The Naked CIO: Time to wage war on home users

What do staff really do at home with their company machines? Our embattled hero - newly appointed CIO at a largish firm - discovers there's a big difference between home workers and home users…

A purchase order for a PC lands on my desk. Nothing unusual there. The machine's for a senior manager in the organisation to use at home. But what catches my eye is the specification. This includes speakers, two DVD drives and a gaming graphics card. How on earth can we justify buying a machine like that?

Over the first few months of my new job I have been trying to sort out the whole home working issue. That single purchase order typifies the problems I've been facing.

Some managers at my new company seem to enjoy the historic privilege that goes with knowing the right people in the right places. But surely logic, standards and support should prevail when buying equipment?

An investigation of the home internet connections that we provide identified at least three individuals who had left the company but still had active ADSL connections that we were paying for.

I went ballistic when I found out about this - it shows a lack of management and attention to detail that wastes money. We've no one to blame but ourselves.

OK, so we have home workers - in these cases we should provide for all their business needs to allow them to work from home as they would in the office. But we also have home users - and this is where I have issues.

Why do we provide PCs and internet connectivity for staff who from time to time want to connect to the office from home? That should be their responsibility.

I am now conducting a full assault on our home working policy to minimise the management, overhead and responsibility we take for these people.

Of course it's never as simple as that - it becomes a political issue. Certain home working practices have been in place for a long time - long before I arrived. So I realise there are those on the board who will interpret any changes in this area as a personal attack.

This means for a sensible and best practice policy to prevail I must stealthily construct an iron-clad case to reclaim company-owned PCs from these home users and also get them to take responsibility for their own internet connections. Sounds simple doesn't it?

For the first time in my life I respect the Working Time Regulations - if only people just worked the hours they were supposed to I wouldn't have this problem. But presently I feel like PC World and that is not the function of IT.

On top of that, once a company PC is in the home we in IT then have to support it, which often means going to a manager's home when a system is not working. Even my doctor doesn't do house calls, so why should my department?

I shall win the policy battle and make home PC usage conform, not only to best practice ideals, but to commonsense basics. At what cost though?

The alienation of those who have benefited from this privilege over the years will undoubtedly lead to resentment and another battle along the road, which is fought not for the sake of the company but to score points against the new guy.

Because of the politics I must remind my team to be squeaky-clean during this period because others will be on the lookout for double standards - as always.

I remember now why I have always enjoyed dealing with computers more than with people. Computers are not petty in the face of reason. They do not sulk and seek revenge when embarrassed and they do not manoeuvre to score points over their team mates - after all, aren't we all on the same side?

If we're in the business of scoring points, perhaps in a month I should do a spot-check at the home of the senior manager who requested the gaming PC and find out what he's really using it for.

I am absolutely certain that this visit alone would provide me with all the evidence I need to put my policies in place.

I suppose the vindictive behaviour of others rubs off now and again, doesn't it?