I get paid to re-enter data that our associate organizations already entered into an editable PDF and emailed it to us (on a monthly basis), track who did and who did not send them, and send out overdue notices to those who didn’t get theirs to us before the overdue date each month.
Before that, I was getting paid (at the same employer) to correct the Optical Character Reader software’s attempts at recognizing the inputs on a different form that was being sent to us in a similar fashion.
My long-term goal is to gradually (as in “glacially”) convince the powers that be that it would be cost-effective to invest in SOME kind of software that would let us directly host our SQL database as web pages for these participating organizations to directly enter their monthly data. And also let them fetch statistics and summaries and old form data so that they get the benefit of all this data collecting we do.
The file attachments come in to me through Outlook. Outlook is dismally awful at finding anything but it’s useful and necessary to be able to refer back to when we received files and who sent them. I built my own database module that tracks for each associate organization when each month’s reports were received, from whom, with what email subject line; it imposes a naming convention on the file attachments themselves, to make it easy to find the file attachment (or rule out that we have them) and makes it easy to do aggregate calcs on complete rates per timeframe. And it tracks issues where what they sent didn’t add up.
Decades ago, in a different setting, I had to fill out a form detailing each planned database change, what would be affected, estimated completion time, beta testing schedule, backout strategy for reverting if it didn’t work as planned, team of people working on it and in what role, etc etc. Took longer to fill out the damn form than to do the change in most cases. “I’m going to define a new table for ‘Regional Office’ code and name and director’s Contact ID, then add Regional Office code to the Organization table, tape them together with a relationship, add Regional Office code and name to the data entry screen, it will take 85% as long as it took me to write this sentence, I’ll call Joe on the phone and ask, ‘Like that, you mean? Any questions or concerns?’, and if I need to rip it out I’ll delete the beformentioned elements”.
Data tracking and process tracking can be highly useful but only idiots impose structure for the sole purpose of imposing structure.
COVID sort of saved me. We all got sent to work from home. I immediately updated my system on my dime, I was not intending to go back to the office.
We all had a sit down with the grand boss, and where asked about our home work situation, do you want to come back etc. Some folks wanted to go back or at least a hybrid situation. They just don’t have a good place to work from home. My boss at the time was working from his kitchen table. I have a loft that is my ‘home office’. It’s very private, with no disturbances. If my wife is home while I’m working we might cross paths in the kitchen.
My wife did work for a time at home and has a good spot as well. But her job sort of requires her to be there. She can work from home for a few days in a row though.
Yeah, I like my last couple of clients at my firm. The first one had me working by myself at a remote client site running a complex system implementation for them. The only problem what that is in the accounting of my firm, I can’t bill enough revenue with just my hours to make my “numbers”. Some of my peers seem to sweat about that shit but that’s where the partners put me so that’s what I’ll work on.
My second project I was leading a team from our firm, with really only the partner being my “boss” of sorts. That was a good team, but not without challenges.
My current account seems more like the sort of business as usual style of staff augmentation work our company actually does 90% of the time. Lots of layers, lots of workstreams, mostly just ordertaking for dumb-ass backoffice banking people. No one micromanages me, but it’s just sort of chaotic and directionless. I fucking hate it.
In banking and finance, “back office” and “middle office” are often used disparagingly to refer to the people who do all this sort of paper-pushing operational, compliance, and IT work. These aren’t Gordon Gekko Wolf of Wall Street types baking billion dollar M&A deals and jetting off to their Hamptons house. These are the people who make sure the paperwork gets filed afterwards.
The main takaway is if you are not involved in the development, marketing, and sales of whatever it is your company does, you are basically a cog doing tedious process work until such time the company determines some sort of automation can do it more cheaply.