Another Day, Another Dollar... 11 hours manning the desk at ol' Investor's Title. It sucks but I need to make up some hours since I'm going on Vacation! Work is starting to get real uncomfortable as a war of words has started between my co-workers. By now the veteran really hates the newcomer who I'll dub Billy as in "hill"... Billy is not a very hard worker and undoubtedly is paid better than us. What's more Billy was given the title "senior help desk technician" so I suspect that he secretly feels he should be asserting more authority. The most frustrating part about him is that he hasn't really bothered to learn about the system. I'm a part-time employee and I know the network much better than him and have closed more trouble tickets. In total he just doesn't pay attention to whats going on in a very hectic office.
Personally as the least paid employee I should hate them both. I mean I know almost as much as the vet, and have done quite a few things that have made the system more efficient(I won't bore with the details). Yet I have resigned myself to my situation, largely due to that fact that I'm using this job for experience and feeding myself through Grad School. Plus I like the Vet, he's a cool guy, and while I'd like to joke around with him, I think he's becoming overly harsh with Billy.
The Vet doesn't share my get-along attitude and things have become increasingly discordant. Billy didn't show up to work today, so the Vet spent a good part of the day trash talking and reading me the latest and most terse of their emails. Billy has criticized us in the past for not closing our calls in what he feels is a prompt manner (he has about 10 open calls, I have around 25, and the vet has something like 55). This is mainly due to the fact that Billy doesn't check the helpdesk mailbox or work on hardware projects. The vet, as a result of his long years of service, handles a lot of projects and general calls, and I configure almost all of the pc's that go through our office. The vet has reacted to these criticisms by transferring his most tedious and annoying calls to Billy. Billy in turn has insisted that he doesn't have time to take care of these calls due to his many projects, and besides why can't the Vet just take care of his own calls like Billy does?
Let me just say upfront that I think the Vet is partially right. Billy is basically a nice guy, but doesn't work hard or pay attention. We've had some rough moments personality wise but now get along pretty well. The Vet's on the verge of bubbling over however, and is likely to continue egging Billy on.
Week after next, both the Vet and I are going on vacation, leaving the office in the hands of Billy and a capable contractor. Should be interesting to say how things stand when we return