, self-centered co-workers.
The Company - "Le Mention Obscurity"
Some who read this may know what company this is. Some of them will know who the people below are. I have disassociated myself with them, and have no direct links, icons, logos or such remaining. I really wish that their customers and investors could know of the unprofessional people, and the unethical practices those people exercise. Call this the rant of a disgruntled former employee if you wish. I expect that. If I burn a bridge or two, so be it.
Now, I am not supposed to "disparage or defame" the company or "parties" from which I was unfairly expelled without cause, but that does not exclude facts, first hand observations, or observations presented by other (current) employees. So, I have put some thoughts out here, like it or not. Yes, stating that someone is an a-hole may be viewed as an opinion, but in these cases, it's a fact. I don't expect to ever work with these people again, and in the unlikely event I ever should, I don't care. These people don't care about honesty, ethics or other people. I must say that if I ever see them in need, I will not give them the time of day, God forgive me. I won't mention the good folks, and many are there. They know who they are, and if not for the economy, many of them would (will) have left.
When I first heard of this company, I had a nice job elsewhere. I wasn't looking for another job when I was contacted by an I.T. recruiter. He arranged for an interview with a director, and that developed into a job offer. I was excited to accept the offer, as the salary was better and I looked forward to the work, which turned out to be little of what was discussed during the interview. This director soon left the company, and is a really nice guy. I since met him downtown on jury duty, and he laughed about that being the worst job he ever had. Shortly after he hired me, he was replaced with a new guy, and many things quickly changed.
In my entire I.T. career, spanning almost 30 years as an employee or contractor at companies large and small, I have never encountered a more unprofessional group of people than this "team" I ended up a part of.
With a background in security, I was amazed that this place (whose product is related to computer security), kept unexpiring passwords for root/administrator on all their development and QA machines set to dumb things like "123123". When I asked about it and offered to correct it, I was told to leave it alone. I've often wondered how difficult a hacker might find access to their production environment. This company has many high profile customers in the government and financial sectors. How confident might they feel, if they knew how bogus this company's own internal security is?
Twice that I know of, USB (thumb) drives were placed around the office with labels such as "porn" and "payroll" as a "social engineering experiment". The drives were set to send e-mail when they were plugged in. I guess I was not that surprised when more than half of the employees who found them connected them to their corporate workstations.
The People
While I did not need help with the technical aspects of my work, as any new employee I expected to receive company and product mentoring from a coworker, whom was asked to provide it. Kevin Strudel would appear in the office at noon (forgive me for expecting to work normal business hours). This guy all but ignored my questions, or referred me to out of date or "vapor" documents. I finally got the message: Figure things out on my own. He was apparently resentful of my being there, because until then, he was the only Unix "expert" in the group. Anytime he overheard my describing how to do something, he would jump in and argue an irrelevant detail in an obvious attempt to discredit my contribution. Later, he would take credit for some of the work I did. I should have realized early on that he cannot be trusted. That's about all I'll say regarding this toad, but what a wormy little a-hole he presented himself to be. That's how my time with this company began, and it's indicative of where my path with this (dis)organization led.
I will add that Kevin was one of many who came to work each day dressed like he was doing yard work. Unrelated to this rant, this is another point I have regarding today's unprofessional workplace. Nobody cares anymore.
Now, meet our "manager". Here is a real piece of work. A married man with children, Rodney Foolbe is a two-faced a-hole with papers of pedigree, and made it evident to everyone in the office from his first week on the job that he enjoyed being so. He wasted no time attacking two of us on his team, announcing that as far as he was concerned, we were "just monkeys pushing buttons". Many in the office alienated him, only tolerating his presence because he was a manager (or director, depending on the day of the week). His own manager (a V.P.) can't stand him either. This guy is a joke, running around the office dressed like a little boy (he too wears shorts almost daily), making bad jokes in poor taste. I recently saw that he is now called an architect. This moron can't even spell architect.
Mark Jackboots, whose position was also eliminated by Rodney, told us that when Rodney interviewed him prior to transferring to our group, he was asked if he had a problem working with gay people. Inappropriate? If Mark had been gay himself, he could have sued the company.
One guy in the group is an openly gay fellow and generally nice guy. During one of his "work from home" days, we were chatting in IM when he told me about an evening when Rodney had gone to a gay C&W bar, got drunk and was hitting on the gay bartender, in the presence of his employee. I wish I had saved the transcript of that IM session, but alas. I showed it to others and we laughed at the time, but now I wish I had saved that. I'll also mention a person in another group who is trans-gender, now female. Rodney likes to follow her around and hang over her cubicle wall. Is any of this appropriate behavior for a manager or director, a married man with children? In today's workplace, who cares, right?
When I was being told that my "position was being eliminated", Rodney had the audacity to say, in front of the H.R. director that he would provide me with a "good reference". I visibly scoffed and shook my head. I can only imagine the defamation and disparaging remarks he might offer. Why would I want to give his name to a prospective employer? I would have to add the caveat that he can't be trusted!
I find it frustrating that people like this exist in what could otherwise be an awesome workplace, yet he still has a job, while many others do not. Why does a company let ethical people go, while retaining the unethical and untrustworthy?
Age Discrimination to save a few bucks
Rodney had hired two very young people with green cards (or student visas - whatever), whom of course work for relatively little salary. Now, in fairness to the concept of a business saving money, this practice generally lends itself to that. However, the other guy who was let go the same day as I, found it noteworthy how our letters each stated that we must agree to "waive any claim of age discrimination". We have to wonder why they made a point specific to that. I would have to add "Hostile Work Environment" and "Wrongful Termination" to the list.
Perhaps you know or have experienced the above. Maybe you care, or perhaps are only amused. If you are relatively new to that industry, you probably have no idea how nice it once was. Good luck to you.
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