One gay gals' musings and observations while travelling on the streetcar
Excel Entitlement
First thing this morning, Tanner came over to my desk asking for help. “I hear you’re a computer whiz and might be able to help me with this Excel stuff,” she said. Tanner explained to me what she wanted to do and I showed her that it could be accomplished with a few simple steps. She went on her way and thanked me for saving her from having to re-type the information she was working with.
Later on in the day, I was over by Natalie’s desk talking to her about our trip next week and I figured I’d ask Tanner how things were going since I was in the neighbourhood. “Oh, I gave up on it because I didn’t know how to insert a column,” she sighed. I wasn’t sure I had heard her correctly. She didn’t know how to insert a column? In Excel?
“Oh,” I replied, unsure of what else to say.
“It’s ok,” she said. “I told Wanker [her boss] I was having trouble and he cut and paste the information how we needed it to look.”
“Well, glad you got it sorted,” I said as I walked back to my desk.
How does someone get a job in an office and not know the basics of Excel? The other day, Larry helped her out by showing her how the paragraph marker in Word works. She had never before seen (or used) that feature before.
Tanner is the perfect example of what’s wrong with the event side of our department. It’s made up of this little Barbie dolls who don’t feel like they should do any real work. All Tanner has to do is bat her eyelashes and her manager caves and does her work for her.
If I ever tried to pass off work onto Larry like that, he’d send me to a Doctor to get my head checked.
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| Print article | This entry was posted by liz on July 29, 2010 at 9:36 PM, and is filed under work. Follow any responses to this post through RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed. |
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about 1 month ago
I fully admit that I suck at using Excel but wow…
about 1 month ago
Exactly! I wasn’t showing her how to do pivot tables or work with Visual Basic, it was the most common tasks.
I’m amazed she remembers how to get to the office everyday.
about 1 month ago
I’m always shocked at how little people know about the Microsoft products they use EVERY DAY in their jobs!
I once worked with a consultant who didn’t know how to “get rid of all those pound signs” in a column. Good thing we were on the phone or he would have seen my visible shock at how stupid he was. When I advised that he needed to make the column wider, he replied that he didn’t know how to do that!
about 1 month ago
Painful. I don’t know how they get anything done… except by having others do it for them. In my department, when one of us learns a new trick or figures out a shortcut, we email the group. Better to bring everyone along and work smarter.