A recent phone call reminded me of a situation where adversity and my determination became an example of a success point.
As the UNIX Sys Admins offered me information with questions I asked, we used virtual machines to access Windows for email and internet browsing from behind our firewalls.
Me: “Why can’t we load an instance of WFMS (Workforce Management System) on the Windows servers?”
Person: “We have been told that it cannot be done. It doesn’t play well with Windows servers.”
Me: *Hmm. Interesting.*
This became a challenge to explore. I immediately went into exploration mode to see if I could hack it. Every day, I woke up at 4 AM waiting for the clock to hurry so it would be time to go to work. Could I sneak in early? Would there be a seat available for me?
Arriving at work, I launched the Windows system that we normally worked at and perched myself in an ideal workstation that I could easily access the other at a moments notice.
At the UNIX workstation, I launched an instance of Windows and went to work hacking it to load the WFMS application so it would work. I figured it out and stopped using the Windows workstation that we started with. I began to migrate into the mix.
Manager: “Deputy! Are you still dispatching?!”
Me: “Yes sir!”
Manager: “Deputy, what did you do?!”
I showcased my hack so I could sit in the Network Operations Center with everyone else.
That hack gained me a permanent position with the offer to choose where I wanted to go to do what I wanted to do. That was a community. That was a great place to work.
