About five years ago, a place I was working at was selecting a new laptop for all employees. Mine was up for replacement, so I was interested in what they were picking.
They'd arrived at some god-awful Lenovo gamer model. It fit the performance and price point they'd decided they needed.
I said I'd prefer to have something smaller with less Christmas lights.
"Policy is everyone has to have the same laptop, and some people need more graphics power than the one you're asking for."
Turns out there'd been some big thing back and forth already about size and performance and this was the compromise that nobody liked.
"But why does everyone have to have the same laptop?" I asked.
"Well, it's just policy. Every desk has a docking station, and we don't want to have to buy different ones."
So I flipped the selected monstrosity over to reveal the extremely lacking docking connector at the bottom. There were some awkward laughs and I got my Thinkpad.
I said I'd prefer to have something smaller with less Christmas lights.
"Policy is everyone has to have the same laptop, and some people need more graphics power than the one you're asking for."
Turns out there'd been some big thing back and forth already about size and performance and this was the compromise that nobody liked.
"But why does everyone have to have the same laptop?" I asked.
"Well, it's just policy. Every desk has a docking station, and we don't want to have to buy different ones."
So I flipped the selected monstrosity over to reveal the extremely lacking docking connector at the bottom. There were some awkward laughs and I got my Thinkpad.