Mike knows his stuff, AND everyone else’s. It’s his job as an IT manager for the Delicious Double Decker Donut Emporium to know where all of the passwords are. He’s been with the Delicious Double Decker Donut Emporium for years and the owners just kind of let Mike do his thing. After all, everything works, all of the donuts are getting glazed, email is getting sent, and everyone is just happy happy happy.
Mike is a pretty healthy guy, I mean, he limits his Delicious Double Decker Donut consumption to two per day, but he only eats the old fashioned kind because it’s got less sugar. He’ll go for walks with his wife and throw a ball or two with his kiddo, so he’s in pretty decent shape, all things considered. One night as Mike was leaving the emporium, he tripped over a cinder block that’s used to prop the door open. That trip resulted in a sequence of events that put not only Mike’s life in jeopardy, but his family, the donut shop, and the owners as well. Regrettably, Mike was struck unconscious and wound up in the hospital with some pretty serious brain trauma. He will be out for months.
The next morning, Barbara and Rob, the owners of the Emporium popped into work as usual, it was time to make the donuts. Rob went to reconcile the previous days accounting on his PC and could not for the life of him remember his password to logon to the network. Normally, he would just yell down the hallway to the IT closet and ask Mike to reset it for him. This was NOT an option today. Rob thought, well, maybe Mike wrote them down somewhere, maybe on a sticky note, or document, or even on a napkin. There was NO trace of any type of documentation. Rob was in quite the pickle. He had no way to access the books, no way to check orders via email, no way to order more of those rainbow sprinkles, and essentially, no way to run his business.
Rob was in panic mode and he called up the team at Advanced Systems Solutions. Tom picked up the phone with a chipper voice only to hear the angst in Rob’s voice. “Tom, we need you, ASAP. We can’t get into our network, Mike is in the hospital, and we’re freaking out down here. When can you be here?” Tom sprang into action, fired up his F150, may or may not have broke a few traffic rules on the way, but he was on his way to save the day. When Tom arrived on the scene, he knew there was going to be trouble. After fueling up on his usual Boston Creme Triple Chocolate Double Glazed With Chocolate Sprinkles donut and three mountain dews, Tom went to work. This is where the story takes an even more unfortunate turn. It took hours upon hours to get into the network. With ZERO documentation, Tom had to creative, and after about 18 hours, quite a few sugar highs, and all kinds of unforeseen roadblocks, he finally handed over the keys to the network kingdom back to Rob. Tom always goes the extra mile and it a mission to document every step of the way. He handed Rob a rather hefty invoice to cover the 18 hours, but also, complete documentation on how to avoid this in the future. Glistening delicious donuts started to flow out of the emporium, the day had been saved.
Just down the road a bit from the Double Decker Donut Emporium was a slightly larger shop. Their coffee was WAY better, and the place was a bit more upscale. Oftentimes this shop was overrun with the soccer mom club, the PTA types, the busy executives grabbing a steaming hot cup of triple pump foam, quadruple espresso shots, and soy, vegan, carb free, gluten free coconut froth, and also, those people who bring their dogs and affix a service dog vest on to their 6 toed Chihuahua. Today, the Yuppy Yum Donut Factory was bustling. Cash registers were busy printing out those six mile long receipts, orders were coming in for catering jobs, their wifi network was being blown up as PTA moms show each other their favorite TikTok’s of Johnny and Suzy and their big beach trip to the Hamptons last week. This place was LIT.
As the day went on and the morning crowd subsided, Joey, the IT manager and the one keeping all of the digital chaos under control stepped out for a quick vape in the back alley. As he reflected on the upcoming weekend and the big Comic Convention that he was attending, NerdFest, something caught his eye. It was a GoodYear Blimp, and it was in distress. It was coming at him fast and he couldn’t outrun the impending crash. Sadly, the blimp landed on top of Joey and he was knocked unconscious. Much like Mike, Joey was NOT having a GoodYear.
In a very similar fashion to our first donut shop, the owner, Hunter, started to freak out. He couldn’t access his network and placed the urgent call to Tom at Advanced Systems Solutions. Tom slugged down 2 more mountain dews and powered up the ASSICopter to arrive on the scene within minutes. Tom headed back to the IT closet and once again, found himself in the closet. Now, Joey, was a planner. He LOVED to keep his IT closet tight and right. To the left of his desk was a file cabinet, Tom opened the drawers and found ALL of the documentation for the Yuppy Yum Donut Factory. Passwords, firewall access, domain controller information, you name it, it was all there. After scarfing down a No Carb, Gluten Free, Sunflower, Apple Matcha whole wheat donut, Tom had the network up and running, and purring like a kitten. “If it wasn’t for your IT Manager Joey and his documentation, this could have taken 18 hours of billable time to restore. It only took me two hours, minus the Mountain Dew and Donut break” Tom said with enthusiasm. Hunter was smitten with Tom and recalled that Joey had actually shared all of his documentation with him, documentation that was updated weekly. Joey and his processes had saved the Yuppy Yum Donut Factory thousands of dollars. Good on Joey.
The moral of the story, ensure that your IT managers document everything in regard to your corporate networks. Instruct them to provide leadership with access to this documentation so that you’re not caught off guard by a tragic blimp accident or cinder block. This will save you and your business from getting into a sticky IT situation.
* Quick Update: Mike is going to be just fine, Joey is on the mend and should be back to work shortly. Sadly, the GoodYear blimp will not be flying over NerdFest this weekend.
We’re here to help keep your business running like a top. Reach out to ASSI via phone (407) 414-6626 or website https://advancedsystemssolutions.com today, and relax, we’re on IT.
