Some interesting thoughts from Sharon Nelson regarding the use of blackberries/smartphones and remote access and how the use of these tools might affect hourly employees.
This is an interesting subject for me, I carry a blackberry, and occasionally log in from remote locations, and am an hourly employee. I try to be fair about using it, and charging overtime for what I do. For example a 2 minute email reply that I sent the other day from the National Mall, I'm not going to worry about. Yes, I'm on vacation, and yes I don't have to answer emails, but here was a peer who needed a quick bit of tech advice and I could help them without too much difficulty. I don't mind using 2 minutes of my time for that. On the other hand, if the firm starts expecting me t be available to answer emails any time I'm on vacation, or just at home in the evening, we're going to have to be fair to me, and my home life as well.
Any of you in the same situation? How do you and your employer handle it?
Just a few thoughts, now that I've had some time to think about it rather than live-blogging it:
1. I've never been a big fan of live bogging, but I felt like I needed to really give it a shot. Doing it over the 3 days of Techshow helped me see where the value is, but I'm still not the biggest fan. Simply put, while it allowed to me to share what I was hearing and learning immediately with folks back in our office or all over the world, (And that has tremendous value, don't get me wrong), I still think my writing sucked because I was trying to keep up. :)
2. Live-blogging and Twitter gave this conference a different feel for me personally. I'm not normally very good in social situations, but having the handful of other folks who were blogging and twittering actually follow what I was doing and want to chat with me helped me feel a bit more comfortable, even when it came time to interact with the far larger number of people who were simply attending and not reading blogs or Twitter.
3. As much as I learned in the sessions, and with the vendor booths, the most important benefit I saw from Techshow was the people. Getting the chance to chat with other folks doing what I do, the speakers, the other bloggers, etc, and share ideas and experiences will make me a better Litigation Support professional, and a better blogger.
4. I met a bunch of great people at this conference that I hope to stay in touch with. I have read some blog entries of folks who were there or speakers who I heard who I didn't get a chance to meet, not to mention all the other attendees I couldn't possibly have had time to met. Whether we met or not, feel free to drop me an email and say hello! (Email link over on the right column of the blog, or connect with me on Facebook or LinkedIn.) Being relatively new to the Lit Support world, I'd love to build upon the network of folks, and their knowledge, that I have access to!
5. Now I have to go back through all these blog posts and pull out the best ideas and bits of knowledge that I think apply to our firm and how we're doing things. I didn't stop to think about just how much I was blogging over those 3 days, but now that I look back, it's A LOT! Hopefully anyone who actually followed along with all that drivel found some value as well.
I've written about this a number of times in terms of working in tech support, but a conversation the other day reminded me why it's important in every aspect of IT work. I was talking with Douglas Welch, in an interview for his podcast that'll be released in Feb. sometime, and he asked about what reasons our CIO approached me when it came time to create this additional Litigation Support position. I answered that, well for one, obviously, I had done pretty well in my time working at the help desk, and had the opportunity to display the technical chops, and creative solutions, but also because I managed to "keep my head about me when confronted with angry attorneys".
It was a quick one-off sort of comment during that conversation, but later, I harkened back to my repeated advice for tech support workers, and realized that it was those interpersonal skills that allowed our CIO and my current supervisor to feel comfortable moving me into Lit Support. After all, if I couldn't keep my head, and couldn't interact with our internal attorneys, there's no way they could trust me to interact with our clients!
Since I'm not answering help desk calls all day long, I sort of put interpersonal skills out of my immediate thought processes, but after thinking about the conversation with Douglas, I realized that they are still a very important part of what I do. Whether meeting with a client and their IT person to handle e-Discovery preservation issues, to getting instructions from paralegals about how they want cases set up in Summation, to working directly with an attorney to put together a presentation for trial, and a thousand other small interactions, my job is really all about helping our clients and attorneys navigate technology. That, obviously, takes technical know-how, but that know-how is pointless if I can't communicate it!
Today I had mine, even though I switched jobs only 5 months ago. It really seemed a little silly. Don't get me wrong, I appreciate the feedback on how I'm catching on to the job compared to the expectations, in terms of knowing where I should be, but it's not really fair for someone to evaluate me based on 5 months of work, when I'm still really learning the job.
That being said, it was a good review, so at least I can take away that I'm picking things up as well, or better, than folks expected me too, so I guess I should just continue to do that.
Still, it's hard to take much away from an evaluation for a job I'm really still learning. It could have maybe waited, but that's the policy, so that's the way it goes. :)
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