He thought “No problem. This should be a quick fix for my efficient bank.”
His EA, who always took care of such issues for him, was on LOA for work-related stress. Her back-up was no longer with the bank due to cost-cutting efforts to outsource EA positions to the Philippines.
Charlie optimistically called the EA Desk in the Philippines. His call was answered by a woman who had trouble understanding English, especially his New York accent, “Uhhh this is Charlie Scharf. I have a yuuge problem with my computaa.” She asked, “Charlie who?”
Charlie was informed by the EA Call Center that assisting with technology is not an EA- approved responsibility. They tried to transfer him to the Help Desk in India, but his call was disconnected.
Charlie phoned a long-time manager who was always happy to help in a pinch, one of the good ones. “He quit?” Charlie learned the manager had been stripped of his title as a result of Spans and Layers and left the bank a year ago.
Charlie thought through his potential solutions and phoned a few of his overpaid C-Suite pals for their professional advice. They all mumbled something about “Technology not being their strong suit.”
He called SVB who could surely help, though no longer Head of Technology. Saul’s suggestion was to try Ctrl + Alt + Del.
Charlie was never hired for his expertise in Technology. He couldn’t believe how much of his valuable time was being wasted having to deal with this bs. “Who came up with the brilliant idea that burdening down non-tech employees and managers with tech-related tasks would save money?? How are people supposed to do their jobs??”
Charlie resigned himself to calling Tech Support in India. He was unable to get past first base due to the quirks of the Voice Recognition Technology. An alternate option was to type in his 10-digit Employee ID #. Great - his EA had it on file somewhere. Foiled again.
Charlie thought he would quickly put in a call to HR for help tracking down his 10-digit employee ID #. Bei owed him a favor (since she is a woman) and would answer the phone as soon she saw his number calling. “What?? HR is making the CEO go through the phone tree??” Charlie listened to 145 seconds of confusing phone-tree options. None of the 20 options fit his situation, so he picked one that seemed the closest and sat on hold for 30 minutes of a brain-numbing voice repeating “Your call is very important to us”…
Finally an HR rep picked up. “Surely someone in Human Resources will recognize me and offer quick assistance plus a little ingratiating flattery…Ugh I’m back to India??” Charlie introduce himself to the HR representative in India, named Bob. Bob asked “Charlie who?” Bob logged the details of Charlie’s request. He gave Charlie a Case #, and informed Charlie he would receive an information promptly VIA E-MAIL IN THE NEXT 5 to 7 BUSINESS DAYS.