My house’s water is provided by a well, and I live in a notoriously low-water part of my county. As such, every year since I’ve lived here I’ve had water issues in the fall. I have a “well guy” who is helping me with these issues, diagnosing minor issues, delivering water for the well when there’s no other alternative, etc.
This guy’s great, but I always feel on the back foot around him and I’ve never really known why. He came out today to look into my current issue (actual leak in the line between well and house) and I myself trying to dive deeper into what strikes me as odd about him. Here’s my list:
- Rarely rude, but often so overworked that he’s very brusque.
- Very obviously cares more about fixing my problem because it offends him that the problem exists, not because it affects me, the customer, in any way.
- Often proceeds with fixes without adequately explaining the exact nature of the problem. I often have to drag post mortems out of him later.
So then it hits me – this guy’s a sys admin! He’s sharp, he has an intuitive grasp of troubleshooting in his domain, and he cares more about the systems in his domain than the people affected! How have I never noticed this before?