[mistermann]

At my current job (very large corporation), I requested certain specs for my development machine, basically just lots of RAM and an SSD. I said I would be more than happy to pay for the hardware myself and they could have IT install the standard desktop.

It took 6 weeks for this request to be emailed around to various people for approval and no one (I saw the email chain) had the balls to make a decision or even give their opinion on the matter. Luckily, it finally hit someone that had both a brain and balls, whose reaction was basically "of course, give it to him immediately, the extra cost is meaningless."

The point of this is, at least to some degree, costs are not what hampers IT, you can offer to pay for something and they will still not let you have it. At mt previous job I got some very suspicious looks from a manager for bringing my own printer to work (to save 5 minutes a day walking to the printer).

I've seen it in many companies.....there's something else going on other than just budget, but I can't put my finger on it.

[omh]

For many people, including the lower ranks of large IT departments, it simply isn't part of their job to ever make a decision or use their own opinion.

If you think for yourself and get it wrong then your boss won't be happy. If you just pass the request around then you can't be blamed.

[theBobMcCormick]

When people wonder why big companies make stupid decisions and why they are are so slow and inefficient... this is it.

If an entrepreneur sticks his neck out for an opportunity that has high risk but potentially high rewards, he's doing it because he expects to get a large portion of the rewards if he's successful. In a big "enterprise" company, your share of the reward for sticking your neck out is likely to be, if you're lucky, nothing more than a Lucite plaque and a mention in your review. But your share of the risk could be quite a bit larger (loss of your job for example). All the individual incentives in most organizations are tilted toward risk avoidance.

[aerique]

I agree with most of your post and there's probably context I'm not aware of but bringing a printer to work to save 5 minutes (and more importantly: a walk) ?! A walk is good for you!

[PakG1]

Politics are the behind-the-scenes battles that permeate the atmosphere but can't be seen. It cows people from taking responsibility and ownership.

[tincansandtwine]

This is the battle I face every day. I am a field tech at a rather large corporation, and there are so many departments in IT that no single one of them can do anything without stepping on another's shoes. I try to be a peacemaker, which has led to some improvement, but politics definitely hampers efficiency, and it's one reason I need to not work for big companies.

[eitally]

I've been on both sides of this, and I can say with some certainty that the two biggest reasons for this attitude about hardware are 1) difficulty in managing a heterogeneous computing environment, and 2) the appearance of unfairness.

Here's another question: why is it that execs tend to always get the snazziest new gear, not the people doing real computing? Argh.

[Nick_C]

It's possible it is a capital cost vs expenses thing.

Where I worked it was very hard to get a new machine because it was a capital expenditure, which affected tax, depreciation and budgeting. Ongoing expenses were easy though, because the tax effect was different.