back to article BOFH: HR tries to think appy thoughts

BOFH logo telephone with devil's horns HR has outdone itself. They've looked at the Company as a whole and realized we need to add AI to our products. If only I'd thought of it myself. I mean, the Company has a fair amount of A already, so all we really need to do is account for the staggering lack of I. The cherry on the …

  1. Pascal Monett Silver badge

    Once again, the BOFH wins hands down

    And I'm sure all the HR people are absolutely overjoyed at the idea of having to go into a trash bin to get their phones back.

    Don't mess with the BOFH. You'll always regret it.

    If you survive, that is . . .

    1. Chloe Cresswell Silver badge

      Re: Once again, the BOFH wins hands down

      If they survived... (the phones, or the HR people? Well...)

      1. Korev Silver badge
        Coat

        Re: Once again, the BOFH wins hands down

        HP people? That sounds a bit saucy for the office...

        1. Chloe Cresswell Silver badge

          Re: Once again, the BOFH wins hands down

          your comment was just in time for me to fix it, thanks.

          But also: could be worst, could be HP or HPE people in the office. Then there will be a half hour wait while they get to a useable state ;)

          (No, I haven't ben diagnosing a HP server and having to reboot a lot with their ultra fast UEFI.. why do you ask...)

        2. TheWeetabix Bronze badge

          Re: Once again, the BOFH wins hands down

          When the steaks are great and the chips are down (in the fryer)….

    2. Korev Silver badge
      Coat

      Re: Once again, the BOFH wins hands down

      > And I'm sure all the HR people are absolutely overjoyed at the idea of having to go into a trash bin to get their phones back.

      They were skipping with joy!

    3. WonkoTheSane

      Re: Once again, the BOFH wins hands down

      Knowing Simon, it was pickup day for the skip, and he & the PFY finished their game just in time.

      1. CountCadaver Silver badge

        Re: Once again, the BOFH wins hands down

        And the skip was being rapidly filled with sharp and dense rubble/gravel, dropped from on high.

        Appears the app issue has been squashed....I mean quashed....

        1. Hot Diggity

          Re: Once again, the BOFH wins hands down

          I can feel a "There's been a terrible accident" about to be uttered, as the truck collecting the skip accidentally makes HR sauce due to the phone owners being do anxious to retrieve their phones that they forget to look both ways before crossing the road

    4. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      Re: Once again, the BOFH wins hands down

      "having to go into a trash bin to get their phones back."

      The BOFH will have rung the skip company to get it taken for emptying in land-fill.

      1. M.V. Lipvig Silver badge

        Re: Once again, the BOFH wins hands down

        That won't stop them from retrieving their phones when they call the skip company to demand the phone back. It's got 2 billion on it in me digital wallet!

        Whups, guess it actually will, at that.

  2. Korev Silver badge

    > A torrent of app suggestions surges forth from each group – some to do with integrating the cafeteria menu

    My former employer wasted a huge amount of time/money on apps, one of the only useful ones was the cafeteria menu (the other was site maps).

    1. Joe W Silver badge

      Also: all websites of all universities at the moment.

      What I need: where is the building I need to go to? Where can I get a coffee if I'm early? How do I get there? Where is the department of $(fieldofinterest)?

      What I get: "oooh, we are so great, the greatest university, look at the shiny pictures of our students, and by the way, we won a prize for (whatever) - now scroll down to even get shown a menue..."

      1. Giles C Silver badge

        Obligatory xkcd

        https://xkcd.com/773/

        15 years old and still correct

      2. Terry 6 Silver badge
        FAIL

        Argh. Yes. A student came to our "Digital Champions" session for some help earlier in the academic year. All she really needed was to be able to find stuff on her uni's website.

        What a fucking pile of shit she was trying to work through.

        There was the rolling banner across the top of the (phone) web page to start with.Fucked if I know what it was for. Then the flashing side panels extolling the virtues of (something or other) that no one cared about. Then some kind of BS "News" panel underneath. All this on the screen of a mobile phone. So we tried on a laptop. And it was actually worse. Actually finding links to useful information was just about impossible.

        1. dmesg

          One of my old schools has one of those consultant-designed-and-built sites that cost an eye-watering amount (that *could* have paid for some storage that was badly needed at the time -- I know because I was lead sysadmin back then). Even after ten years, the only reasonable way to get to the directory is by typing '${school_URL}/directory" in the URL bar, and I happened on that by guessing.

        2. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          The company used to have a decent intranet 'news' page, with a menu across the top that would get you to many useful pages... then it got 'updated'.

          The news page was shifted to SharePoint (easier to maintain?!?) but, even worse, they signed to company up to 'Workplace by Meta' (faecebook for business) and senior management started using it for their official pronouncements... along with pics from their visits to exotic far-flung outposts... and junior management congratulating Tracey on selling a gross of pencils... and Simon from Lift Maintenance has brought in his dog today... and Health and Safety are running a quiz to win a pair of safety flip-flops... all in triplicate because you are 'signed up' to groups A, B and C

          Some people seem to have loved it but I don't think any of them were workers at the coalface... I looked at it a few times but never found anything usefful

          (now retired and thankfully FB free)

          1. My other car WAS an IAV Stryker

            Sounds like the intranet of my current employer, almost exactly.

            Still better than the "portal" of my last employer aka Stryker/Abrams HQ. Yeah, I'm saying it: their portal from 2005-2018 sucked. Probably still does.

    2. Prst. V.Jeltz Silver badge

      Pointless apps

      money on apps, one of the only useful ones was the cafeteria menu

      That there is a great example of the "Could this app just a simple web page?" debate

      1. Filippo Silver badge

        Re: Pointless apps

        Yet another appropriate xkcd: https://xkcd.com/1174/

      2. bemusedHorseman
        Alien

        Re: Pointless apps

        The only reason they aren't, is because a mere webpage can't exfiltrate all the juicy monetizable data on your phone. Beware the app that refuses to open until you grant it "full storage access (including files not created by this app)" permissions!

    3. chivo243 Silver badge
      Stop

      A former employer created a Wellness director position for some relative, and company morale went through the floor... no raises for us, but a new D level position for a D level relative.

      1. PB90210 Silver badge

        We had 'wellness' but it was outsourced to a site that had T&Cs that allowed it to keep you employers informed of all your troubles, foibles and kinks

        Somehow I never felt the need to sign up <twitch twitch>

    4. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Client wanted an app to increase engagement and enhance community or something along those lines. They weren't really sure about the specifics.

      What does the app do? It replaces an email/phone call to a person with various buttons that send templated emails.

      My motives may not have been entirely pure when I suggested that we could "increase functionality" if instead of the email being sent by the server, it opens the user's email client with a draft email for them to send themselves.

      The client's initial feedback after being given the app for the first time specifically said they liked how that functionality worked.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "HR tries to think appy thoughts"

    The first four words pretty scotch whatever follows.

    No accident that for the more discerning gamey is a euphemism for putrid and presumably gamify to mean putrify.

    I had never picked up that the PFY was baptised Stephen.

    Tossing the tossers' phones into the skip brilliant. Incorrectly entering the screen lock pin or pattern etc to require the puk beforehand would be icing.

    1. Joe W Silver badge

      Re: "HR tries to think appy thoughts"

      Look at the story when he enters into the BoFH's service... should be about 10 or 20 years ago, might still be in the BOFH archives on this site, I think he was related to "uncle Brian" (not going to spoil which Brian). He is "Y" no longer...

      1. Joe W Silver badge
        Pint

        Re: "HR tries to think appy thoughts"

        Looked at the oldest BOFH-story on ElReg. The PFY is in it. The story dates from 2000

        Which is 25 years ago.

        Which makes me feel old (I might be old, but there's no reason to actually _feel_ old, innit?)

        Edit: found it.

        http://www.bofharchive.com/1996/bastard96-03.html

        1996.

        The PFY could have been in his twenties then. Now he is thirty years older (yeah, time does not work that way in stories, I know).

        1. Korev Silver badge
          Pint

          Re: "HR tries to think appy thoughts"

          BOFH predates its time in The Register, you can read Simon's history here.

          Edit: Just seen your edit :-)

        2. DJO Silver badge

          Re: "HR tries to think appy thoughts"

          You seriously believe it's the same PFY‽

          After a few years the PFYs either move on to become BOFHs somewhere else or find themselves getting cosy with a carpet and quicklime in a quarry somewhere.

          1. doublelayer Silver badge

            Re: "HR tries to think appy thoughts"

            No, it's the same one, named Stephen, all the way through. I challenge you to find a single example of either of the events you've claimed. You will find a couple attempts by the PFY to leave, which are often reversed in that article or a couple episodes later, and you'll find two attempts by the PFY to replace the BOFH by fire (literally). The challenge isn't serious, as I'm quite confident you won't find it, but you'll read a lot of BOFH stories if you attempt it which is reward enough.

            1. Handel was a crank

              Re: "HR tries to think appy thoughts"

              Ah, but can you prove that they are the _same_ Stephen?

        3. Andy Taylor

          Re: "HR tries to think appy thoughts"

          Simon and Steven age like Dennis the Menace or the Bash Street Kids - i.e not at all.

        4. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

          Re: "HR tries to think appy thoughts"

          They are both ageless.

          1. that one in the corner Silver badge

            Re: "HR tries to think appy thoughts"

            > They are both ageless

            Every few years they must return to their Ringbinders of Power, light another Page That Was Intentionally Left Blank and immerse* themselves when the Flame Turns Blue.

            * nudity isn't actually required, but Simon has found that leaving a set of clothes crumpled on the floor in the outer office has kept the curious at bay; whether he told the PFY that they were a *spare* set is unknown...

      2. Dave K

        Re: "HR tries to think appy thoughts"

        1996 is when the PFY was introduced if I recall. Blimey that seems a long time ago!

        1. Alan Brown Silver badge

          Re: "HR tries to think appy thoughts"

          If that's a long time, then what does remembering red buckets count as?

          1. M.V. Lipvig Silver badge

            Re: "HR tries to think appy thoughts"

            Inaccurate, of course - it was the striped irregular bucket, of course.

    2. dmesg

      Re: "HR tries to think appy thoughts"

      ... and, as I learned from the intertubes, "boss" is related to "botch". It can also mean "an ornamental stud".

      1. A.P. Veening Silver badge

        Re: "HR tries to think appy thoughts"

        But it is derived from the Dutch word "baas".

  4. elsergiovolador Silver badge

    Gamification

    Imagine an idea where the more you work, the more money you get paid. That would be neat!

    1. Prst. V.Jeltz Silver badge

      Re: Gamification

      Would probably reduce the traffic here at el'Reg considerably

      1. Joe W Silver badge
        Pint

        Re: Gamification

        What? Reading ElReg is work!

        Enjoy the weekend!

      2. Sam not the Viking Silver badge
        Pint

        Re: Gamification

        Look. It is because of articles like this, that the boss knows I read, that enables me to fulfil my objectives. Some of these objectives are even connected with our business. The 'ideas-graveyard' is generally foretold by the BOFH together with useful solutions.

        Another solution ---->

    2. Antron Argaiv Silver badge

      Re: Gamification

      This comes scarily close to my experience at a former employer.

      HR was looking to enrich their jobs. So now, mandatory annual security/harassment/regulatory videos came not only with Q&A, but a "gamification" option. Which I never used. (I'd let them run in a background window and just try the Q&A until I got enough right that I passed)

      Also on the HR enrichment agenda: "personal goals", "360 feedback", "achievement badges" (you got one for finishing each mandatory training), and so on. Lots of busy work that kept you from doing your actual job. And the "everyone's a winner" (virtual, not actual -- you could see them on your HR web page) badges were the weirdest thing I have ever seen in my professional career. It was like being back in grade school.

      Retired now, and not a moment too soon.

      1. Kevin Johnston Silver badge

        Re: Gamification

        OMG...I was in exactly that place and told them what they could do with their 'gamification' which was not well received. I have a feeling I know which company that was and they decided to 'let me go' when the system I was the only EMEA support/admin person for was in the final 6 months of it's Prod usage. Somehow they assumed that the 10 years they needed to keep the data available for did not need any servers to restore the data onto, who knew?

      2. the Jim bloke
        Windows

        Re: Gamification

        Our company did some deal with an online training video provider. might have been called Go One

        and the crap they presented was all animated, with fake competitions supposedly against other employees where you displayed how much smarter than them you were..

        The entire thing was aimed squarely at whatever group of generations are casualties of youtube and social media, and its presumption of stupidity, and overall fakeness was so blatant I found it too offensive to actually do any of the training.

        1. PB90210 Silver badge

          Re: Gamification

          Go One, Go One, Go One...

          (Mrs Doyle)

        2. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

          Re: Gamification

          Similar here. HR provide "training" and it's invariably US imported cartoons (that ought to have 1000% tariffs applied to them!) but with a British voice over to make it appear "local", Of course, the visuals and text are a dead giveaway and often a bit jarring when something culturally non-UK is front and centre in the presentation. I've done so many of these over the years that I rarely watch them now and just wait for end (or skip forward if it allows) and do the Q&A at the end. I'm long, long past caring about getting 100% and am content with getting whatever the minimal pass mark is. Having said that, it's not unusual for there to be an 80% pass mark and only 4 questions so the ONLY option is 100% to pass LOL ie yet another example of the lack of care taken in preparing the "training".

        3. Antron Argaiv Silver badge
          Facepalm

          Re: Gamification

          Ditto here on the outsourced cartoons. The best part (since they were outsourced) was the disclaimer at the start of each video, saying that the requirements given in the upcoming video may be different than the ones applicable in your company and/or region. On a compliance video. SMH, does anyone in charge actually watch these things? Oh, well, got my badges (one for each video watched, IIRC). Now that it has been mentioned, I do recall something about a "leaderboard" and competing against your fellow employees. But...you only got these compliance videos ever so often, so I'm not clear how (or why) you could do more of them than you were told to do...

          And the videos we were required to complete seemed to vary every year. Some years, we had sexual harassment (avoiding, not how-to) training, some years not. Every now and then, we got videos required that were clearly meant for software people (I was a hardware engineer), and I just gave up on them...all about requirements for building software, which process to use, etc. Greek to me. Never heard a word more about it. Did not get a badge for that one.

          HR once ran a contest for badges. I kid you not, and I have screen grabs to prove it, which I will not post here. The contest was to see who could award the most badges to fellow employees as recognition for whatever they were being recognised for. It ran for a while and then the HR people running the contest posted the names of the winners. Apparently, these people either worked with a LOT of high energy contributors, or they were really into giving and collecting (virtual, mind you) badges.

          One of our guys once tried to create a badge for something relevant to our small development group (might have been Outstanding Effort on a Project That Was Cancelled, or some such). They submitted it to "Badge Central" and got a note saying it would not be approved. Apparently there are standards and this one didn't meet them.

          This badge stuff went on as long as I was there. Totally bizarre, it was like getting a gold star on a grade school essay, but virtual. Somehow the number and types of badges you had factored into your promotability (in a way that, natch, was not disclosed). As I was already at the highest non-management level, that didn't matter to me.

          1. Fr. Ted Crilly Silver badge

            Re: Gamification

            The carbon rod kept scooping the awards eh...

      3. A.P. Veening Silver badge

        Re: Gamification

        Makes for lovely timesheet entries, which is the only known way to make it stop.

      4. Ropewash

        Re: Gamification

        I would enjoy the gamification of workplace harassment. I'm really quite good at it.

      5. David Hicklin Silver badge

        Re: Gamification

        > mandatory annual security/harassment/regulatory videos

        Ah you got them as well often on subjects we would never face in real life, we gradually compiled a collection of the Q&A's to speed things up , efficient eh

        Like you also happily retired

  5. Admiral Grace Hopper

    Stop doing this

    Every time Simon seems to be transcribing a meeting/shitstorming session that I have sat through I get a crick in my neck from nodding along. The older I get, the more it hurts.

    1. KarMann Silver badge
      Big Brother

      Re: Stop doing this

      In the XKCD fora, that phenomenon has been known as 'get out of my head, Randall!'

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Stop doing this

        We used to have that with Scott Adams' Dilbert too until he turned to the dark side.

        That said, I imagine with the orange buffoon in play he'd have again an audience - it's not like there isn't a lot to make fun of there.

        Ah, no, wait, no sense of humour.

        1. A.P. Veening Silver badge

          Re: Stop doing this

          Ah, no, wait, no sense of humour.

          Doesn't matter, they will see it as a manual anyway.

  6. GlenP Silver badge

    Genuine...

    For context most of our sales are to quote, we don't have web ordering and at the time several of our customers had only just progressed to sending orders by Fax!

    Director: The board have decided we must have an app!

    Me: What do you want it to do?

    Director: Help the customers! You know, datasheets and stuff.

    Me: So basically repeat what's already on the website?

    Director: Er, umm, probably.

    I go away and do some very brief research.

    Me: It'll cost a minimum of £15,000 per platform, and there are three separate platforms* to provide for.

    Director:

    That's the last I heard of the idea!

    *Windows Mobile was still a thing.

  7. steelpillow Silver badge
    Coat

    The AI app

    Hi, generative AI thingy, write me an app that writes and runs more apps that write and run more.....

    1. KittenHuffer Silver badge

      Re: The AI app

      .... and do this without using recursion!

  8. s. pam
    Facepalm

    BOFH wins, H/R sent to the rubbish bin!

    HR doesn't need any fancy tools -- they already have the human shredder which is the tool they use to scan CVs.

    What they need are actual HUMANS, with a brain, compassion and caring for the good of the employee.

    -

    Sigh, loks like I've not sniffed enough glue this week, again :(

  9. frankvw Bronze badge
    Pint

    Pandora's box has officially been opened...

    Because now I'm getting ideas myself:

    - An app that connects to the lift controls based on proximity of a beancounter's phone. Call it the Hotel California lift option: you can enter the carriage any time you like but you can never leave...

    - Sliding doors and halon releases triggering automatically based on the number of outstanding support requests a user has, once again proximity-triggered

    - Camera and microphone linked to servers (TODO: install device file /dev/blackmail on all Android devices, or hook into device files already installed by Chinese home automation apps)

    - Remote controlled NFT payment features (the beer fund needs topping up!)

    ...

    This could work...

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Actual Idiots.

    We aren't short of AI implementations in this business

  11. Evil Auditor Silver badge

    This reminds me uncannily of a certain colleague - I shall refrain from naming names.

    Discussion between unnamed colleague and killjoy me: "We should use AI!" - "Why would we do that?" - "We could use it in our audits!." - "In which way would this be helpful?" - "We could use it for analysing evidence." - "Right. Who's going to train our AI? We certainly cannot send any audit evidence to any third party." - "Ah, okay. But maybe we could do a pilot?" - "?! Same problem." - [more cringe exchange] - "Maybe we can ask AI how AI can help us?"

    1. ortunk
      Devil

      Start an AI training project

      get graphics cards with lots of ram

      lots of them

    2. dmesg

      To be fair, I asked a LLM how I might catch students using LLMs to do their homework. The suggestions were actually reasonable, but missed an idea I'd had. I mentioned the idea to the LLM. It agreed it would probably work. Turns out, it was right.

    3. PB90210 Silver badge

      Big problem... government/industry mandated audits that the company relies on to do business

  12. Blackjack Silver badge

    So... did Simon really destroy everyone else phones while he is inside the same room? Hopefully there is a fire exit nearby.

  13. gnasher729 Silver badge

    Just thinking… What kind of nonsense is this? If HR had a concrete use case to help them doing HR work more efficiently, by all means go to some development manager who sends you someone to record your requirements. But the company’s business and what software they create is none of HRs business.

  14. that one in the corner Silver badge

    The Company App - definitely Gami

    Mandatory sign on with your Company ID (all 19 digits, plus the 4 digit checksum), which you do by tapping on the flying keypads as they cross the screen. This is only intended as a a one-time logon, as once you are in the app will generate a QR code to use next time, but we've noticed most users appear reluctant to use the QR (note: for security, screenshotting is disabled; pencil and squared paper are available in the stationery cupboard).

    Within the app you can get the number of a support ticket to work on (playing the Vegas Slots for a three digit number), log time against a job number (wobble the phone to sink the ball into the right hole, quarter an hour logged per ball) or use the geo-caching clues to find where the sheets from the stores ordering books have been hidden around the office. Your emails are presented as crosswords and take-home from payslips are found in the shaded squares after completing the Sudoku.

    Your time within the app is shown by the clock at top left and your best time to date is shown on the right. To incentivise productivity, every five seconds over your best results in a deduction from your year end bonus.

    As the consultants who prepared the app for us have described using it as "a pure and child like adventure from the comfort of your cubicle, an experience that will refresh and enliven", the CFO has determined that it counts as non-productive time for the purposes of your timesheet and will not be payable. The app will automatically log its usage on your behalf, rounded up to the nearest half-hour per session.

    Addendum: Workplace safety has demanded that, in order to "reduce fatigue from excessive screen use", the app will automatically log you out after a maximum of ten minutes usage.

  15. FeRDNYC

    Hey, shouldn't have left all those phones there in the room if they weren't supplies for the group project! Mistake anyone could make, and the BOFH always will make.

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