Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!wuarchive!brutus.cs.uiuc.edu!apple!oliveb!amdahl!rtech!markd@rtech.UUCP
From: markd@rtech.UUCP (Mark P. Diamond)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.pyramid
Subject: Re: The Quality of Pyramid's Service
Message-ID: <3535@rtech.rtech.com>
Date: 1 Sep 89 18:26:20 GMT
References: <82731@pyramid.pyramid.com>
Sender: news@rtech.rtech.com
Lines: 27

From article <82731@pyramid.pyramid.com>, by csg@pyramid.pyramid.com (Carl S. Gutekunst):
> 
> Out of all the complaints I've ever heard about *any* field service organiza-
> tion, this is by *far* the most common. And there are very practical, human
> reasons behind it. RTOC takes thousands of calls every week. Greater than 90%
> of them are User Brain Damage: the person calling didn't understand what they
> were doing. 

This attitude really bothers me.  Users are not stupid.  Engineers, technical
writers and service people are stupid for thinking that they have built a system
which is easy to use.  Maybe it is not a bug in your system,
but if someone is having a problem maybe you have poor documentation, maybe 
the installation instructions were not clear, maybe you are not listening to
what the customer is really saying.  

Try an experiment:  you are a user of a pencil.  If you are right handed,
try writing with your left, or vice versa.  What?  It's awkward?  Can't
do it?  You've been using a pencil for many years, what is the matter
with you?  Are you "brain damaged?"   

As an engineer, if someone can't use my system -- for whatever reason -- I have a 
problem.  It is incumbent on me as an engineer to make my systems usable to eveyone.   

Mark <>
Mark P. Diamond    {sequent,mtxinu,sun,hoptoad}!rtech!markd markd@rtech.com 
" 9.17 sys3b SYSTEM CALL (SYSTEM V) *      
* Every book should end with a good joke." -- Marc J. Rochkind, Advanced UNIX Programming