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.?
So, careers involving handling sewage, manure or garbage are actually BETTER than being an IT manager?
I heard a guy on the radio once who's job was to clean the cages of monkeys used in virus research. Get all the shit-flinging benefits of the insane asylum plus the chance of getting some rare, highly lethal disease. All this can be yours for $9.70/hr.
As a former manager in IT, I found that I was being trained to lie. Just like Scotty - Never tell them the truth!
Budget::
Them - cut your budget as much as possible.
New Manager - cuts as required.
Seasoned Manager - cuts Half or Less than what is required.
Them - cut your budget more.
New Manager - cant do that I already did.
Seasoned Manager - cuts Half of Less of what remaines that can be cut.
Them - cut your budget again.
Former new manager - I need a job, My position was cut.
Seasoned Manager - cuts Half or less of what still remains to be cut.
Lesson Learned? Dont cut it all at once.
Time Management::
Them - How much time is required?
New Manager - 2 weeks. (2xactual required)
Seasoned Manager - 2 months. (8x actual required
Them - We need it in half that time.
New Manager - Ends up working nights and weekends but demands cut in requirements.
Seasoned Manager - Resigns to half time but demands cut in requirements.
Them - We need these new requirements but it can be done with an additional 1/4 original time.
New Manager - What are you nuts?
Seasoned Manager - We can do it but it will be a miracle.
Them - Congratulations project is complete on schedule.
New Manager - standard pay check. Was done in 75% time estimate. (1.5wk)
Seasoned Manager - BONUS. completed in record time. (75% time estimate =6wk)
Lesson - lie about time to complete.
was my first job: cleaning out the incinerator at an animal disease laboratory...sometimes they shut off the gas before the rabid dog carcasses were completely burnt. After that, even my job as an operator at the student services counter for my university's computer center seemed like a real move up in the world. How many days a week can you constantly deal with the software problems of people who should never have been given anything more complicated than a bottle of beer and still think you have a great job?
SLASHDOT: news for people who can't concentrate on work or have no life at all and got tired of yelling back at the TV.
Yeah.. as a server jockey it ain't fun.. but then I look at my manager.. making decent money.. having to put up with demanding executives with unrealistic time frames and demands... I can understand why he is disinterested in my career.. my needs.. he's resigned to just doing his job.. getting the freaking work done any way possible.
I understand this now after 3 or 4 years of wondering why no one listens... it's cause and effect.. someone somewhere is here for a little time and wants their piece of the world to shine.. enter the shining monkey (the manager) and his shining monkey team (the IT folks).
Don't delude yourself that another job would be any different. What it comes down to is that jobs in North America suck when it comes to considering quality of life. Other countries have it better in personal respects.. but wealth is less of a concern there. Which makes you wonder why more billionaires than ever are coming out of North America... someone has it right!
(1st sig) If this were a snappy sig, you'd be reading it right now. (2nd sig) I'm a karma whore. >Insert FUD here
All depends on the size of the company and the size of the IT dept.
My boss keeps complaining that he's the highest paid laptop administrator in the Silicon Valley. Technically it's only me and him (and a part time contractor), and does more than his share of grunt work.
I've found that workers treat their IT staff according to how well they're treated by them. If you want to hide behind a nameless "tech support" system, then they'll blame you for everything that doesn't work. If you show them that you're working as hard as you can on the things you can control, they'll understand why you can't control the things you can't.
I don't agree with the premise either. I was an IT Manager, CIO's right hand man as it turns out, for a $1B/yr tier one automotive supplier. It was the greatest experience that I've ever had. I was the manager that understood the technologies, and took care of the people, while at the same time was setting the expectations and influencing the decision makers that I reported to. The best part was that I could extract and summarize time and cost requirements from the leadership, and lead my team to a solution that met all the requirements in a very participatory manner. Team moral was very high. Too bad that the company went chapter 11 and reduced the staff from 18 down to 5. It was very soon after that they the leadership figured that I wasn't really needed either. Now that I've got my masters degree, I'm looking to get back to a position like that again. I honestly feel like this is were I can provide the best value exchange both for myself and the team that I'm leading.
The last place I worked the president of the company came steaming down the hall and started screaming...I mean red-faced screaming...at the poor lady at the IT desk. In an exhibition of pure gonads, she calmly took his laptop and dumped it in her trash can. I was fully prepared to quit before I would fire her but he never said another word about it.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
None of the turn-key solution providers were local. To make matters worse, one management team member had heard that a potential competitor had a solution in place that was almost one-third of what I was suggesting. It was an impossible job to convince these people that the cash I was suggesting to be spent would be worthwhile.
I resisted what they were offering, but coded a report generator for them in access after which I resigned the job, telling my manager that my office environment had deteriorated so much to the point that it had become a "pioson" to ambitions of a young man like me.
Whenever viruses were lurking arround the web, I could hardly sleep - fearing that I would find chaos at the office. I could have got a heart attack!
In my expereince, clueleass managers, often owners or representatives of the owners are a very big pain. All they are interested in is the bottom line. The IT manager's job is not easy depending on the environment.
I do not believe that it is the third worst job as the report seems to suggest. There are nurses who MUST be prepared for death every day. In my present job as a day-trader, Linux is not supported, so I am still stuck with Windows, adding to my previously accumulated "stress".
One reason that I'm not in IT is beause of the people.
From all of us in IT, thank you.
;i believe this chap has a far worse job than any listed here... but you be the judge. er, moderator.
;treehead
"If any part Linux was stolen, then Windows was the biggest heist in history."
work for a company who's in perpetual "crunch mode" because of shoddy management, or malicious managers who take the attitude of "I own your ass", and a 100-hour work week is not uncommon
Absolutely true. And on top of that, forget about vacations.
I had HR sending threatening letters to me saying "you will lose your accumulated vacation time if it is not used up by Dec 31" - only to have the CEO, COO and CTO tell me my IT team could not use vacation for 2.5 years straight. They'd blow the money on tons of hardware deals (like stuff from Ascend, which we couldn't use, but they bought millions nonetheless because it came financed and for every $1 of Ascend gear, they got $1 of walking around money they could blow on more Ferraris, shockingly rich corporate headquarters that out-did the rich middle eastern embassy in the same building, etc.
Getting money for usable Cisco gear was impossible. They'd waive performance bonuses at us like candy - except the asshole CFO would sit on all our equipment requisitions for 30-45 days (on a three-month project that also had 30 days of lag from having to sneak equipment into countries because the CFO was also too cheap to pay import duties). Out of the gate, we realized we had no more than two work weeks for a project that normally would take no less than six months.
Oh, they always found money for their bonuses. Christmas usually meant new Ferarris in the parking lot. Nothing better to motivate the 100-hour workweek IT staff that controls your business than that.
"Vacations are for closers..." *sigh*
> And if I find the mother-f***er that gave the entire company my cell phone #, they are dead!!
what happens if you don't answer?
i mean. honestly, say you're out of range, or battery, or decide not to answer?
what happens after the night-in-question/w/e
my boss has my mobile number, but sometimes i can't get to the 'phone.
surely the same happens to you?
weddings, holidays, etc ?
http://milkshake.dexy.org
So why work extra hours if you're not getting paid for it and don't enjoy it?
.
Cuz if you don't, there are hundreds out there ready to take your job for less. May not be better than you at it, but the job market is seriously fucked enough that companies can demand more work for less money. It's called supply and demand. .
There are more tech-monkeys than there are jobs!
Can I get an eye poke?
Dog House Forum
IMO, the worst aspect of IT is the baseless politics. Everywhere are factions of people who think their tools are the best or that the latest fad is perfect for the new long-term project. No one seems to understand why all their fancy layers of abstraction are actually detrimental to resolving problems (J2EE enterprise beans for a teeny weeny website?). Oh, and we must use CVS for commercial software development...oops, now where did that symbolic link go...oh, now the high lords of software fashion will allow us to use Subversion...version 1.0...oh yippee just kill me now. God forbid we pay for VC after spending $150K for an enterprise web server.
And to have to try to manage all of this... No wonder I left.
-- "Makes Little Debbie look like a pile of puke!" - Moe Szyslak
I used to have 200K salary, 10 people under me and 2 mil / year budget. But I also had my ass chewed every day, blood pressure, divorce and lots of extra weight.
I found courage to quit and went back to coding. Today I work 40 hours a week, 10 months a year, do what I want and lost 50 pounds.
1. Like flipping burgers and writing a database application even fall into the same realm of compensation. You save them 300,000 they pay you 3,000.
2. Yeah right.
3. True
4. Try having a time-and-motion study carried out continously, by you. That is, every second of the day has to be "billable" to a person/department/organization and you have to log the time you spend loggin the time you spend logging the time.....Why? because you're too damn efficient. Your efforts aren't noticable because there's no downtime to fix. Hmmm...99.999(five 9s) uptime for the last 2 years...you're goofing off aren't you?
The worst part of being an IT manager is having a CIO that has an BCS and MBA and knew something about computers 10 years ago. (180 computer years).
MAN, I feel better.
I always enjoyed it, mostly because senior executives and department heads trust me to have their data safe.
Right now, I'm IT manager for a small artisanal paper mill, which is a really filthy place to work in the first place but the people are extremely nice.
So nice (the manager is delightfully cynical) that I don't mind when the boss asks me to help them make some hand-made paper, which involves putting on big boots, a thick apron (because you stand in a big puddle of water laced with paper pulp) and you pull out from a 500 liter vat of pulp a paper mold that weights about 30 kg, drain it on your shoes, then flip the whole heavy shebang without the slightest tremor or vibration, lest the extremely wet paper sheet falls downm with a really shitty sound (come to think of it, drained pulp must have the same consistency as wet shit - at least, it doesn't smell).
When you're done with a pile of about 40 sheets, you then have to run the pile through the 100 ton press, which has to be applied extremely gently (it takes about 5 minutes to have the press travel about 30 centimeters).
And finally, you take the sheets one by one and hang them to dry.
Two weeks ago today one of the sales force brings in his laptop on a sales meeting day, as previously arranged with me, but instead of giving it directly to me decides to get his mail instead. By the way, did I mention he was bringing it to me to clean the worms and trojans he had picked up from the illegal (in our company) internet connection he decided he had to put on it and use... Yes you guessed it he infected half the machines in the building... All were running McAfee and up to date, but they got it anyway. Once in the network came to a screaming halt with worms, trojans, viruses, spyware, addware, etc...
...so how do the Darwin awards work...
I think I also forgot to mention that particular Monday was day one for month end closing to start... and it also happens to have been year end too.
Those of you who know what the last two weeks were like for me, need no further explanation. Those of you who haven't yet experienced it, well I don't want to scare you. Did I mention yet that I am the only Canadian IT for my company and our 350 or so users... Well let me say that my daughter did the "Daddy, I love you, I thought I had forgotten what you looked like..." speach for me.
Well the best part is that I got hauled into HR last Friday afternoon at 3:45, just as I was about to go out for some lunch (four hours overdue without any breaks since 8 am). The head of HR then informs me that I am scaring the (L)users... the "L" is no longer silent when I think it. Yes you read it right, I am being hauled onto the carpet for scaring the users.
So I ask what is it I am doing that scares them? It turns out that after doing an inventory in the morning of the printing supplies and finding that one of my brain damaged users couldn't read the description on the box, or the labels on the shelf, or event the huge sign that says "If you don't know, ask!" They had opened most of the toner cartridge boxes, pulled the toners out of the bags, and removed the tapes to try them all in their printer... They then tossed the ones that didn't fit back in "a" box and randomly put them on the stock shelf. Before cleaning this up I spent a couple of minutes developing new strings of creative language to explain the origins of the unknown user, and possibly how they deserved to win a Darwin Award. Well I guess I was overheard.
When I get out of the HR office I decided to go home for the weekend... I have had enough and don't want to scare anyone...
So here I sit, tomorrow I return to work after the long weekend, today being Thanksgiving up here, and I am trying to think of how to respond to this unsettling news.
I would appreciate any comments you might suggest...
I have several lawyer friends. They live the death march every day, unless they work for themselves. Those that work for themselves don't make so much money, but they make their own hours. Those that work for law firms DON'T get to see the money they bill for. They work on salary. If they don't put in 70 hour weeks, they'll never make partner, or they'll just be let go sooner or later. None of them have made partner (at which point they'll stop associating with the likes of IT maggots like myself), but once they do they'll be so brainwashed that this behavior will seem normal, and they will perpetrate it on the next generation. Of my 3 lawyer friends, one has already quit to enter law enforcement. He'd rather carry a badge and be shot at than continue the law job.
Oh, and now I get to hang out with my sewer and trash collecting friends...
./.
No. Lawyers, like bankers, only *appear* to be working from 9 to 5. Law firms are allowed to demand that their employees work in excess of 100 hours a week without extra pay. There's actually a provision in the labour laws specifically for lawyers and doctors and a few other professions. A little while ago, some numbnuts tried to add IT/programming to that list too but failed. The article was on
What you're thinking of is a private practice, which is much like conslutting for IT guys. Nice work if you can get it.
"No problem. I have the capacity to do infinite work so long as you don't mind that my quality approaches zero."-Dilbert
The thing about being a real manager is that you are suppossed to be in control.
I know a lot of supervisor/admin jobs have "Manager" in the title but actually have nothing to do with management - perhaps these are the guys who are whinging?
However as far as real IT managers are concerned. You are in charge, you make the decisions, you manage your bosses expectations. If your workplace is shitty then its your own fault!
Do something about it or leave!
Old COBOL programmers never die. They just code in C.
I've witnessed this phenomenon myself as a neurodiverse tech employee with fellow neurodiverse coworkers; there was an abnormally high incidence of left-handedness in that department, not to mention ADD, Asperger's Syndrome, and who knows what other interesting "diasabilities" and "disorders". Of course, it was the POSITIVE aspects of those disorders that let them excel at what they were asked to do... most of the time. The company's solution to the relatively minor challenges was to hire a former high school teacher as the department manager! Not surprisingly, he tried to manage the department's employees just as though they were a bunch of rowdy 15-year-olds, which never worked all that well.
- Be proactive about your own PR. If you've done something well, let people know. Think that is being arrogant? Welcome to the World, baby.
- Higlight overpaid, underskilled consultants to your management. In my last two jobs, I've shown management that those highly paid consultants they hired were charlatans. It's really not that hard and everybody wins (except the consultants, of course). The company gets to save money by purging corporate parasites and you look good by dispelling these people who were sucking the business dry.
- Document their mistakes in writing and show this to your boss.
- But be reasonable. If you cry "charlatan!" at every little mistake, you just look petulant.
- Be confident. The idiots I dealt with at "Ass-centre" and "Toilet and Douche" talked the talk but were little more than glorified salesmen. It wasn't too hard to demonstrate that they lacked any skills other than salesmanship.
- Check their work as they produce it. There is nothing worse than finding out after you have paid $750 000 that the quality of work is appalling. However, if you say "this is a cock-up" all along, you can only look good when your prophesies come true (and 99% of the time you'd be right).
- Let it be known that their work is bad throughout the company in kitchen chats (only, if of course, it really is bad). This kinda news spreads like a virus. Do you think this is Machiavelian? It probably is. But they are going to screw you over - afterall, it will be you maintaining their abortion after they have taken the money and run. So either shut up and take the pain later or do something about it now.
- Don't think other professions are hugely different. Over here, Doctors get paid crap and work much harder than I do and in much worse conditions.
- Outline your objections to your boss. If you think you deserve overtime, ask for it. If they refuse, refuse to do the work. If you lack the spine to stand up for your rights, tough. I can't help you. If they give your job to somebody else, good for them. Now move on.
Bottom line: IT people need to realize that they have to play the political game just like everybody else. We are not so high and mighty that we are above it.A much-loved IT manager at my present company sent around an email to everyone that basically said: "We've upgraded the whole network and the fact that nobody noticed is a sign of how well we did our job". Brilliant. He was 100% accurate but wasn't going to let an amazing piece of work go unnoticed.
Tips to do this are:
--- "We've always been at war with Eastasia."
You're mainly sat down all day, rather than stood up
You work 8 hours rather than 12-16 hours
You work days rather than nights
You're inside in a nice cosy office, rather than in a filthy factory or in the cold wind and rain
You don't have to shovel shit, the most you have to do is type or write
You get a decent wage rather than minimum
You don't have to obligatorily work every weekend
You get to go on the Internet/play games whilst you should be working
Next to no risk of being injured like you would on a building site
You don't come home covered in oil/paint/rubber/shit that doesn't wash out
Company car
You don't get a bad back after a few weeks in the job
You're doing mentally stimulating work, rather than brainless production-line work
You get comfortable shoes rather than rock-hard boots
When you need a piss you can go for one, rather than waiting 3 hours for your next break (because someone has to fill in for you whilst you're gone)
You don't risk slipping over in oil, being run over by a fork-lift, and you don't have to crawl into 3-foot-high crawl-spaces inside sweltering pitch-black ovens to clean them of all the dust and soot (which gets in your eyes and in your lungs)
Comparing a manual-labour job to an IT manager job makes the IT manager look pretty well off. Also, there's this observation:
More people complain about being an IT manager on here because IT managers get to spend time at the computer reading slashdot. Manual labourers don't have time in the day to sit about bitching on the Internet.