A day in the life, No. 1: Today I’m your Outsourced System Administrator
Editor’s note: With more than eight years of experience working for Hyland’s Global Services team, Brittany Henthorn has more than a few stories. Since we take privacy very seriously, we’ve consolidated her accounts and made them anonymous, even though they mostly involve jokes about databases.
This is the first part of a series dedicated to these “tales from Global Services.” Enjoy!
This is my third week of acting as an employee at one of our customer organizations. It’s been a busy few weeks, and today in our regularly scheduled sync, I asked Angela, the organization’s Hyland Program Manager, the individual who requested my services, “I think it’s going well, don’t you?”
She does, which is great, because that first week was a little hectic. Karen, our customer’s new OnBase System Administrator, was transitioning from another role in the organization and seemed a bit overwhelmed—but no one could blame her for that. She suddenly had two new OnBase projects to manage, several existing solutions to support, and a new software application to learn.
She clearly needed additional support.
And so: Voila! Here I am!
A Hyland Global Services Business Consultant for nearly a decade, I’m now also this organization’s Outsourced System Administrator for the next four weeks.
As Karen has transitioned out of her current role and fully into the role of OnBase Administrator, I have assisted her with help desk and work requests, as well as guided her in identifying the daily, weekly, and monthly tasks she’ll be performing to maintain the organization’s Hyland solutions and effectively support her users.
It’s all in Bob’s head
From what I’ve heard, Bob – the previous OnBase Administrator – was really on top of all this stuff, since he’d been doing it for years. But he didn’t write any of it down.
And I don’t know exactly what happened to Bob. I like to imagine he won the lottery and left to travel the world.
Bon voyage, Bob!
Over the past 15 or so years here in Hyland Global Services, we’ve learned there are many reasons a company may need to temporarily staff their System Administrator position—from vacations or leaves, to projects that require in-house resources, to ramping up new hires into the System Administrator role to … winning the lottery!
Thus the creation of our Outsourced System Administration Services, a component of our extended services which provide temporary staffing, on-demand consulting services, and technical expertise to our customers tackling projects in-house.
Getting it into your head
Since no one could hold Bob’s luck against him, his company engaged with Hyland Global Services to put me into this role for a defined period, and ensure we keep their Hyland solutions and environment running smoothly. In addition to guiding Karen through routine administrative tasks, I’m training her to:
- Use troubleshooting tools to resolve issues (basic to advanced)
- Run OnBase reports to better understand the system and its components
- Access Hyland Community for guidance and tools from Hyland experts and peers
- Explore our Education Services training resources for guidance, on-demand training, role-based certifications, and career development paths
I also share insight on practical things, like how and when to consult a Module Reference Guide (MRG). Our MRG library is a powerful tool, but these comprehensive technical manuals are not exactly a leisure read. Truly, nobody is lying on the beach reading an OnBase MRG.
… Except maybe Bob.
I’ll be holding down the OnBase Administrator desk next week while Karen is in Westlake, OH, attending certification courses, and then I’ll head back to Westlake myself. At that point, Karen will have everything she needs to support her organization’s Hyland solutions on her own.
And as a side note, I am planning to ask Karen if she knows where Bob played the lottery.
‘Til next time, and my day in the life in staff augmentation!
