4 Types of Tech Workers That Are Bad for Your Business

by Stephanie Faris on Monday, August 01 6:00

Information technology (IT) professionals serve as the backbone of businesses, providing file storage and support. If they do their jobs well, your employees can do their jobs, which means your customers and clients remain happy. When the process breaks down, your employees may not have the tools necessary to be productive, hurting your income and possibly affecting morale.

Whether you have an in-house IT team or you pay a third-party service to help when needed, it s important that you have the right professionals in place. Here are a few types of IT workers who could harm your business rather than help it.

The Know-It-All

In this tech worker s mind, there s nothing more to learn. They know everything and assume that every end user they encounter can t match their expertise level. They can be dangerous when your employees feel alienated every time they come around, especially if they refuse to share some of their supposed wisdom with the employees they re being paid to help. If these IT professionals are extremely knowledgeable, it might be worth keeping them around but their people skills often make them better suited to work behind the scenes.

The Slacker

The slacker does the minimum amount necessary to avoid getting in trouble. This can sometimes mean taking shortcuts on a job and having someone else clean it up later. It can also mean resolving only the reported issue on a piece of equipment and ignoring other obvious problems like out-of-date virus definitions or system errors. This type of employee may also take too few tickets, leaving other team members feeling disgruntled at having to constantly pick up the slack. This type of employee must be constantly pushed and, after a while, it might be necessary to push them right out the door.

The Rule Follower

Employees who follow rules are valuable, but in some cases they can be problematic. A technician may be on site working on an issue when other end users at the location report problems. Instead of fixing them, the rule follower will insist they put in a ticket, then leave the site with the intention of coming back once a ticket is in the system hours or days later. This type of employee should be directed that it s acceptable to go against policy if it means putting customer service first.

The Rule Breaker

This type of person consistently makes it difficult to manage IT teams by ignoring set protocols. Often this means not putting tickets in resolved or in progress status even once they ve been dispatched to work on the problem. It may also mean consistently doing work without putting in a ticket for it, even once they re back in the office. If the problem persists, management may eventually need to discipline this type of employee to ensure rules are followed.

If your IT team is causing a problem for your business, it s important to speak to the worker s manager as soon as you notice the issue. For businesses with in-house IT teams, it can help to provide a link to a survey that can be emailed with each notification that an issue has been marked resolved. Managers should regularly review that feedback and take action where appropriate.