Dashing and Daring

PK Dash. 

As a name it may not send shivers down the spine. But the situations and issues it lead to really did made some people, not just shiver but literally got themselves hurt laughing.

The day of onboarding:

PKD: “Hey team..i’ven’t received my credentials”

Recruiter: ”Did you submit all your forms?”

PKD:”Yes I did. If you want I can resend them”

Rec:”That would be great. Let me check in parallel on the status of your cred creation”

Recruiter to IT (over call) 

Rec:”Can you check why PK Dash doesn’t have his credentials yet”

IT: “PK what?”

Rec: “Dash”

IT: “We can’t have special characters in name field”

Rec: “Pls raise it with concerned team and resolve this system issue. The employee should get his mail id by today EOD”

IT: “Connect me with the employee. Will talk with him”

IT to PKD

IT: “ Hi, we are IT. is it PKD?”

PKD:”Yes”

IT: “Can you let me know your full name with right spelling”

PKD:” It is P as in PK, K as in alphabet after J and Dash”

IT: “what is on the dash”

PKD: “nothing”

IT: “Should I leave it blank?”

PKD: “No it should be dash”

IT: “!! OK. How many dashes”

PKD: “!!! Only one of course”

IT: ”We don’t have provision to include special characters as part of the name. And it will create confusion over mail id as well”

PKD: “What confusion. It is straight forward”

IT : “PK-@company.com is not a valid mail id. Server will not accept”

PKD: “huh..in my previous company my mail id was P_K_dash @company.com. Can something similar be tried?”

IT: “that is one weird mail id. Not sure how they managed. Did you use outlook or lotus notes”

PKD: “Both”

IT: “Strange. Let me try again”

IT to supervisor

IT: “This is very strange. How to create a name with dash?”

Supe: “ You sure got the details correct? "

IT: “ I spoke to him directly”

Supe: “May be some numerology case”

IT: “Still how do you get – in the name. I want to use so many alternate words to fill the dash which are generally marked as dash dash to avoid getting caught for profanity”

Supe : True. What the ----. Search on help sites”

After few days PKD escalated again stating he hasn’t got his creds yet. When the recruitment team mailed his details to IT then only they realized the situation. 

The situation continued post the mail id creation as well, for not a single person got his id right when he told it to them.

What the dash!!