Helpdesk
When you're on helpdesk, a certain amount of interpersonal skills are necessary. One should be able to meet one's customers with a friendly and professional manner, eg.
user: Um, excuse me?
techie: Yes, how can I help you today?
People who teach courses in personal interaction will tell you that
user: Um, excuse me?
techie: *rolls eyes* What?
is definitely bad form and sends the wrong signals. I suspect they would be rather more baffled by one of today's opening gambits:
user: how are you today, Great Adrian?
techie: I am most well indeed, thank you, supplicant.
user: *affronted* Careful!" I have Pritt-stick! *brandishes*
I also had to call Dell and tell them that the DVD drives on one of our new PCs was causing CDs to explode. And we would therefore not be using it again as it was full of fragments.
In other news, I saw Milton Jones a few days ago. He's a standup comic who I first saw when my band played a gig in Portsmouth. It was a large club, and the evening consisted of various comedians alternating with a couple of songs from the house band, then finally a full set from the headline band, which was us. So I spent an evening getting entertained and then got paid for it. Result! Scarily enough that must be about 12 years ago now. :-/ Anyway, if you fancy going to see a standup comic and you see Milton Jones is playing somewhere near you, go see him, he's well worth it.
And in a few days I'm planning to get some friends together to go and see Stardust. Yay!
user: Um, excuse me?
techie: Yes, how can I help you today?
People who teach courses in personal interaction will tell you that
user: Um, excuse me?
techie: *rolls eyes* What?
is definitely bad form and sends the wrong signals. I suspect they would be rather more baffled by one of today's opening gambits:
user: how are you today, Great Adrian?
techie: I am most well indeed, thank you, supplicant.
user: *affronted* Careful!" I have Pritt-stick! *brandishes*
I also had to call Dell and tell them that the DVD drives on one of our new PCs was causing CDs to explode. And we would therefore not be using it again as it was full of fragments.
In other news, I saw Milton Jones a few days ago. He's a standup comic who I first saw when my band played a gig in Portsmouth. It was a large club, and the evening consisted of various comedians alternating with a couple of songs from the house band, then finally a full set from the headline band, which was us. So I spent an evening getting entertained and then got paid for it. Result! Scarily enough that must be about 12 years ago now. :-/ Anyway, if you fancy going to see a standup comic and you see Milton Jones is playing somewhere near you, go see him, he's well worth it.
And in a few days I'm planning to get some friends together to go and see Stardust. Yay!