I was in the Army 8 years and I never heard the terms "officer" and "enlisted man" either!!
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To those who answered nicely, thank you. To those that didn’t, have a beautiful day anyway.
I wasn’t trying to insult anyone. I have never heard the term “Craft” until I started looking at this website. I have the utmost respect for everyone.
Having been Craft and a Manager, in regards to what a Manager can and cannot do. For example, they can login to a DMS100 switch and look around, they can verify things, print things, but they cannot make any changes, that would be contested by the Union, should it be brought to the Union's attention.
“myself often wondered why there were so many L3-4-5's in the company! I never had a problem with any of the union folks I worked with, they were all great and capable to work with”.
Seriously??? I’ve worked my way up the last 20 years at Bellsouth and T from L0 thru L2 in various roles to include operations, DA, center, field and network support and I can honestly say that this post is without a doubt, the biggest bunch of nonsense I’ve ever heard. It’s amazing to me how much union employees think they contribute to the company. They really have no idea how incredibly overpaid most of them are (Not all of them. I’ve worked with some of those 1% er’s that are very talented and driven) for the work they do. Outside of a few job functions/titles, it’s mostly just manual labor (Not skilled labor. Their is a difference.) and they make anywhere from 3-6 times minimum wage to do it (sometimes more). It’s honestly shocking to see the level of incompetence with some of them. I know the same thing can be said of supervising management and IC (individual contributor) Management level employee’s, but I have rarely encountered it.
It’s like being in the military and asking what is the “infantry “.
I think the rub from those having a hard time not understanding when anyone at the company for many years doesn’t know what “craft” is, is an ego thing.
But I get it!
This company was built on providing customers a way to communicate. The only people sweating, bleeding and dying to make that happen were “craft”.
When it is said by another employee they don’t know who that is it seems like you have no idea how the company you work for provides service.
Ignorance of what the company you work for does is shocking.
Every support group, billing, sales, IT, engineering....) are all here because they help make sure the service “CRAFT” installs and repairs for the customer goes smoothly.
Why all the bashing of people unfamiliar with the term craft? Until I found this website I wasn't familiar either in the context being used here. At least the person cared enough to ask. I have been a database administrator and report developer, writing SQL, for years. If I started throwing around jargon familiar to me and people with similar roles I wouldn't be offended if someone asked for a definition of a term I used. Not everyone in the company is represented and the vast majority of us are NOT managers in the derogatory sense. Most level 1 and level 2 managers are individual contributors who also get treated like c-ap and share in the disdain for upper level management's running of the company.
They typically work with paper mache and popsicle sticks in an office in El Segundo.
If you don’t know what the term craft means you obviously don’t work for AT&T & out trolling!
Craft Mac and cheese.
Yep, Craft is an old term for union workers from long ago. You were either a Craft or Management employee. The Craft were the folks that did the wiring, provisioning, etc, the actual "work" (back then). I first saw that first hand in the mid-'90s when my original company (before AT&T) which was non-union, had the Lucent Autoplex 1000 Switching System installed for TDMA wireless technology. There were a number of Lucent installers in our MSC building putting the system in, and they were Union folks, and there was one fellow that I guess was Management. And if he ever started typing in provisioning on a terminal, the Union guys would get upset. He was NOT supposed to do that. I didn't understand all that at the time, and I don't have a problem with it. Later, after my company was bought by what became AT&T (Mobility) I had left the MSC OPS position and transferred to an Engineering position and was therefore classified as "Management". All that really meant was, we may have had a slightly higher base salary but were not getting overtime or on-call pay or anything. And by gosh, there was plenty of that once you were made "management"! I always knew as a switch tech if something was really important because your boss would have to approve overtime for it and if it wasn't that important it could wait til the next business day. Not the case as a management employee!!
I've seen a lot of posts over time negatively against L2 managers and that they should be sir+'d en masse and they aren't worth it and all that. While that may be true in certain cases, many of the L2 "Managers" (like I was) were just grunts working a lot of hours / on-call, NOT "managers of people", it feels kind of unfair. However, I myself often wondered why there were so many L3-4-5's in the company! I never had a problem with any of the union folks I worked with, they were all great and capable to work with.
Management=dark side
I've been in Mobility 25 years, and I think it's fair to say it's not a commonly used term on this side of the house. We normally would say "bargained for" or "Union" rather than craft.
Wow rock did you crawl out under from
Craft=non management
Craft is short for craftsman any employee or non employee covered by a bargained contract.
Craft = Union