I’ve heard of many cases where the person who is paid to do the work, somehow ends up seeking help from the customers. One example is what happened to my sister. She’s an accountant in a MNC and there was this fresh graduate auditor who kept pestering her and the other accountants……not for information or documents, but for help. The fresh graduate did not know how to do her job! To make things worse, my sister actually gave her some documents to study but she didn’t study. She preferred to be spoon-fed.

Spoon-fed by a customer…? Hmmm.

Actually, this kind of incident happens a lot. These people have no idea that they are dealing with the customers, and they are supposed to be the one providing solution, not the other way round. If you can’t give me solution and expect me to teach you how to do it, then what’s the point of paying you? Isn’t it better to just hire a maid?

If you seriously don’t know how to fix it, then just seek assistance from your seniors or something and don’t let the customers know that you can’t fix it. Always know your role and where you are. It won’t benefit you or your employer if you allow the customers to know that you can’t fix the problem (and pestering to teach you to fix it will certainly make things a lot worse).

As for the guy allocating resources, always know who are your main customers and the skillset of your people. No point sending a lazy rookie to the front line of a warzone. You’ll just lose more people and give the impression that your squad (company) is weak. Try to allocate them under some helpful seniors and put them elsewhere.

Remember that if I’m paying you to fix the problem for me, and you can’t do it…then the least you can do is to spend some time figuring out how to do it (and not asking me for help!). If you still can’t do it, I’ll just find someone else.