Have you ever accidentally turned a very powerful man’s phone into a shiny, useless paperweight? I did that this weekend.
For those of you who (understandably) can’t keep up with my current employment, I am currently working in retail sales for AT&T, selling some awesome gadgets, features, and accessories–and loving it.
Sunday afternoon, a gentleman came into the store to have an issue fixed on his blackberry, and I gladly helped him out. During the course of our conversation I asked him where he worked, and he said the name of a company that you would readily recognize if I told you. A few minutes later, I asked what he did for the company.
He didn’t break eye contact, and smiled slightly when he said “Director of Customer Services. I oversee 19 international offices all over the world.”
Just as he said that, I began rebooting his Blackberry, having fixed the issue.
Or so I thought.
It turns out that the fix I applied, though generally very quick and painless, did not jive well with the security software on his particular device, and it started into a loop where it would not come out of “boot up” mode.
Big, important meetings. Tight, busy international schedule. Shiny, expensive paperweight for a phone. And to top things off, Sunday at 6:07 PM is quite possibly the hardest time of the week to get anything done regarding replacement devices. The store closes at 6:00.
Gulp.
And to think, I thought lukewarm-calling (because you can’t call it cold-calling if I got referred to them from a friend) strangers to ask them for money for my ministry was stressful.
To be honest, he was super-gracious, and we are going to ensure the problem is fixed for him. But that didn’t prevent me from nearly wetting myself when the phone didn’t come back on.
Have you ever done something like that?