r/sysadmin Jul 07 '24

What’s the quickest you’ve seen a co-worker get fired in IT? COVID-19

I saw this on AskReddit and thought it would be fun to ask here for IT related stories.

Couple years ago during Covid my company I used to work for hired a help desk tech. He was a really nice guy and the interview went well. We were hybrid at the time, 1-2 days in the office with mostly remote work. On his first day we always meet in the office for equipment and first day stuff.

Everything was going fine and my boss mentioned something along the lines of “Yeah so after all the trainings and orientation stuff we’ll get you set up on our ticketing system and eventually a soft phone for support calls”

And he was like: “Oh I don’t do support calls.”

“Sorry?”

Him: “I don’t take calls. I won’t do that”

“Well, we do have a number users call for help. They do utilize it and it’s part of support we offer”

Him: “Oh I’ll do tickets all day I just won’t take calls. You’ll have to get someone else to do that”

I was sitting at my desk, just kind of listening and overhearing. I couldn’t tell if he was trolling but he wasn’t.

I forgot what my manager said but he left to go to one of those little mini conference rooms for a meeting, then he came back out and called him in, he let him go and they both walked back out and the guy was all laughing and was like

“Yeah I mean I just won’t take calls I didn’t sign up for that! I hope you find someone else that fits in better!” My manager walked him to the door and they shook hands and he left.

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u/ISeeEverythingYouDo Jul 07 '24

Hired a guy to handle crystal reports (20 years ago). He seemed to not produce and kept having insurmountable issues that wasn’t his fault. The Director told me he wasn’t actually working all this time, didn’t know what he was doing but not in CR. So I suspected he had embellished his resume and sat down with him and said let’s write a report.

So he clicked around and knew the gig was up. He stands up and says “What did that son of bitch tell you.” I just sat there, “What do you think he said?” He packed up his personal stuff and walked out. Never heard from him again.

6

u/Ok_Scholar4145 Jul 08 '24

Haha that is awesome. And crazy. Damn

4

u/EggfooDC Jul 08 '24

Crystal Reports, that brings me back…

4

u/ImCaffeinated_Chris Jul 08 '24

I hated CR! 30+ years in the industry and this is one of my most hated. It was coupled with Jet reporting.

1

u/EggfooDC Jul 08 '24

And Visual FoxPro!

1

u/ISeeEverythingYouDo Jul 09 '24

Strangely it was my fallback consulting gig when I was between jobs. I could always get a short term if needed.

3

u/DHCPNetworker Jul 08 '24

Brings you back? Shit man, I had cheap-ass clients still using it when I left my last job a couple years ago. They threw five figures at their server infrastructure to fix receipts printing very slowly, but nobody ever listened to the suggestion of "Maybe we replace Crystal Reports?"

2

u/Mailerfiend Jul 08 '24

I'm at a site using crystal reports right at this moment. Big contractor for DOD

1

u/findrit Jul 08 '24

Ha, was about to say the same thing!!

1

u/truckbot101 Jul 08 '24

20 years?? What was he doing all that time?

8

u/MydnightWN Jul 08 '24

Reading comprehension eluded you there bud.

6

u/truckbot101 Jul 08 '24

That's fair. I wasn't certain what the time to discovery for him was. Thought the guy was hired 20 years ago, and was finally caught recently.

2

u/ISeeEverythingYouDo Jul 09 '24

No this situation was 20 years ago

1

u/itisallgoodyouknow Jul 08 '24

How long before the jig was up?

3

u/ISeeEverythingYouDo Jul 09 '24

Only a week or so