Slashdot Mirror
One Terrible Job: IT Manager
editingwhiz writes "I suppose we've always suspected this to be true, but IT Manager's Journal reports that a recent email survey by the authors of a new book called 'Crap Jobs' says that IT managers have the U.K's third-worst job -- ranking just below phone sex operator (No. 1) and ferry cabin cleaner (No. 2). Hmmm. Do you agree?" (ITMJ, like Slashdot, is part of OSTG.) Maybe it's better in the U.S.?
Theme designer for the IT section of /.
Ugh...horrible...
I suppose the guy that wipes fecal matter off the walls in insane asylums ranks in at number 4...
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I don't know about the UK, but I am an IT Manager here in the states, and I couldn't agree more. I don't make much more than your typical blue-collar worker (please, no offense meant to anyone - I was blue collar up until about 6 years ago), yet I have to deal with phone calls at night, on the weekends, and when I am on vacation. I cannot get away from my job. Not to mention, there are plenty of people that work for me that can solve 99% of the problems that come across my desk, yet *I* am the one on everyone's speed dial. And if I find the mother-f***er that gave the entire company my cell phone #, they are dead!!
Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master.
Is something going on?
If something were going on, /. wouldn't be mining the sister sites for "news" like this.
This comment is fully compliant with RFC 527.
I thought for sure that jizz mopper at the porn store would rank up there.
Oh there's tons of others, but I'm lazy, perhaps if I'm bored I'll come back later and document them all.
I've noticed that the Tea-Wops can be pretty god-damned obnoxious whenever their computers aren't working correctly, and all of those Punjabs that they're importing from god knows where to do all of their IT grunt work really don't know their ass from a hole in the ground. So it really dosen't suprise me that IT-Managers in Limey-Land are only slightly better off than phone sex operators.
Nah they're just better whiners. :-)
My Weblog
The deep south of the UK, correct. Somewhere around Nottyfrothingshire or thereabouts.
(Yeah, OK, I'm a jerk. The joys of AC!)
Why on earth would anyone take a job as a deodorant taster? What possible good could tasting deodorant do? And why would it be tasted in the armpit? Why not from the dispenser? That's just an appalling career, and it sickens me. That's even worse than my career as an IT Manager.
Hmmm?
Oh.
Never mind!
The results are a BOFH trick. You see, it is in the interests of U.K. IT managers to make everyone believe no one is interested in their jobs.
By keeping up this illusion, their vast network of power and influence can be maintained and competition can be eliminated.
M
>Oh, and my manager was right beside me. She was an excellent boss.
She is right beside you right now, isn't she?
No of course I don't agree with this article, I love my job.
BTW, did I ever tell you that one of my coworkers (who I don't get along with) audits the logs of all employee posts to websites?
Michael, is that you?
If my answers frighten you, stop asking scary questions.
This survey backs the general view in both the UK and US that *certain* IT professionals are self pitying loners without much appreciation or knowledge of how the rest of the world works, or lives. The survey in this case can be considered a pulse of the disatisfaction these malcontents have with there personal life, and in order to avoid taking responsibility reflect that unhappiness by resenting their job and various authority figures. Most of these guys (and they are mostly guys) voluntarily put in more time than is asked of them, even counting time surfing the web or playing quake as time that they were "forced" to work. They remember the one 80 hour week as their weekly average work week. Compared to many other jobs; IT management positions are well paid, safe, clean, have regular hours, vacation, (health insurance in the US), and on average is more secure against layoff. Not perfectly so, but very much on the better end of the scale. We've all seen this phenom. The good news is that as this type of job become more of a commodity - through better tools and spread of knowledge - the people in these positions will largely be chosen, among other things, their attitude. So I expect job satisfaction will self regulate to a certain degree.
I cleaned the office (I was 15 and saving for my bike, so do not laugh). It was not an IT corp[, but a logistic (trucks, shippings etc) corp, so the M/F rate was not as bad as an IT corp, but about 60/40. But the toilets were. awfull. And njot the mlae toilets. But the woman toilets. OMG, those were bad. (think of badages sticking on walls, P all over the place, and make-up (removal) pharmacy laying around everywhere. After that, I beleive no-one who tells me man are dirtier that women. Yuk!
Pfft, literally child's play. Try working Friday and Saturday nights flipping burgers next to a university. See the kind of washroom mess those little rats can make when they're four times bigger and have access to 'last call'.
actor in Clerks? Nah.
"Have you ever wondered how much the average jizz-mopper makes per hour?"
"The jizz-mopper's job is to clean off the glass after each guy shoots a load. I don't know if you noticed, but cum leaves streaks if you don't clean it right away."
If you do what you always did, you get what you always got.
Well it was part of my job description, it paid really well and it was quite easy. The trick is not to be a mopper but rather a high powered hoser.
Just get a presure washer and spray away, then that stuff don't streak.
I just want to know then, where the IT managers that work for a waste collection agencies fall in the grand scheme of things...
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
I don't know about IT Management, specifically, but each of those would make good metaphors for most of IT work...
At least in those more normal jobs, you don't normally get:
- Upper management interrupting you regularly to complain that the dirt you're shoveling isn't the preferred brand of dirt [and it then turns out the that "preferred brand" is "used kitty-litter" because someone read about how wonderful "used kitty-litter" is in some magazine]
- A bathroom patron showing up and pitching a fit because you cleaned a spot that they wanted left in there.
- Someone complaining that you're making the burgers too hot, until upper management makes you cook at a lower temperature, at which point the complaining switches to "this is taking too long, hurry up", so upper management makes you take less time to cook it but still at the lower temperature, and then the complaint is "hey, how did I get this foodborne virus, don't you people cook this stuff enough?...", nor put up with snide comments from Certified Burger Technicians about chicken being a "niche player" or being derided as a "zealot"
...
- After moving the boxes, having to tape them together in various ways, and then having people complain about all the tape being visible, so you end up having to tie up the tape between the boxes into bundles and arrange them neatly, at which point someone decides they liked the boxes over THERE better after all, so you have to cut all the tape loose and start over...
Not to mention not having to keep up with 3 or 4 different dirt-shovelling, toilet-cleaning, burger-flipping, or box-moving magazines, pay someone to "certify" you in dirt-shovelling, toilet-cleaning, burger-flipping, or box-moving. Nor having someone deny you a job because you don't have a Master's degree in "Dirt-shovelling Science" or a B.S. in "Toiletry Studies" or 5 years of experience with Burger technology that's only been around for two years...If/when you can get into IT jobs, the pay is usually okay, but just because it doesn't seem as demeaning or dehumanizing as boring old honest labor doesn't mean it's easy...
Hacker Public Radio is our Friend
2) I suppose that working in a climate controlled environment (chilled server room with fans/noise all the time) is good if you live in the tropics. Most IT guys end up shoved into a corner of the server room with a bundle of CAT5 running right overhead and a shelf of backup tapes right behind the pile of old PC carcases on the floor.
*sigh* You lucky bastard. They make me work in a normal office. Just because you get to work in Heaven, you don't need to taunt the rest of us...
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
He may work in heaven, but the commute is a killer.
"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"
glad you're going into a low stress job like law ... short hours, nice people, friendly co-workers and almost zero stress!
"Teachers leave us kids alone
Perhaps its time you cleaned up your server room. I found six Suns the other week in a rack I'd forgotted existed behind piles of cardboard Dell boxes. Of course, now that I've thrown the boxes away, I remember why I piled them up in the first place. They made good sound insulation for all the noisy fans in those Suns.
Now if you think that having a deep fryer which sends SNMP traps is cool, then you'd love being an IT manager.
I'd have a personalized plate on my car, but "toxic bachelor" won't fit into 7 letters.