At several workplaces, I have known people in similar situations. However, these people were among the most important parts of the workplace.
They were valued for both having a lot of background knowledge in their area, and having an ability for judgment about detailed problems that could only be called "wisdom."
Management kept them around like wise elders because once or twice a week there'd be some task that others could do, but not as well or as thoroughly (use of judgment, again) as these people. Thus problems got transferred to them.
The counterpart to these people are Suzannes, named after the first one I met. You can have an office full of highly technical people, but Suzanne -- who usually doesn't get paid much, and is some kind of administrative staff -- is the person everyone asks questions of nearly constantly because she knows all the ins and outs of the business. Every office has a Suzanne, and often the place won't function if he or she is out sick for a day.
Sounds like those people are holders of institutional memory. The bigger companies get, the more they forget about the value of institutional memory - treating everybody like a cog in a wheel. Individual managers know the value of such people, but company policy doesn't recognize them because they aren't beans that can be easily counted.
Yes, exactly. Thank you for this phrase. There's also a certain amount of institutional bonding (to coin another phrase) involved with these people, in that they're sort of "mother hens" who take care of everyone.
Definitely not cogs, but I'm not sure anyone is who actually belongs in a particular office. Cogs are (generally) apathetic, at least in their machine counterpart. In a team scenario, "apathetic" usually translates to some kind of burden being shifted to the group.
This sort of knowledge is so so handy. When some bright spark shortcuts the normal process the havoc that occurs is baffling to everyone except the old hand who cares and understands. Just being around and observing events can make an employee pretty damn useful quite fast. I'm not sure if every business has as many moving parts as the one I'm in, but it can't be unusual. With dozens of bits of software that supposedly work together, the bugs are sometimes fascinating. Kodak, I'm looking at you. Why do you refuse to archive any information on patients who's first name starts with BRE?!
They were valued for both having a lot of background knowledge in their area, and having an ability for judgment about detailed problems that could only be called "wisdom."
Management kept them around like wise elders because once or twice a week there'd be some task that others could do, but not as well or as thoroughly (use of judgment, again) as these people. Thus problems got transferred to them.
The counterpart to these people are Suzannes, named after the first one I met. You can have an office full of highly technical people, but Suzanne -- who usually doesn't get paid much, and is some kind of administrative staff -- is the person everyone asks questions of nearly constantly because she knows all the ins and outs of the business. Every office has a Suzanne, and often the place won't function if he or she is out sick for a day.