Why TS/OP would Not contact site support group: My analysis

RahulG31 · Active User Joined: 20 Dec 2014 Posts: 446 Location: USA

I've seen this a lot of times that the TS/OP is advised to contact their site support group but they don't do so. We can see a recent example here: http://ibmmainframes.com/about65823.html

In my opinion, most of the TS/OPs work from offshore (mostly India) where they work in a services company. They are given a task by some person sitting onsite and they probably don't have much idea on the requirement. They just do what is asked to be done.

Since, the mainframe belongs to the client, these services company have no control when the offshore resources face any access related issues. Being as novice as they are, TS/OPs do not know if they are doing something wrong (they are still young and still learning).

Moreover, most of the clients are located in USA or Europe/UK and the TS/OP is Not in the same time zone to be able to contact the Client's site support. The best thing for them would be to wait for somebody at onsite to come and help them.

But then, by that time, their day is all gone and that would mean that they didn't do anything the whole day (or they didn't do what they were asked to do). That raises a question that why client would pay for 'no work' and that puts the pressure on the management which, in turn, would reflect in the TS/OP's appraisal.

That is why TS/OPs become desperate for an answer on the online forums because there is No one to help them at on site location.

My advice to such TS/OPs would be to inform their onsite counterpart/manager as soon as they come to know that they don't have the required access to perform the task given. The grant of required access may take a day or two (or even a week), so it would be wise enough to spend your time on some other task.

*This is probably one of the reasons why you would see people at offshore working late hours.

Moderators: Please move to suitable category.

Rohit Umarjikar · Posted: Wed Mar 22, 2017 8:35 am

Thats a right problem statement but staying late is mostly happens because of bad project estimates nithing else. Management just wants to win the bids without considering the resources and their talents and involvement intot projects and then those employees stay late to finish the tasks as then they have no other choice left at that point.
I agree that they should contact site support but i guess they will learn along the way.

vasanthz · Posted: Wed Mar 22, 2017 11:36 am

One of the reason people don't contact site support is because they don't know such a team exist or their roles.
During my first 3.5 years I never knew there were people called systems programmers or what they did. I just did application coding and my world ended there.

We were given training on COBOL, CICS, DB2 and JCL but not given the whole overview of how Mainframe was managed by different teams.
We all learn stuff along the way and get better little by little.

CaptBill · Posted: Thu Apr 06, 2017 7:26 am

Another reason is cultural: Never admit you don't know or understand something as you will be seen as stupid or weak.

I've had this happen when dealing with off shore people.

enrico-sorichetti · Posted: Thu Apr 06, 2017 12:47 pm

the subject is one of the things that bothers me (*)

we spend our time at no charge and we share our skills
to provide help for badly managed organisations and projects

people who ask are really the victims,
but helping poor organisation/management victims is not the same as helping earthquake victims

the companies want to save money by outsourcing
the outsourcers want to save money by hiring unskilled people
and using a cheap approach and infrastructure
and thats what they get

really they are not worth our time
so let the project be late , who cares anyway,

(*) only the IBM employees asking for help on a public forum bother me more