Dirty IT job No. 5: On-site reboot specialist

Seeking individuals for on-site support of end-users. Must be familiar with three-fingered Ctrl-Alt-Del salute and power cord reconfiguration. Ability to withstand a variety of environments and personality types; concealed-weapons permit a plus. Individuals with anger management issues need not apply.

Closely related to the help desk zombie, but even lower on the totem pole, is the on-site reboot specialist. Unlike help desk or support vampires, the on-site rebootnik must venture out into the physical world and deal with actual people.

Joel Bomgar worked his way through college as an on-site support specialist. He recalls hot sticky summers spent driving Mississippi back roads in 100-degree heat, providing "sweatnical" support to clueless end-users.

"First there's the heat," Bomgar says. "Then you show up at the customer site, and the server room is a closet. Loud, dusty, dingy, and there's nowhere to sit down. You end up standing wedged between the server and the wall for hours at a time. It's like flying on a regional jet. Everything about it is uninviting."

It was this experience, Bomgar says, that ultimately inspired him to start Bomgar Corp. (formerly Network Streaming), a Ridgeland, Miss.-based provider of remote service solutions for SMBs. By adding a Bomgar Box appliance to a company's network, remote technicians anywhere in the world can access an end-user's PC and troubleshoot it. Providing non-site support also puts some welcome physical distance between techie and customer.

"What makes on-site support dirty is interfacing with the user," Bomgar says. "People's workstations are often a nightmarish wreck. They issue you into a tiny room covered with dust, grit, and grime. The keyboard's broken and the mouse doesn't work, but they're used to it."

For their part, customers don't have to stop working while the tech takes over their machines (or stand near some college kid who's just been driving in 100-degree heat).

"Tech support becomes so much cleaner when you don't have to go deal with all those environmental variables," Bomgar says. "You get to interface with the technology without the grit, grime, and dirt associated with support."

Dirty IT job No. 4: Interdepartmental peace negotiator

Looking for self-starter skilled at moderating tech disputes between warring factions within the same company or between company and its client. Must possess experience in ego-stroking, manipulative massage, and hand-to-hand combat.

Cats and dogs, Democrats and Republicans, Martians and Venutians — they're downright chummy compared to warring departments within many enterprises. Unfortunately, at some point they've got to pull together for the good of the company. That's when you call in the negotiator to smooth ruffled feathers and break up the fights.

This comes up a lot when different sides of the organization need to collaborate on, say, a company wiki, intranet, or portal, says Syrinx's Gelina. Somebody's got to play the heavy — what Gelina calls the "Portal Majority Whip" — to keep everyone on the same page, following the same rules.

"If someone is not riding herd on this, renegade elements will crop up and threaten the stability and usability of the portal," Gelina explains.

The problem? "The IT people want centralized control, while the typical users want to move forward at the speed of business without restrictions," Gelina says. "They don't want to have to wait for IT to decide something before they can move. Satisfying those two camps can be tough."

But this battle isn't always geeks against suits; sometimes it's geeks vs. geeks. Dimension Data's Domich likens the job to herding kittens.

"The Cat Herder has to keep multiple architect-level technologists focused on a common cause to a common problem," Domich says. "Even if it seems redundant at times, it's essential to have systems — or, in this case, people — in place to keep technology architects on schedule."

Domich adds, "IT project managers are gluttons for punishment." As if we didn't know.