IT dream job becomes a nightmare

In 2001 I found myself unemployed — and stranded. I had gotten a job with a seemingly well-funded telecommunications company, which relocated me and my family to California, and immediately went bankrupt. Just another victim of the dot-com bust. Then, within weeks, I landed a fabulous job! I was hired to be the one-man IT department for “Ore-T,” a small tool manufacturing company in Oregon, at a generous salary.

My first assignment was to turn Ore-T’s ancient DOS-based database system into a Windows-based SQL version. No problem, at least until I discovered that all the computers were so old they could hardly handle Windows 3.1, let alone Windows 2000. Nor was there any money to replace them. Worse yet, Ore-T’s owner/CEO was under notice from the Fire Marshal about illegal wiring. Thanks to my predecessor, all the network cabling was simply thrown through the drop ceiling. Our temporary occupancy permit was about to expire in two months, and the code requirements were strict.

Any one of these problems might have caused another techie to run screaming. But I had just moved my family for the second time in a month and was out of cash. I rolled up my sleeves and came up with a plan to purchase some low-end ($500) PCs that could at least run Windows ME. Ore-T’s accountant was amazed; apparently my predecessor had been building most of our PCs himself and charging the company $2000 each!

Unfortunately I was not able to get all his expensive home-brew clunkers replaced fast enough. Late one night, one of the computers started billowing smoke. Upon tearing it apart, I found that the cheap wiring had deteriorated to a point where it was shorting out.

The most urgent problem, though, was clearly the network cabling. When I called several contractors, their bids came in between $5,000 and $7,000. My boss went ballistic. He told me I’d have to do the work myself. After I went ballistic, he agreed to let me hire an IT assistant, but I was not allowed to offer more than minimum wage. Needless to say, there was not a lot of interest. I spent the next two months learning how to put metal conduit into the ceiling, and pull wires through it — along with reinventing the database, maintaining Ore-T’s Web site, installing new PCs, and keeping an aging DOS system operational.

I had barely finished with the wiring when the owner began complaining that when he Googled “tool manufacturing in Oregon,” Ore-T didn’t appear until the 10th page. He demanded that I call every search engine company, speak with the people in charge, and insist they “fix” their engines to list his company more prominently.

As you might imagine, I was not looking forward to these phone calls, nor the subsequent conversations in which I’d have to tell my boss he was full of baloney. That’s when I realized I just couldn’t take it any more. So I gave notice. I also decided that maybe I needed to stay away from IT altogether for a while — especially considering that the dot-com bust was still busting big time.

As it turned out, that nightmare experience did have one major benefit: I got my next job pulling cable for one of the networking contractors I’d asked for bids during our rewiring project. By now I was an expert!