[bossyTeacher]

>some Linux nerds found me working as a receptionist answering phones and scanning paper records in at a failing medical practice. They got me doing desktop Windows and Linux server support. I’m an official software engineer now

There is a gap between receptionist and official software engineer. Please, give us more details about your journey and what happened in between

[wavemode]

> There is a gap between receptionist and official software engineer.

At many companies (especially old, stodgy companies) this gap is artificial. The day you get asked "hey, I've got some data .... and I need ..." and you successfully solve the person's problem, is the day you become the office's live-in software engineer. That person you helped will be back, and they will bring friends.

The rest after that is just job title shuffling.

[bossyTeacher]

Not sure what country you live in, but where I live, a receptionist doesn't have access to any data processing tools that are not within the realm of a receptionist, and therefore this mobility does not happen. The receptionist ends up redirect the query to someone who has access to the relevant systems.

What sort of companies are those were receptionists have access to tools beyond their role? and why are people approaching the receptionists asking for data queries?

Like having to run a script on that data when your machine doesn't have the permissions to run arbitrary software without permission from the IT team

[wavemode]

You're still thinking too much in a "tech company" mindset. At the kind of company I'm talking about, concepts like "access" and "permissions" are irrelevant. Most of the company's employees barely know how a computer works.

You seemed vaguely tech savvy, so someone asked you for help and emailed you a file containing the data (or perhaps just handed you a laptop and turned you loose). The rest is history.

It's a modern invention that companies have separate software engineering orgs, software engineering roadmaps, software engineering managers. At older companies, a software developer is just another businessperson in a cubicle. Your manager probably has an English degree.

[EvanAnderson]

> You seemed vaguely tech savvy, so someone asked you for help and emailed you a file containing the data (or perhaps just handed you a laptop and turned you loose). The rest is history.

I know that someday I'll work in something other than IT. When I do I am going to make for damned sure that I don't express even the slightest bit of tech savvy for exactly this reason.

It's similar to playing dumb w/ people I encounter outside work who find out I work in IT. If I get asked a question I play dumb and cop to working on some highly siloed subject (usually I'll claim to only work on "networking" or firewalls... >smile<).

[dghlsakjg]

Many small business.

The first job I had where I did anything technical (basic JS and HTML) also had me cold calling, answering phones, designing brochures, fiberglass repair, and some other stuff I’m forgetting. Small businesses frequently have more niche jobs than people and are more than happy to have people help where they are interested.

My first full software job was a direct to consumer company, and during the Christmas rush the entire front office was on the packing line.

Larger companies tend to appreciate people staying in their lane.

[0xdeadbeefbabe]

In small companies there is one lane.

[dghlsakjg]

Which lane was I in?

[olowe]

> What sort of companies are those were receptionists have access to tools beyond their role? and why are people approaching the receptionists asking for data queries?

It's a fair question. I questioned myself all the time doing the job. The couple of competent doctors couldn't see other patients as the doctors couldn't get paper records themselves. The old retiring doctors (one had a genuine diagnosis of vascular dementia) sometimes hid the paper records for themselves. Admin staff stopped bothering sorting the records properly some years back too. You needed to just know where some group of patient's records were in which cabinet. The workflow for accessing records, in the morning:

    1. study the appointment book
    2. open delivered snail mail, set aside ones for patients who had appointments that day
    3. get each patient's records, attach any new mail (real attachments with paperclips!)
    4. place them on each doctor's desks

By scanning the records in other doctors, competent ones, could see other patients. For me, I was ok with doing this job even though it is officially inappropriate.

Despite this strict paper workflow, there were 3 PCs on the front desk to be used by any admin staff at any time. No password to log in ("too slow" otherwise). The password to log in to the medical software was "1234" ("too slow" otherwise... again). The practice purchased computers only to be able to bill patients using credit/debit cards and to get rebates more quickly from the government.

> ... permissions to run arbitrary software without permission from the IT team

There was no IT team. The practice called an IT support company who billed per 10 minutes - no contracts - if the "server" didn't come back up again after a disk failed or somebody kicked the cables. The practice staff stopped calling the IT team once they saw that I could do the job myself (see my longer comment)

[piperswe]

In a small business, the receptionist may be responsible for inputting much of that data in the first place, and it may just live on the receptionist's computer.

[cestith]

In fact in some companies outside of tech proper with smaller headcount and less technically minded management, by the time the boss decides to look into systems like HRIS, CRM, ERM, and such the receptionist, office manager, and/or the interns already have about 837 Excel macros doing most of that work.

[stonemetal12]

>receptionist answering phones and scanning paper records in

They were also converting paper records to digital. Asking the data entry person where the data is or how to find paper record xyz in the digital system doesn't seem odd.

[inopinatus]

Microsoft Excel is the #1 tool at the top of that rather narrowly envisioned slippery slope, since you ask. Followed by any web browser.

As for data access; the vast majority of firms, worldwide, in every country, have abysmal internal controls, and in many cases, none at all. The filing cabinet is unlocked all day, everything from payroll to posters is in a share that every network login can R/W, and nobody cares.

[olowe]

That's pretty much how it happened. A neighbour bought a medical practice from two retiring doctors in their 80s. One had officially diagnosed vascular dementia but was still practicing. The place was losing money because they couldn't reliably bill appointments. Nobody really knew how to use computers except for that neighbour who was himself busy seeing patients. That neighbour knew I was interested in "computers" because I picked up some old desktop he put out on the side of the road for rubbish collection, and asked if I was up for scanning papers in for hourly cash. "Ummm, sure". I never knew I could really make money using computers.

Every couple of days "the server" would crash. It was an old dusty Windows box under one of the admin staff's desk. I offered to move it out so they wouldn't keep accidentally kicking out the power cable or disturb the wobbly ethernet switch making it fall down off the top of it down into the corner where the mice and moths hid. I was sick of crawling down there after a while.

Once staff saw that I knew how to plug network cables back in after moving IT gear, they stopped calling in the IT company meant to be keeping all this stuff on life support. From there you hear about every tiny little problem, you get busier, learn to automate bits of your job piece by piece to keep up with the demands.

For example, a doctor complained about waiting for me to scan in pathology reports delivered by snail mail. The fax machine kept running out of toner & paper as it was also the practice's main printer. I researched and found that the pathology providers could install some software on a Windows machine which would deliver reports directly into the medical software the doctors were starting to use. That software would crash, too. How can I monitor that Windows service and have it send me an email if it goes down? What if I could get it to try to start it back up again before it sent me an email?

Eventually the dementia doctor retired as he kept falling asleep during appointments.

The other old doctor voluntarily quit when the filing cabinets containing all the paper records moved to a locked room with just a scanner and shredder.

A doctor wanted to be able to connect to the practice remotely. I learned about VPNs, but I had no idea if I could set that up using the modem/router provided by the ISP. Some family friend referred me to the IT company who took care of their email. Turned out that company were real Linux purists running all their own mail system in a datacenter. They were impressed by my proposed network diagram for the medical practice. They thought it was cool that I installed Linux on old PCs to keep using them for fun.

Instead of me hiring them for support, they just offered me a real salary job at a bit over minimum wage.

[afavour]

Particularly those of us who don't have computer science training kind of end up falling into this stuff.

One of my first jobs was as an admin assistant at a utilities company. We logged data about pipe replacement, which was done in something like five different spreadsheets, each optimized for its printed form (legal requirements for paper copies of various things). I knew just about enough about Access to know that entering the same thing in 5 different spreadsheets is a waste of everyone's time so set up a database where people entered the information once and Access forms generated the five printable versions. Management were impressed and asked me what else I think might be possible. Cue me diving into the world of complex forms, eventually VBA, then once I got frustrated with that, VB.NET via SharpDevelop (they sure as hell weren't paying for Visual Studio), on and on. I was doing software engineering while still keeping the job title of admin assistant.

...then I went and got a real engineering job with a real salary.