We have a guy at work who’s a nice guy but so utterly useless, no one knows how he hasn’t been fired already. He’s not stupid but just doesn’t seem to think. Ever.

We will call him “Bob”.

Bob comes back after lunch, looking nervous. He eventually tells us that he lost “Bill’s” loyalty card.

How you may ask?! He borrowed Bill’s card as he’d lost his own. 

This card has a photo on it which you show at the door and then again at the tills. It’s kind of very famously the whole point of the store. And they are very strict.

The problem? Bill is your typical 50-year-old white Londoner; Bob is a 28-year-old native Nigerian. 

At no point before they confiscated the card did he realise that this might be an issue.

A while back, my office hired a new — somewhat senior — manager. He was a guy in his late forties — quite a nice guy, if I may add — with tons of experience in direct marketing, but quite bad with computers and anything IT. We noticed from day one that it took him an hour to type a few complete sentences, but emailing was mandatory, due to the size of the company. 

A few weeks into the job, he still wasn’t sending any relevant emails. Once in a while, he would send a blank email to the entire team, or a partial email, but that was it. My coworkers and I were getting a bit frustrated at this point; one of us had to go and ask him about his agenda personally, and then someone would put this in an email and send it to the entire team.

A couple of more weeks passed by. The new manager was getting a bit cranky. He was mumbling about people “always resending his words.” He then called us for a short meeting one day, saying how disappointed he was that nobody ever replied to his emails, and that people just ignored his replies.

We were all baffled, as none of us had ever received any sensible reply.

I thought there may be a problem with his email account; he seemed to receive everything, but apparently, whenever he tried to send something, it got “lost.”

I offered to look into his settings to see if I could help and I noticed over 200 items in the draft folder. Long story short, the guy thought that “Save” as in “Save draft” sent an email, and that “Send” meant “Send to trash.” Mystery solved.

Related:
Email Fail, Part 25
Email Fail, Part 24
Email Fail, Part 23
Email Fail, Part 22
Email Fail, Part 21

(I am dealing with a heart condition that I’ve only just learned about. Anything that raises my heart rate or blood pressure too much can send me into a gasping fit as my heart tries to keep up. It should be noted that I have Asperger’s and can get unreasonably upset if I have to repeat the same answer multiple times. My boss is aware of this and working with me on how to handle it. I’m currently in a meeting with another team, retroactively discussing an issue we had.)

Other Manager: “Well, we just don’t understand how this even happened.”

Me: “According to the audit logs, someone logged into the account and performed [action]. That lead to the system recognizing that’s what the user wanted, so it did [other action] for it.”

Other Manager: “Well… can you guarantee this won’t happen again?”

Me: “Well… No…  can’t guarantee that someone won’t log into the account and perform [action] again.”

Other Manager: “Why doesn’t the system protect against that?”

Me: “Because it’s what is supposed to happen anytime someone performs [action]. Every other team uses it in that manner. It’s just that your team doesn’t need it; I’m not even sure why someone on your team needs to use that function.”

Other Manager: “Oh, they don’t. We didn’t even know that’s what it does.”

Me: “Well, then, it sounds like the solution is to tell your team to stop doing it.”

Other Manager: “Well, can you guarantee it won’t happen to us again?”

(That cycle repeats itself a few times. Around the fifth time we get to that question, I lose control of myself and throw my politeness out the window)

Me: *angrily* “NO! Can you guarantee that your team has more brains than you do?!” *starts gasping and slumps down onto the ground*

Other Manager: *oblivious* “I just don’t see how this even happened!”

My Boss: “[Other Manager], I’m going to stop you right there. First, we need to get [My Name] to the hospital.” *looks at other person in meeting, who is already calling 911* “Second, [My Name] has already answered that four times. He’s answered all of your questions four times and I’m satisfied with what he’s given you. Go figure out how to stop your team from being as stupid as you are because right now, your stupidity is literally killing one of my best.”

(This happens back in the day when computers are still relatively new in the office — and yes, dinosaurs are already extinct by this time — and PCs and Microsoft Office are starting to be commonly used. We — mostly — work with forwarders, who have to make drafts that need to be copied and printed onto specialty paper in a form-like format. These drafts are first reviewed by their customer. I am speaking to an employee of such a forwarder who has had difficulty in dealing with the switch from typewriter to computer. His retirement is due about ten years after this conversation.)

Employee: “My customer just faxed me revisions and now I have to reenter everything again and hope I don’t make another mistake.”

Me: “But didn’t you save your draft the last time?”

Employee: “Of course I did. But then I need to make a new draft and the previous one is lost. With a typewriter, you could at least take your old draft and correct that one.”

Me: *after having processed what was said* “You do know that you can save every draft under a different name? The document number, for example. And you can easily retrieve this copy.”

(I then proceed to explain to the confused forwarder how to use the save function and how he can retrieve his documents).

Employee: “You saved my life!”

(I was just flabbergasted that he wasn’t sent to a course or and didn’t receive help from his colleagues. When I spoke to him next, he was much relieved and thanked me again for making his job easier.)

(I work remotely and am on a conference call with several people.)

Coworker #1: “We’ll also need to sync with [Team] to deliver the– I’m sorry, there’s some noise on the line? Is someone rustling papers?”

Coworker #2: “Oh, that’s me. Sorry, I dropped my meatball on the mic and was trying to clean it off.”