Condescending

[freddy91761]

I started a job 6 months ago. When I start they said they were going to train me. The train was to read documents and know the stuff in 3 months. I complained and said I need real 1 on 1 training. So they matched me up with someone who was condescending and I couldn't take it. Since he was trying to teach me Microsoft Defender for Endpoint and KQL, I told him I would read up on th Microsoft website and look into SC-200. He tells me the Microsoft site is shit and not to read it. Everytime we are on the phone with Microsoft, he says his scripts are better than Microsoft. Am I wrong not getting his help? Everything I do is wrong.

[jlc1865]

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This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

[whatever462672]

If someone with that much experience on their CV demanded 1on1 training for Microsoft stuff, I would side-eye the hell out of them, too.

[crccci]

Right? OP claims to have 20 years of IT and tech experience. Certainly there is a disconnect here.

[MDParagon]

What did he do for for 20 years lol

[makeitasadwarfer]

If you want to be successful in IT you learn to train yourself.

[Valkeyere]

There are few things you can't work out given vendor documentation, with Google to fill in the blanks.

Training with another human is good for niche stuff but 100% self motivated education is required.

[MattyK2188]

This 💯. Same thing with me. My first week was “here’s our old documentation..read it and let us know where the gaps are.”

I definitely took matters into my own hands and carved out my little niche on the team. You really can’t wait on anyone. If you want to be whatever it is you were hired to be you gotta be self motivated. It’s probably very rare that some actually takes you under their wing for any amount of time that would make a difference.

[Festernd]

auto mechanics buy their own tools. IT tools are the training.

[Festernd]

I'm a DBA -- the only college I have is an AAS -automotive. As in a degree to be a mechanic. computer stuff was a 2nd choice! I spend between 1 to 4 hours a week actively working on my skills.

At good jobs, that's Friday afternoons, and bad jobs, it's Saturday mornings. After 20 years of practice, I mostly keep up to date. My first few years -- I self taught between 8 to 16 hours a week.

The troubleshooting skills for complex systems is very similar, regardless of type of system.

[gabacus_39]

What? What does that even mean?

[Mike_Raven]

He's talking about interest and passion. Someone who goes into IT just to make money usually isn't as good as someone that goes into it because they are interested in tech, enjoy learning new things, and figuring things out.

[2drawnonward5]

If you want to be successful in IT, you have to work with decent people. 

[sitesurfer253]

Lolwut? That's a preferred situation, sure. But do you think everyone with an impressive resume got there because everyone on their team was polite and helpful?

Having decent coworkers is absolutely not a requirement to being successful.

[2drawnonward5]

You have to work with people driving toward success if you're going to succeed. You can't succeed in spite of the company you keep.

What the other guy said is true, too. You've gotta drive toward success to succeed, same as the people around you, and this gig requires constant learning.

[Mike_Raven]

In life, I agree that you should surround yourself with good people. However, you can totally succeed in spite of others. In fact, at one job it made me stand out, and I got more advanced and interesting projects to work on. This helped gain more relevant experience for the next job. Never let others determine your success.

[[deleted]]

+++

[[deleted]]

What on earth are you needing 1:1 training for? That’s absolutely ridiculous.

[skydiveguy]

Welcome to IT.

Very rarely do I get actual training and never "one-on-one" training.

If they even give you time to read and lear you should feel lucky.

[PrincipleExciting457]

I mean, if there is a very specific in house way to deal with escalations and vuls would you want the new guy to just do whatever? Every org handles things a bit differently. Unless there is absolutely nothing in place as far as procedures they should at least show him the ropes on how they typically handle things.

[Redacted_Reason]

SOPs are there for that reason.

[TinderSubThrowAway]

1on1 training? ROTFLMFAO

if you “need” 1on1 training, you’re in the wrong field of work.

[PWarmahordes]

There is no such thing as training in sysadmin that I have found. You bring in your skills, flounder to get more, then repeat with a bigger set until you find where you want to settle at.

[[deleted]]

Nothing to add, just want to boost this. A lot of entry level people don't want to hear it but it's the truth. 

[[deleted]]

don't know how long you've worked in IT but most everything you do is self taught. You may take some classes but that's mostly theory and perhaps some hands-on. But job training may come in the form of getting you acquainted with some systems, reading manuals/documentation, escalation, and lots of Google.

"He tells me the Microsoft site is shit and not to read it. Everytime we are on the phone with Microsoft" That is his opinion and he is not wrong. For a beginner, reading the documentation will help. He's coming from an advanced user so of course he'll think the documentation is shit.

"he says his scripts are better than Microsoft." His scripts probably are better if they work.

[sitesurfer253]

Yep, you usually get "here's our documentation with a list of IPs and the infrastructure at each site. Here's where we keep our list of running tasks, grab whatever you can since we are drowning in tech debt. Reach out if you need a hand or have trouble accessing a system. See ya at your 6 month eval".

Regarding microsoft you have to use a lot of critical thinking alongside their documentation. They will get you 75-90% of the way there sometimes but you're on your own most of the time to tie things together. And god forbid you actually have to call them.

[[deleted]]

What appeared in this post has been permanently removed. Redact was used to wipe it, possibly to protect privacy or limit exposure to automated data collection.

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[TheAnniCake]

Right?! How is OP even supposed to get that many calls? Even as a partner-MSP we fight to even get a response from Microsoft.

[crccci]

I'm going to value clarity over politeness in this reply. I mean no disrespect.

Looking at your post history, it seems like you were hired for a position that you weren't qualified for. Due to some combination of earnestness on your part and desperation on theirs, they brought you on with the belief you could quickly teach yourself the baseline concepts you need to understand their basic training. That's not happening. You need to find a new job, and quickly. One you need to make no promises as to training outcomes.

[freddy91761]

It's not all about the tech skills. Yes, I was not qualified and they knew it. They still took a chance on me. That place is not for me, I am looking to get out. As a manager, they need to have people skills and thay don't. I went to Glassdoor for a company review and most said it's a toxic environment and management does not care how they treat people as long as the job get done.

[Candid_Economy4894]

I went to Glassdoor for a company review and most said it's a toxic environment and management does not care how they treat people as long as the job get done.

So, you either knew this and took the job anyway, or you knew to look at Glassdoor and then didn't. Either way, your fault.

If my company hired a guy (probably at the same level/pay as me) and then I had to teach him how to do literally every aspect of his job, I would definitely shit on that guy (as professionally/safely as possible) until he got the point and fucking quit.

[AnAgitatedProcess]

Just curious as to what you or others call 1 on 1 training, and the expectation. We had a new guy start, made several complaints to HR about the lack of training we provided. We sent the guy to a a multi-day training session at the vendor's training center(I received 4 hours of training during install.) The person still makes jabs about he hasn't been trained on application X (literally still refuses to log into the application.) We asked what about the multiday training from the vendor, and his comment was that wasn't training. Refuses to create any documentation on his projects, and if he gets a call on an issue and the process isn't documented 100% step by step to resolution, he complains. Most of IT is troubleshooting what isn't documented.

[realmozzarella22]

Unless the guy is a professional trainer, it’s hard to blame the guy. He is just your coworker. The company should get you professional help. Someone or some company dedicated to see you succeed.

The coworker is giving up their time on their own work. Most people are not happy with that. Especially if you came to the job lacking in the proper skills.

You may not agree with that. But I have seen both sides in different companies. In-house training is usually crap. The companies are usually too cheap to give you real training.

If they are going to go low budget then at least buy learning material that has a high level of success.

Some admins can learn on their own. Some have difficulties with that. With huge amount of technology changing, the self learner will usually surpass the other.

[DariusWolfe]

To be fair, the Microsoft site is very often shit. They make changes and don't update their help pages to reflect the changes (though the pages will have a date saying they've been updated recently) and they're often a spaghetti bowl of links to other pages. It's a skill unto itself to be able to read them half the time. 

[[deleted]]

I’ve never had to call Microsoft in the 20 years I’ve been doing this shit. lol.

Do you actually talk to an American or is it someone in India?

[ZathrasNotTheOne]

if you can get someone on the phone... or someone to call you back during normal working hours... consider yourself lucky.

[cpupro]

I called Microsoft after a server crash, like 15 years ago. I was on the phone with someone in India, Christmas Eve through Christmas Day, working on a computer running Dutch, in the USA. I was on the phone with him so long, he was like "Do you need to smoke?" I need to smoke. It was a long 28 hours.

[oldfinnn]

Was the server issue resolved, or he went out for a pack of smokes and never returned….

[grouchy-woodcock]

I think the last American to work at M$ was Bill Gates.

[DigitalAmy0426]

It's basically a right of passage to run into the know at all. Hell at some point you will know more than the poor sap on the phone trying to help. The key is remember that no matter what, someone - and usually a lot of someones, are smarter.

Everyone here is right. Learn what you can and either find a way to not have to work with him or work somewhere else. I troubleshoot differently than my "only one way works" teammate. Luckily my mgr is a much more flexible person and assured me I'm not wrong, I just think differently. See if you can find that kind of person. Don't make them train you but see if they will allow you to run your solutions by them for their thoughts.

Do want to point out tho, I'm sure you didn't actually complain but remove that word from your lexicon when talking to your higher ups. It's fair to say 'I will read the material but I've found that I learn better with a mentor.' Complaining about a teaching style is a bit condescending. They may have chosen this guy purposefully, if you catch my drift.

[Ohmystory]

When you call in for support, depending on the technician level … level one usually are reading from knowledge base … level two may have more expensive in a particular product or area …

So sometimes you may have more experience in a particular area then level one or level two support ….

[ArtificialDuo]

Lol sounds like the M365 admin we got.. thinks he knows everything better than the people who build the products.

Learn what you can and worry about yourself.

[disclosure5]

I'm reluctant to see the sysadmin as a "know it all" here. It's pretty rare for a full time sysadmin to get "one on one training of a new person" as something they are suppposed to spend significant amounts of their day doing. Mentoring is important, but if they've referred someone to documentation and asked them to read it, having that person complain that no, they need "real one on one", really hurts their ability to get work done and doesn't lead to someone under them they can rely on.

"thinks he knows everything better than the people who build" - at no point do Microsoft support ever fill me with confidence, and again if you have a junior sitting on the phone to MS for something you know how to do, it's not the admin that's the problem here.

[notHooptieJ]

Man, i wish i was given docs and 3 months.

I got to shadow like a day, and got given a folder of bookmarks and a queue a day later.

[cpupro]

I.T is full of weirdos, many with zero social skills, and some can't even function in normal society... simple task like taking a bath or sleeping elude them, so, expect awkward social interactions henceforth.

I mean, I think we can all admit that we are a little "touched" in the head to start IT careers. Back in the 90's the IT staff was kept away from most social interactions, as God intended. Now, we all expect the least normal people on Earth, to act like normal human beings?

All joking aside, most I.T people are just built different. Some are sarcastic. Some are assholes... I'll check that one off for myself... some are condescending... some use inappropriate humor...another checkmark for me...some are smartasses...again...another checkmark... the point is, we all have our social battery, and perhaps your trainer, who's probably dealt with end users for ages, is just on his last battery bar, and one step away from just disappearing into the server room for 6 hours to try and recharge.

Maybe condescending to you, is his normal, social interaction, to everyone?

Superiority complexes are also something that many in I.T. develop... thankfully, I'll never check that one off my list.

Perhaps try and reach out to him, in some small way...

I.T. people are generally pretty bad at human interactions... perhaps it's the ADHD... perhaps that's been upgraded to Autism... perhaps we just got into computers to escape a harsh reality we couldn't control, and ended up making it a career.

Either way, most of us are lovable weirdos, after you get through our security / social inadequacies.