Category: Work

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Query Quotient

Working for a large company, I often find myself in the scenario of needing information.  I therefore seek to resolve this knowledge deficit by sending a simple email to an individual who holds said knowledge.  Yet all too often my queries go ignored.  Why is that?  What deep underlying motivations have possessed this individual to turn a deaf ear to the needs of others?  What cruel, sociopathic inclinations govern this person’s actions?

I debated at length these social dynamics, but the answer wasn’t nearly so disturbing as my overly-dramatic introduction might have implied.  Rather, I conclude there are a few and very simple factors: Does the person feel they have time (an extension of job title and pay grade), does the person feel the inquirer is worthy of their time (also an extension of job title and pay grade), can the person benefit from the inquirer, has the inquirer committed some social slight against them, and does the person like the inquirer?

To distill this even further, from the contactee’s perspective:

  • Are you at my level?
  • Has there or will there be a quid pro quo?
  • Do I like you?

Yet all reasons are not created equal, so based upon entirely subjective reasoning, I have developed a formula to weight them properly:

  1. Each party’s pay grade.  The first thing an email recipient looks at when receiving an email from an unknown party is that person’s job title.  A lot of information can be instantly determined from the hierarchy.  If you’re higher than me, I’d better listen, for my future promotion could depend on it.  If you’re lower than me, well…(dismissive wave of the hand).  If we’re the same level, I should at least consider you a peer, and there’s the possibility that I might work for you one day.
  2. Subjectives.  How well do I know this person, do we work together, do we have a good working relationship, and do I like you?  So much is difficult to determine from an email, but in short, if you’ve pissed me off, then you’re probably not going to get an answer.  Fair?  No.  True?  Always.  From failed experiences, I know to always humble myself accordingly when initiating contact.
  3. Positive Empiricals.  Have you done good work for me before and are you a potential cardinal to my promotion?  Obviously I would want to maintain a relationship with someone who’s benefiting me directly.
  4. Negative Empiricals.  Have you done lousy work for me before and have you beat me out for a job or opportunity?  Obviously I’d want to distance myself from a poor worker, but the last point does seem petty.  However, people take ego blows very seriously, and it’s no coincidence that former colleagues have severed contact when I became competition, and especially if I won.

As for probability, I’ve determined from experience that I will always get a response from a peer if every positive category is satisfied.  I will generally always get a response from someone lower with almost all of these conditions satisfied.  And I will usually get a response from someone higher with every condition satisfied.  However, if any negative conditions are satisfied, then the response rate very quickly drops.  As I stated, it’s weighted, and formerly positive relationships are always easy to sabotage since the human mind tends to remember the bad and not the good.  Here’s the formula for reference:

=IF(Their pay grade>Your pay grade,100*((1/(0.5*(Their pay grade-Your pay grade))/4)+(Do you know them?+Do you work with this person currently?+Is person within your department?+Do you have a positive working relationship?+Do they like you?)/25)+(Have you done good work for them before?+Can you get this person a job/opportunity?)/10)-(Have you done bad work for them before?+Have you beat that person out for job/opportunity?)/5)),IF(Your pay grade>Their pay grade,70+(100*(Do you know them?+Do you work with this person currently?+Is person within your department?+Do you have a positive working relationship?+Do they like you?)/25)+(Have you done good work for them before?+Can you get this person a job/opportunity?)*10)),60+(100*(Do you know them?+Do you work with this person currently?+Is person within your department?+Do you have a positive working relationship?+Do they like you?)/25)+(Have you done good work for them before?+Can you get this person a job/opportunity?)*10)-(Have you done bad work for them before?+Have you beat that person out for job/opportunity?)*10))))

Of course, that nightmarish formula is more readily understood in its natural format: a spreadsheet, so naturally I’ve provided it along with instructions:

https://moorheadfamily.net/data/Query%20Quotient.xlsx

Out of curiosity, I tested it with a recent scenario involving someone from our Legal department.  The calculator suggested a 33% chance of receiving a response, and seeing as it took 3 weeks to get any answer, this figure seems pretty accurate.  Hopefully this tool will allow you to adjust your project timelines accordingly.

–Simon

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Decade

For the life of me, I couldn’t figure out a clever alliterative title to this post.  All the D-words I could think of were rather derogatory (see–there’s one right there), and while I may have failed to change others’ lives with my career, like so many with hopes and dreams of grandeur, I did managed to change mine, and drastically improve its standard of living.  And after all, isn’t that our prime directive as a species, before we get into all that nonsense about purpose and self-actualization that we’re spoon-fed from the time we learn to write our names?

But I’m too young for a midlife crisis.  This was a mere 10 years.  What happened career-wise in that timeframe?  Hmm…

I joined the company as the recession hit.  Large swaths of the management staff were let go.  Merit raises were frozen, our insurance was overhauled (not for the better), there was a hiring freeze, and then the parent company tried to sell off the division.  When that failed, they realigned it, then merged it, and ultimately spun it off.  In the end, I held 6 different positions over that time.  It wasn’t exactly a period of sustained economic growth.

Through it all, the company has still maintained the practice of awarding ceremonial gifts unto an employee upon reaching a milestone number of tenured years.  Or rather, they send a digital catalog and the employee gets to pick out a gift.  They can be a bit odd too, like sunglasses, a crockpot, or a telescope.  But I, reflecting upon what I have endured to reach that point, prefer to find my own symbolic meanings and so choose something of…symbolism.

So it was that upon reaching 5 years, when I was still a call-center agent toiling away in the ranks, when every second of my time spent on the clock was tracked and reported to generate various statistics and graphs that visualized how I wasn’t working hard or quickly enough, that I chose the Bulova analog watch:

…you know, because time?  Although now it occurs to me that this may already be intended symbolism, due to the watch’s ubiquity as a “years of service” award.  Because I guess there isn’t really a wearable calendar.

But now, I’ve reached 10 years.  Following suit on the symbolic gift appropriate choice…thing, I noticed this in the catalog:

A crystal whiskey decanter!  I couldn’t think of anything more appropriate had I tried: both a symbol of what has gotten me through those 10 years alive, and going forward, a physical item to get me through the next 10 years.

Plus, it’ll annoy Liz.  Win!

–Simon

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Password Expiration

For anyone who follows infosec, or even just basic tech, news–NIST has made a landmark change to their password guidelines:

Verifiers SHOULD NOT require memorized secrets to be changed arbitrarily (e.g., periodically). However, verifiers SHALL force a change if there is evidence of compromise of the authenticator.

The change came last month, with the NIST Special Publication 800-63B.  Now, to clarify, NIST cannot enforce these standards upon the private sector.  However, as a general best-practice, businesses incorporate the NIST standards anyway–a decision with which I personally don’t find any fault.

But a consequence of this has been the eternal password debate.  I jested at the very-popular entropy argument, and offered my own thoughts on the matter, specifically that the mathematical models change depending on how one views a password’s derived length.  And while this argument still continues, as least now we can finally acknowledge that once a “good” password has been created, the human elements create enough points of failure as to render any advantages of regular password changes negated.

I therefore beseech you, my employer: can we now please stop with the mandatory 90-day password changes?

–Simon

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The Filename Doesn’t Match

I usually refrain from posting about my job because 1) There’s always someone with no sense of humor who takes things too literally/personally, and 2) There’s always a fine line between giving context and disclosing too much about things that aren’t public knowledge.

But I will attempt to traverse this line because in this scenario the story involves no widespread PR disaster, nor does it explain anything proprietary–simply basic technology.  All is paraphrased.  Here goes:

I notice an email campaign isn’t launching.  I ask the guy who schedules them with the FTP server why.

FTP Guy:  “The filename doesn’t match the email platform template, so the SAS code is sending data to the inactivate template.”

Me:  “Why doesn’t the filename match?”

FTP Guy:  “Because when you requested the original test file from the Data Team, you gave them the name of the old template.”

Me:  “Fuck.”

I consult a colleague.

Me:  “Why did the test files launch if the filename was for the wrong template?”

Colleague:  “Because the test files will still work for test emails, just not live data.”

Me:  “So I’d have no way of knowing the filename was wrong based on the test emails?”

Colleague:  “Correct.  You’d have to go back and verify a successful launch with the [generated report A] for each email campaign you manage.”

Me:  “I checked [generated report B], and it showed volume.”

Colleague:  “[generated report B] only shows activity between SAS and the email platform, which was sending files as intended, just to the inactive template.”

Me:  “So [generated report B] does not confirm live email activity?”

Colleague:  “No.”

Me:  “Fuck.”

I consult my manager

Me:  “So, this email didn’t go out because the filename mismatch caused SAS to send data to an inactive template.”

Manager:  “Why was there a filename mismatch?”

Me:  “Because I requested a test file for the wrong template, but it still worked for test emails so I didn’t notice.”

Manager:  “Why didn’t you notice that the email wasn’t launched?”

Me:  “I checked [generated report B] to confirm email activity, which I just found out only only shows activity between SAS and the email platform, and does not confirm emails go out.”

Manager:  “Okay, I will log this error.”

I go to inform the client liaison.

Me:  “So, this email didn’t go out because the filename mismatch caused SAS to send data to an inactive template.”

Client Liaison:  “Why was there a filename mismatch?”

Me:  “Because I requested a test file for the wrong template, but it still worked for test emails so I didn’t notice.  I checked [generated report B] to confirm email activity, which I just found out only shows activity between SAS and the email platform, and does not confirm emails go out.”

I get summoned to a meeting with my manager.

Manager:  “We have to put together a report and fill out this form explaining what happened, then discuss with your colleagues how to prevent it from happening again.”

Me:  “Okay.”  I fill out the form as follows:  “I requested a file for the wrong template, but it still worked for test emails so I didn’t notice.  I checked [generated report B] to confirm email activity, which I just found out only shows activity between SAS and the email platform, and does not confirm emails go out.”

I consult colleague for advice

Me:  “How do I regularly verify email activity?”

Colleague:  “You check [generated report A] for each email you’re managing.”

Me:  “Is there a quicker way to check all emails at once?”

Colleague:  “You can check [generated report C].”

Colleague shows me how to generate [generated report C].  I return to my manager.

Me:  “So in order to prevent this issue again, I will generate [generated report C] regularly to confirm email activity.”

Manager:  “How do you generate [generated report C]?”

I show my manager how to generate [generated report C].

Manager:  “Okay, I will add that to the report.”

I get summoned to a surveillance meeting to discuss the larger implications of the error.

Surveillance:  “What caused this email to not go out?”

Me:  “I requested a file for the wrong template, but it still worked for test emails so I didn’t notice.  I checked [generated report B] to confirm email activity, which I just found out only only shows activity between SAS and the email platform, and does not confirm emails go out.”

Surveillance:  “Why did you not notice the email didn’t go out?”

Me:  “I checked [generated report B] to confirm email activity, which I just found out only shows activity between SAS and the email platform, and does not confirm emails go out.”

Surveillance:  “How will you check for this in the future?”

Me:  “I will generate [generated report C] regularly to confirm email activity.”

Surveillance:  “How will you prevent it from happening again?”

Me:  “I now know how to properly request a test file for the right template, that test emails still generate with a filename mismatch, and that [generated report B] does not report email activity.  I will now generate [generated report C] regularly to confirm email activity.

End of meeting.

The above chain of events has been greatly shortened.  Bureaucracy is a consequence of large groups of people all performing specialized roles, and since this is a large company, it’s inevitable.  But one thing is certain, and that’s that I won’t request a file for the wrong template, thus creating a filename mismatch, ever again!

–Simon

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Like a Record, Baby

Standing desks are hippie-dippie crap.  Just because you want to lessen your chances of fatal cardiac arrest one day, I have to hear you and your stupid call as you talk way too loudly over the cubicle walls.

That is not the topic of this post, but a mere introduction.  I, too, feel my fragile physical form atrophying as I sit in a chair for hours.  And so, partially out of concern for my musculature, partially because I can’t bear to hear standing desk guy talking loudly on his eternal call anymore, I venture forth into the harsh and unforgiving wilderness that is the paved perimeter of the building.

I started taking walks whenever I had the time very early in my employ at this company.  And now, years later, I again went walking, but this time with someone else.  I’ve done that before of course–I’m not an antisocial weirdo.  But apparently I always take the lead, for on this occasion, upon our mutual egress from the edifice, she turned right–a direction I had never considered.  She wished to circumnavigate the building in a clockwise direction.  I implored her to rethink her rash and unwise decision, but nay said she, for the wild called to her in that direction.

Actually I think she just said she wanted to go that way, followed by a rhetorical question along the lines of what the hell was wrong with me.  And I, being the eternal gentlemen, acquiesced.  Then, 10 steps into the walk, I collapsed from an anxiety attack.

Which brings me to my question: why are sporting events which involve circular autotransference always done so in a counterclockwise direction?  Once again I sought the Holy Oracle for its wisdom of the collective consciousness.

Google quickly directed me to several sites, wherein the answers were many.  Explanations included but were not limited to: Coriolis effect, faster movement in relation to the planet’s rotation, more natural for the majority right-foot dominated athletes, and the interpretation of chronology as athletes moved from left to right from the perspective of the spectators.

But I recall an X-Files episode in which a buried naval antenna, miles long, generated ultra-low frequency radio waves for communication with deep-sea submarines.  Except, this being the X-Files, there were unanticipated consequences, and local residents suffered some sort of explosive decompression of their inner ear if they stopped moving–some sort of bone-resonance in relation to the antenna.  The guest actor was the guy who played the Breaking Bad dude.  Anyway, things didn’t turn out so well for Breaking Bad dude, the navy denied any wrongdoing but mysteriously shut down the antenna, and Mulder got the usual berating from FBI Assistant Director Skinner (or maybe it was his new boss after he was officially removed from the X-Files).

It is therefore my preferred theory that my panic attack was not due to some simple neurological disorder like OCD, but rather that, let’s say, the gel in my inner-ear is in resonance with the earth’s rotation and it causes me physical pain to travel clockwise.  One day, I will travel to the southern hemisphere to confirm this theory.

For now, let’s take a walk, and turn left dammit!

–Simon