Finger-Pointing Your Way into a Corner

You don’t like to be told you’re wrong. Heck, no one does — especially carriers and hardware vendors. There are many variables in telecom, and although you may think you’ve isolated a problem and can pinpoint its source, you may want to avoid doing so. There is always a quirky possibility that a problem you find in one location may be the result of something wrong in a seemingly unrelated part of the network.

If you sound too sure that you know what a problem is, and who is to blame, a tense situation can quickly deteriorate into a series of verbal attacks and pointed words. If your troubleshooting team is at odds with each other, you are doomed to either failure or a very dicey bit of diplomacy that makes the Mid-East peace talks look like a cakewalk.

 Tip  If emotions run high, end the troubleshooting, separate the people that are fighting and adopt a diplomatic stance.