So, Where Have You Been? – Part II

Today was my last day at the Omnipresent Non-Profit Charitable Organization. The vendor has bolted the control boxes to the remaining wall space in already cramped equipment rooms. The lines are getting slowly cut over. The receptionists received brief training sessions.

It’s all happening according to my plans and I won’t be there to see if it works. Does that matter to me, you ask? Only a little. I’d like to see the changeover take place smoothly, but I’d rather not listen to the crabbing on Monday morning when people realize that their old, dear, favorite phone numbers no longer work.

Can anyone tell me why people grow so attached to randomly generated work phone numbers? Is it simply because they feel that it will be too difficult to notify each of their contacts of the change? We set up a disconnect recording that points callers to the new number. We’ve set up a directory system that callers can use. We have live operators who can transfer calls. What else do they want?

They want status quo, that’s what. People clearly hate change—except when they embrace it. Like when the new thing is clearly better than the old thing. In our case though, the vast majority of the people in the office won’t see a noticeable improvement in the quality of their work lives. The new system was designed to be cost-efficient by bringing the switch in-house and cutting most of the copper wires to the big gray box on the street corner, not to add pile of pretty features to everybody’s desk.

SBC takes a hit (aw gee, that’s a shame), the CHARITY saves a ton of money in the long run. And let’s be honest here, the phone company was not giving the charity any breaks on the price of that copper. None.

That’s a beautiful thing (as far as phones and charities go, of course) and I won’t get to see it in action. Or inaction if it goes terribly wrong.

Your best pal,

bob

P.S. It will be a lot of fun for you to send an email letting me know that you’re hiring. For maximum enjoyment, let me know who I need to speak with to apply for that job. I’m giddy just thinking of it!

P.P.S. Post-mortem on my job at a charity coming soon!