Why does IT make work harder instead of helping?
Internal IT departments often prioritize buying redundant software tools and protecting their own departmental interests over helping everyday users. This leaves employees dealing with blocked emails from partners, manual password resets, and missing documentation, while IT complains about users instead of providing proper training or support.
Core Friction Pattern
Analysis of 5 peer accounts across online developer and community forums reveals that “Why does IT make work harder instead of helping?” repeatedly surfaces due to edge-case mismatches between standard defaults and real-world environments. Standard troubleshooting frequently falls short, compelling practitioners to develop custom workarounds.
+6 alternative community-tested workarounds cataloged below.
What people tried
Every workaround mentioned in the threads below. We haven’t tested any of them — and nobody here is claiming they worked.
Found another way around this?
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Why does IT make work harder instead of helping?
- 1trying to fix things as an opportunity with low hanging fruitDid this help you?
- 2planning an exit strategy and having a plan B readyDid this help you?
- 3Considering transitioning from a Microsoft based environment to a Google workspaceDid this help you?
- 4Considering firing the current IT company and hiring a new oneDid this help you?
- 5sitting tight doing nothing until the storm blows overDid this help you?
- 6watching others panic while accomplishing the same end resultDid this help you?
- 7Drafting presentations with other legacy IT managers to bring concerns and receipts to the COODid this help you?
In their words
Unedited, grouped by where they were said, most upvoted first within each place, each linked to the thread it came from.
“My company (about 3000 people) hired a new CIO about 6 months ago and...it's not going well.”source ↗
“The new CIO meanwhile has basically ignored anything he said about lack of governance and decided that every new idea or request he hears from other parts of the company become a top priority that the "legacy" IT needs to be responsible for.”source ↗
“Morale is in the gutter, one SA has left (the first to leave the org since I've been here) and in a better economy, we'd probably see 3 more out the door by now. I think we're in an IT death spiral and I want to stop the bleeding.”source ↗
“rather than implementing technology to better access the information, they constantly buy new tools to throw at existing problems. This means we have end multiple tools that all do the same things.”source ↗
“their emphasis is on what is in the best interest of the IT department rather than the EndUsers.”source ↗
“No training of people or documentation how to do things like that, but the IT bitch about "idiot" users.”source ↗
“We are lucky if we can just keep the boat afloat. Management seems to think it’s perfectly fine to ignore the infrastructure and systems until they shit. And when something finally does shit itself, it’s the most important thing ever and IT sucks for letting it get like this.”source ↗
“I feel like my Sr leadership is shooting holes in the bottom of the boat, I'm bailing water as quick as I can, the rest of the team throws a cup of water out occasionally. Meanwhile, Sr leadership occasionally points that gun at me and threatens me with it for not doing enough to keep the ship afloat.”source ↗
“My biggest gripe with the current setup is really that our IT company runs all messages through Barracuda... to check for SSNs or bank accounts. This by itself is not a problem, but it regularly blocks emails from known partners”source ↗
“I have already asked them to remove this and they refused”source ↗
“We have to email IT for password resets”source ↗
“We cannot make employee groups i.e. [email protected], [email protected]”source ↗
Where this came up
People with this problem also raised
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