It’s Time to Upskill
We’ve been saying the phrase “the tech is tech-ing” a lot lately to describe our frustrations with technology, and recently it came to a head. Here’s what happened…
We share Google Drive files + a Project Portal (made in Google Sites) with our clients during our engagements, and a few weeks ago, the permissions suddenly weren’t working for one of our clients.
What started as a file-sharing and permissions issue resulted in a “fix” (provided to us by Google Support) that downed our website for 24 hours. 🤯
After we undid what Google Support had us do, we sought out an IT vendor who specializes in Google Workspace to find a resolution. I won’t get into what Google provided as a “fix”, but let’s just say that our IT vendor said the advice Google gave us was the “dumbest thing he’s seen all week.”
After this experience, we can safely say that we’re no longer confident in the support teams at major tech companies.
Please don’t mistake this for an argument against off-shoring tech support–that’s not the issue at all. The issue is that major tech companies aren’t able to provide adequate support for the tools they’ve built and sold to us.
They’re moving too fast. They can’t train their support staff fast enough to keep up with their ever-evolving products and the ever-evolving use cases for their products in increasingly complex business environments.
And most of the users of the tech haven’t had time or capacity to keep pace with the advancements in tools they’re already using–and now AI is hot on the scene, complicating things even more. 🤯
So what do we do?
We upskill.
Not to be on the cutting edge or out of any fear of AI taking anything from us.
We need to upskill because if there are more of us out there who truly understand how software works, there will be more of us able to hold software companies accountable for the consequences we face because of their broken business models.
In my case, I knew in my gut that the advice they were giving was wrong, but I was missing just a tiny bit of knowledge during my support sessions to call it out. Instead, I had to somewhat blindly follow their advice–and you can see where that got me.
I’ve since learned what I need to know to avoid having this happen again, and I’ve also shared some very direct (but kind!) feedback with Google’s support team now that I have a better grasp on where they led me astray.
If you find yourself in a similar situation, I recommend that you do the same. Knowledge is power, and it’s your ticket to a more positive experience with the technology you’re using to run your business.