What rights do I have?

[joohang]

Background:

I'm a UBC student who was working at Library Systems part-time during school session and took a temporary full-time position for the summer. During the past 2 weeks, we've been struck by "FUNLOVE" virus, which it looks to me like the virus was around for a while but wasn't activated until recently.

We have a "senior admin" (that's what he does, although the HR calls him some other elegant title) who constantly picks on me. And today, I think he went a bit too overboard. He worked there for like 20 or 30 years and extremely favoured by my supervisor and our manager.

Another fact to note:

Our library public machines have "guest" and "patron" access. "Patron" requires an id and password while "guest" does not. To avoid anonymous fraud, guest machines are usually only around reference desk. The machines run NT Workstation. All the public machines I am referring to in this post were within 5 feet or direct sight from the library's reference desk.

What happened today:

Two days ago, I got an email at Help Desk from one of the library's staff (not in Systems) who regularly reports us problems with public machines. Apparently, some of the machines were logged in as patron, although they should've been guest. They were around the reference desk so I thought it was safe to do so. (not to mention that was the only thing I was told as far as "guest" and "patron" stuff were concerned)

Any ways, we had problems with some of those machines. Our PDC was down due to the virus problem and it was up again. Apparently the workstations couldn't log-in. I removed the machines from the domain, re-added to the domain, rebooted, rebuilt from an image and they kept on failing. I thought it had to be a server problem, so I reported to him.

He says: "What is the error message?"
Me: "It says that the account may not exist."
Him: "What exactly is the error message?"
Me: "That the account may not exist."
Him: "That doesn't mean anything. What EXACTLY does it say?"
(He was kinda pissy but not TOO BAD at the moment.)

Oh.. so I was apparently supposed to be the DUMB A$$ and report to him as if I took a screen capture of the error message. WTF? How else can I report a workstation having problems communicating with the PDC?

So we go over and somehow the problem got fixed. I have no idea how it was fixed but it looked to me like he didn't know what he was doing either. Apparently when he rebooted, they worked fine, even though they didn't work when I rebooted earlier.

When it was "fixed" he logged in as patron. I told him that the machine was supposed to guest.. UH OH! Now he fired at me. Apparently I was not supposed to do that because that woman had no AUTHORITY to change them. WTF? And how was I supposed to know that? I got yelled at and then he joked (about me, of course) to his "junior admin" guy (who is really nice) beside him.

I felt awfully humiliated and I don't think I deserved such crap for something I was never told about. If I made a MISTAKE, I would apologize.

Later that afternoon, I asked my supervisor what I was supposed to do. Apparently, our inventory database (which uses some ancient text-based database on an SGI server) had the information on whether the machine should be guest or patron.

So guess what? All those machines are SUPPOSED TO BE guest!!! So I had to go back and changed them back to guest. WTF???

I'm sure some crap like this will happen again to me. Apparently he likes to pick on new people with my job title.

Do I have to take this crap throughout the summer? Can he do that? I don't recall my job description stating that I am the admin's punchbag.

What if (next time) I kindly tell him to shut up? Does the manager have the right to fire me for that?

It sucks to be a student because even though I take a proper full-time position, I'm still just a student to them. I'm treated with minimal respect (especially from that admin guy) and my voice is probably not even properly heard to the manager.

I can't wait 'til I get out of school.

(Damn.. long post. Sorry. Had to vent. Couldn't find any better place to do this than ATOT.)

 

[Valafar]

Did he say specificaly "That woman had no authority..."? Could be grounds for discrimination and/or hazing.

 

[Hamburgerpimp]

My advice is one Novel idea!

 

[joohang]

<< Did he say specificaly &quot;That woman had no authority...&quot;? Could be grounds for discrimination and/or hazing. >>


It was more like &quot;she has no authority to do that&quot; or something to that line.

 

[joohang]

<< My advice is one Novel idea! >>


Mind sharing it with more details?

 

[Hamburgerpimp]

Pun was in &quot;Novel&quot;

 

[joohang]

Haha

He's awfully anti-Microsoft yet he chose an NT environment because it is &quot;easier to manage.&quot;

But then also borrowing his words: &quot;IIS is tough to configure.&quot;

Hmmm.. I ran a web server since IIS 3.0 back in grade 10 with minimal knowledge of TCP/IP or any training in NT server.

 

[joohang]

So no suggestions on how to deal with this?

 

[skywhr]

Get over it or find a new job...

 

[joohang]

I am ok now, but I don't know if I can hold it up without exploding on him if he keeps doing this to me.

 

[skywhr]

The guy is a prick, speak with your supervisor and try to resolve the situation.

 

[joohang]

The problem is that my supervisor is not exactly &quot;above&quot; his position. And they seem to get along very nicely.

i.e. If my supervisor reports the exact same error message exactly the same way I did, they'll joke about it and laugh.

Oh well. Looks like I got a crappy summer job. At least the libraries are spread around so I can try to spend most of my work hours outside the office.

 

[GasX]

Welcome to the real world...

If he crosses the line into creating a &quot;Hostile Work Environment&quot; then you can file a complaint or initiate legal action if it is serious.

Otherwise, pay your dues and collect your paycheck.

 

[perry]

Tell the sys admin guy that you don't appreciate being talked down to like that. Do it in private as to now cause a ruckus. Maybe he's just joking around and doesn't realize that he's offending you. Make note of the day you do it.

If he keeps it up after you've told him how you feel, go to his supervisor, and then above that supervisor if you don't get satisfaction.

 

[Modeps]

what rights? thats your question? you have no rights. you work for them. they own your time and pay you for it. you will do as they say. sorry, but thats the way it goes.

 

[rahvin]

Deal with it. If you blow up you blow up but make it good and lasting if you do. If you are bigger than him and he pisses you off enough ask him if he would like to step outside to discuss his continued disrespect of you. Make sure and do it in front of other people so that when he backs down word will get around.

 

[xraymongral]

My response would be somethng along the lines of: &quot;Sorry you are having a bad day. I hope whatever is troubleing you gets better.&quot;

Either he will take it as an aknowledgement that he is being nasty, or he will ask WTF you are talking about, then it is up to you to say something along the lines of &quot;Well, you have not been acting very nice to me, so I was assuming that you were having some problems and decided to take them out on me. I understand, it ok.&quot;

That might be about all you can do, sort of a nice non-confrontational aknowledgement that he has been an ass to you.

 

[joohang]

I like your suggestion xraymongral.

And quit your talks about &quot;welcome to the real world&quot; because I think that's just BS.

I work for the library. The admin is NOT my employer. Even if he is, I think I should be treated a little better than that.

I work very efficiently but I take pride of maintaining the library machines up and running. This job means more than a pay cheque to me and I've been enjoying mostly except for the crap I had to deal with him.

 

[shifrbv]

joohang - Since this is only a student job, I wouldn't be too worried about it. Roll with the punches. Just think, in a short time, you'll be out of there onto bigger and better things while this admin will be stuck there.

As far as saying something to your supervisor, be careful on that one. I once had a job where I didn't get along with one of our project managers. I had some real issues about this guy's office demeanor. Being young and inexperienced about office politics, I went to my supervisor and spilled my guts. It totally blew up in my face. My supervisor talked to this guy about what I said and shortly afterwards pretty soon the whole office knew about it. Because I was the only minority in the office, everyone else pretty much ganged up on me and I never felt the same about working there again. A few times I would walk in to an area and overhear people talking about me and this project manager and this issue (heard some bad comments). It was terrible and I started looking for a new job not long afterwards. I guess sometimes you've got to suck it up and tough it out.

 

[joohang]

Unfortunately I really need this job to make my living. I tried the best I can with everything I did with this job. They told me to fix computers, so I fixed them. They told me to do this, and I did that. They even told me to vacuum (yes, in the library with people around) and wipe keyboards/monitors/cases/cables with alcohol, petroleum and other fluids and I did that without a single complaint. One of our major labs is cleaner than ever and I take pride of that, although it was a very tedious work that took 3 straight days. And this is what I get in return?

They paid me $20/hour to clean computers (which was pretty much all I did for the first 2 weeks). That sounds like a big waste, but I didn't complain. However, sometimes I even wondered why they even bothered to ask me to submit my resume and cover letter because I hardly ever use any of my skills. As soon as I say anything, I am more likely to be perceived as this rude wannabe kid who knows crap.. this coming from a guy who finds IIS &quot;hard to configure.&quot;

When September comes, I'll be back to part-time night shift, where I get paid $600/month for hardly doing anything. Not to mention I won't have to deal with him again.

Also, I was talking to some local enterprise developers and I will be spending most of my summer shaping up my programming skills. By the end of summer, I could possibly work on some more exciting projects, and work with people who actually know how to respect others. One of my possible summer home projects could be building a forum like FuseTalk in COM and later migrate it to ASP.NET. I was hoping to help out with some of the library's projects, but they seem very reluctant about that also. I guess I'll just stop wasting my time and work on some more interesting stuff at home.

 

[Pretender]

You have the right to remain silent, you have the right to an attorney, but you do not have the right to talk back without repercussions. You have the right, most of all, to do your job to the best of your abilities as instructed by your superiors and not be fired on.

Find out who your direct superior is and do what he/she says. If someone directly above him/her contradicts this, do what that person says. If this type of contradictory stuff happens often, bring a hidden tape recorder with you so that they can't accuse you of lying.

 

[joohang]

LOL

I often thought (a few years ago) about buying an MD with a hidden microphone and have the &quot;record&quot; button handy. I've seen so many people lying and backstabbing that it would be a good idea to carry something like that around.