Spend until the last dime is gone
I work in the public sector, for now. After three decades, I’ve finally figured out what sets us apart from the private sector. We don’t believe in savings. Got a dime? Spend it, before the end of the fiscal year. That’s it. Nothing else.
At work, you can spend eleven months in relative frugality. The twelfth month signals a change in strategy. Count the numbers in the budget envelopes, and then spend until you reach bottom. You didn’t need it, yesterday? Today, you do! New hardware. New furniture. A change in the old tried and true. As long as the spending gets past the (next) audit, you’re gold!
At this point in my career, I no longer care, much. The new stuff won’t end up on my desk (other than the day required to update the inventory).
The only technical puzzle of note at work was a printer that no longer “did” recto verso… unless you printed from a Mac. Tricky stuff to explain, when everything worked fine only days ago, and we remain a Windows shop. The blame may lie with a recently updated server, but the fix at the desktop level was to redirect print jobs to the printer by direct IP. Let the server serve; a machine won’t notice a drop in traffic, and we don’t log such things. That might also change, but I’ll be out the door before any fingers are pointing. My motto: “The secretary is right”.
Another kick in the ribs to the Canadian IT world. Forecasts show Blackberry dropping to 0.3% of the world market within five years.
