When I worked for the BBC, I was once asked in an interview on 5Live's Up All Night whether I was a hacker, to which I replied, "Nah, I never hack anything except BBC computers." That was a truthful, albeit, probably ill advised admission, and I'm sure that it's an admission that a lot of technically clue-ful employees would be forced to make. And in meaning hack, I don't mean I sat there and stole other people's credit card details to fund an extravagant lifestyle far beyond my meagre salary. No, I mean hack in the sense of knowing the system well so that I could route around 'problems' and get my job done.
It was probably after the umpteenth time that some technically illiterate manager downloaded a virus pretending to be a game of flash cricket that corporate IT departments became such control freaks, but it's not just annoying, it's also counter-productive. IT should work with other employees so that they have the technology and the rights so that they can do their jobs, but IT departments increasingly see the technology as theirs and the users (other employees) as the problem. Look, as a technically literate employee who frequently fields other people's questions, I know it can be annoying working with people who don't know the USB port from the headphone jack, but totalitarian IT policies and IT departments that are "The Land of No" aren't the solution.
If you need an example of what I mean, check out this Wired wiki on 'traversing corporate firewalls'. Skip the how-to and go straight the comments.
Yes.. but try any one of these lame, simple and well known policy subversion techniques on my network and you will not only fail, you'll likely be terminated for violating our employee policy. Not smart.
'My network'? No boss, that's your gaming LAN at home. Your network belongs to the company too. And yo, CIO, if your IT policies actually prevents your employees from doing their jobs, that can't be good for productivity or your job security.
Technorati Tags: control freaks, IT, security
