IT/Software career thread: Invert binary trees for dollars.

Nirgon · May 17, 2023

Mist said:
Because putting up with bullshit for any length of time is a skill.

Do you know what kind of employees you get at 45-60k these days? People who don't even show up.

The "everyone else but me should be paid less" people are the fucking worst. Nearly everyone at any corporation is underpaid. If someone else could do that job for cheaper, they would have gotten someone else or automated it already.

I score you points all over this one.

So it's the putting up with crap aspect?

Id say fearing for your job over matters largely out of your control is very stressful.

But where does the rubber hit the road? People won't do it for less? I know for a fact any time we posted a mid or entry level dev position at any job we got a stack of like 400 resumes within 2 days (and I didn't work for FAANG etc either). So I imagine a "soft skill" based position would get loads more applications.

Definitely tons of phone it in types, so true. It can be a huge demoralizer to anyone in the work force, unavoidable and hard to tell them apart simply given resumes and interviews without dealing with them for a few months.

I'm still stuck why this pays double or more what your entry level call center IT person gets. Those people tangibly produce and there's obvious results in at least getting another person to answer the phone, make tickets and knock out the gimmies.

These people are rarely subject matter experts (if u can't code you better be as far as I'm concerned), don't answer a phone and just rely on senior/lead level people to tell them priority which they then make official by changing a color or ranking # on some ticket.

I went a little further since my last post and read that they are tasked with "eliminating obstacles". The only obstacles I can think of in tech are like some kind of nasty, interconnected asynchronous issue that rarely occurs and usually can't be reproduced, some goofy unit test hackery or on the non technical end getting a license renewed for software we need which any of us can do in a few minutes if authorized.

They just seem to be neither a business logic expert or a technical expert so how the hell can they remove obstacles? An obstacle would be something we can't do...

Id do the job for the price tag they're offering if it wasn't for the fact I'd be mostly finding ways to pretend I am important in some way most of the time. I guess that's a good trade off for the crunch hours. I just can't bring myself to be "pretend useful", too morally appalling to me.

Anyone got any experience with one of these types that really made a difference? I remember reading some of the useful idiot stuff here, and it came to the same conclusions that I have. I just don't understand what meets that 120k price tag for this position? You can get another pretty experienced developer for this kind of $.

Mist · May 17, 2023

Nirgon said:
I went a little further since my last post and read that they are tasked with "eliminating obstacles". The only obstacles I can think of in tech are like some kind of nasty, interconnected asynchronous issue that rarely occurs and usually can't be reproduced, some goofy unit test hackery or on the non technical end getting a license renewed for software we need which any of us can do in a few minutes if authorized.

The biggest obstacles are budgets, politics, territorial disputes, ownership, accountability, responsibility, etc.

Us engineers constantly tend to think solely in the technical sense and never in any of the other dimensions.

For instance, there are dozens of ways I could improve efficiency, resiliency, and redundancy for each of my clients right now, that would allow us to meet their uptime SLAs better and probably save money in the long term. But all of those things would require billable hours or resources that have real $ expenses, and figuring out who is going to eat that cost, whether the client or one of our teams internally, is a mess outside of my control. Further, for everything that gets built, someone is responsible for supporting it forever. So before you build something, you need to figure out who will be responsible for it.

Finding people who are responsible and accountable, and understand the responsibilities of others, and aren't just going to leave a position in 3-6 months after it gets stressful, costs money. You are going to get someone with less accountability than a McDonalds employee for 45-60k.

Nirgon · May 17, 2023

Okay so retention is another reason for the higher pay. I guess this helps but still mindblowing from a standpoint of being able to hire another experienced dev who will produce tangible results.

Mist · May 17, 2023

Nirgon said:
Okay so retention is another reason for the higher pay. I guess this helps but still mindblowing from a standpoint of being able to hire another experienced dev who will produce tangible results.

All the 'results' that devs produce becomes someone else's headache someday.

Nirgon · May 17, 2023

And becoming a certified scrum master is a.... 2 day course (if you neckbeard it)? This can't be right.

Control · May 17, 2023

Nirgon said:
Okay so retention is another reason for the higher pay. I guess this helps but still mindblowing from a standpoint of being able to hire another experienced dev who will produce tangible results.

I'm not saying that any of the people actually in scrummaster roles are good or useful, but it's not hard to imagine the usefulness of one if they were good. What % of people do you think can communicate effectively with both developers and upper management (and be happy to do so)? Sure, it's just another layer of management, but sticking one of those people in between devs and other management should ideally keep them from having to deal with each other, which should make both sides happier and more productive.

Filling that spot with someone competent and giving them the control they need to actually be effective is the hard part, as always.

Mist · May 17, 2023

Nirgon said:
And becoming a certified scrum master is a.... 2 day course (if you neckbeard it)? This can't be right.

An ITIL cert is a 40 question vocab exam. A bunch of these certs are just stupid easy.

Mist · May 17, 2023

Control said:
I'm not saying that any of the people actually in scrummaster roles are good or useful, but it's not hard to imagine the usefulness of one if they were good. What % of people do you think can communicate effectively with both developers and upper management (and be happy to do so)? Sure, it's just another layer of management, but sticking one of those people in between devs and other management should ideally keep them from having to deal with each other, which should make both sides happier and more productive.

Filling that spot with someone competent and giving them the control they need to actually be effective is the hard part, as always.

Yeah, I've had it explained to me by people who are actually good at these roles, and then see it in action every day now. While 80% of PMs, scrum masters, XXX Delivery Managers, etc, suck at their jobs, the 20% who are good at their jobs are literal "human routers." Everyone who needs anything goes through them, and they always know who to reach out, and who to navigate around, in order to get things done.

The thing to realize when working in a corporation is that, for any given role, 40%-80% of the people in that role suck at their jobs. But the good people know who all the other good people are and know who to avoid.

Nirgon · May 17, 2023

So why am I griefing myself with code/code benders... if I can just be a "who you should talk to" interface and never work late, ever

Control · May 17, 2023

Nirgon said:
So why am I griefing myself with code/code benders... if I can just be a "who you should talk to" interface and never work late, ever

Because that sounds like hell on earth for most developers. If it doesn't, start climbing that management ladder.

Conefed · May 17, 2023

Get call from department for help with computer
Wait at mantrap behind locked doors, no one comes to get me.
message them on the app, they're not even logged in. email tagged as away.
I leave the area and walk around to the unlocked side, get their attention tell them I need access and escort.
Return to mantrap and wait longer than I should.
they finally come.

They complain about how long I took;
I literally walked over directly after the initial call (call btw, not ticket submission)

Get to computer in question. Wasn't the issue they said, account based.
All three department leaders were there, supervisor, manager, director. None took claim of setting up the account. perhaps it wasn't created?

Anyway, back to my office to check.

Sometimes accounts are cloned to save time, this one was nested under an account instead so it was linked to the account it was cloned from, instead of linked to the server.
I moved it out. Also the naming convention was incorrect.

I call to let them know it's fixed and tell them about the naming convention, they cut me off and said they figured it out without my help.

literally impossible. but not worth arguing.

Mist · May 17, 2023

Conefed said:
Get call from department for help with computer
Wait at mantrap behind locked doors, no one comes to get me.
message them on the app, they're not even logged in. email tagged as away.
I leave the area and walk around to the unlocked side, get their attention tell them I need access and escort.
Return to mantrap and wait longer than I should.
they finally come.

They complain about how long I took;
I literally walked over directly after the initial call (call btw, not ticket submission)

Get to computer in question. Wasn't the issue they said, account based.
All three department leaders were there, supervisor, manager, director. None took claim of setting up the account. perhaps it wasn't created?

Anyway, back to my office to check.

Sometimes accounts are cloned to save time, this one was nested under an account instead so it was linked to the account it was cloned from, instead of linked to the server.
I moved it out. Also the naming convention was incorrect.

I call to let them know it's fixed and tell them about the naming convention, they cut me off and said they figured it out without my help.

literally impossible. but not worth arguing.

Everything about this screams IT out of the early 2000s what the fuck.

Ya'll never heard of powershell and automation? It should not be possible to fuck this up.

Mist · May 17, 2023

Nirgon said:
So why am I griefing myself with code/code benders... if I can just be a "who you should talk to" interface and never work late, ever

I think you would quickly find out that the "who you should talk to" interface people are actually the most "always on" people, especially when you have a company that spans timezones/follows-the-sun.

But yes, as you get older, you should absolutely be gaining more soft-skills, political maneuvering ability, and corporate-structure navigational skills.

Purely technical people get laid off as soon as they are too old to tech.

Phazael · May 18, 2023

Mist said:
Everything about this screams IT out of the early 2000s what the fuck.

Ya'll never heard of powershell and automation? It should not be possible to fuck this up.

This bring back any memories?

Also you would probably be amazed at how many international companies suck at automating even basic shit. Or maybe not, if you are jaded enough I guess. I work for a company with international presence and our Identity Management is the biggest bunch of African American Engineering MacGuyver shit I have ever seen in my life. And oh yeah, I am the entire T3 help desk for all of USA and they still think me coming into the office so I can drive 90 minutes one way and get fucking bothered by in office c-suite Karens all day is going to somehow improve my work output.

This is also why middle management is terrified of WFH. They have not adapted at all in decades, only hobbled progress to keep their worthless asses collecting a paycheck.

Mist · May 18, 2023

Phazael said:
This bring back any memories?

I don't need memories.

I work in telecom. Even the brand new fanciest cloud phone bullshit eventually connects to some shit that was made when Bill Clinton was still getting taxpayer-funded blowjobs.

Big Phoenix · May 19, 2023

Conefed said:
Get call from department for help with computer
Wait at mantrap behind locked doors, no one comes to get me.
message them on the app, they're not even logged in. email tagged as away.
I leave the area and walk around to the unlocked side, get their attention tell them I need access and escort.
Return to mantrap and wait longer than I should.
they finally come.

They complain about how long I took;
I literally walked over directly after the initial call (call btw, not ticket submission)

Get to computer in question. Wasn't the issue they said, account based.
All three department leaders were there, supervisor, manager, director. None took claim of setting up the account. perhaps it wasn't created?

Anyway, back to my office to check.

Sometimes accounts are cloned to save time, this one was nested under an account instead so it was linked to the account it was cloned from, instead of linked to the server.
I moved it out. Also the naming convention was incorrect.

I call to let them know it's fixed and tell them about the naming convention, they cut me off and said they figured it out without my help.

literally impossible. but not worth arguing.

The feels.

Wednesday one of our security cameras was down. No signal, but was getting power and showing as connected at the actual camera itself. Since this isnt a system I have access to I email the company that manages it.

Tell the guy the name of the camera but he says he needs the mac address of the camera to diagnose the problem. Mac is on the underside of the camera thats mounted to the ceiling.

Ok, go down to maintenance and get a ladder. Make my way down to the camera, get it unscrewed and get the mac

15 minutes later get back to my computer with the mac to see an email from the guy saying he found the camera and got the camera up.

Khane · May 19, 2023

Scrum master is not a job. It's a minor role easily fulfilled by your lead devs. If you think scrum master is an actual full time position I have a bridge to sell you

Mist · May 19, 2023

Khane said:
Scrum master is not a job. It's a minor role easily fulfilled by your lead devs. If you think scrum master is an actual full time position I have a bridge to sell you

Is it a Webex bridge? Because I don't know how they sell that shit either.

Conefed · May 20, 2023

Hired on as 9-5, rarely weekends
24hr facility but enough redundancy that can catch up anything in the mornings

Wrong, underestimated nighttime tech help needs, so this week noon to 8.

Still not good enough, today and tomorrow want me 4-midnight, tomorrow being Saturday so also cancel morning gig that would've been an easy 100$ and the evening event of my friend's wedding.

8 pm boss thanked me for staying late and offered to buy me dinner.
Shift so far has been way less hectic than mornings. So much so that I start working on near zero priority tasks such as create training documents for processes.

Food arrives, I leave office to wash hands. Another department head exclaims, IT! Great! I thought you all left for the night, we've been down almost an hour and are losing money come quick. Preferring to instead remote in over dinner I asked for the device name (no ticket for this issue had been created btw). It's not the computer, but the printer they said. They tried everything (they said) but couldn't get rid of error message.

I'm lead to ops manager, the one who asked the other guy who got me. We get stopped four times by patrons along way and I hang while they're fixed.

Ops manager asks me for key to get into device. I don't have keys, don't have clearance for keys. I contact my boss who said the very dude I'm talking with is the one.

We talk with several heads who all point in different directions and ultimately learn it's manager b who unlocks the room and manager c who unlocks the device, all of which must be escorted by security. Four of us... All taken away from our busy duties. For paper. The printer was out of paper. Special paper that's locked elsewhere, but I held tight incase paper wasn't the issue (these printers suck, I've worked with several already and solution isn't always the same.)

This time it was just paper.

Rewashed hands, debriefed the VP I had to get involved to cut through earlier key noise, while he didn't know the answer he was able to get manager c involved which was an ordeal not mentioned.

He responded with, my shift ends in three minutes head out early before somebody else grabs me.

Midnight. Went from 8:30-9pm to midnight.. for nothing, nothing that needed me, truly.

Mist · May 21, 2023

Conefed said:
Hired on as 9-5, rarely weekends
24hr facility but enough redundancy that can catch up anything in the mornings

Wrong, underestimated nighttime tech help needs, so this week noon to 8.

Still not good enough, today and tomorrow want me 4-midnight, tomorrow being Saturday so also cancel morning gig that would've been an easy 100$ and the evening event of my friend's wedding.

8 pm boss thanks me for staying late and others to buy me dinner.
Shift so far has been way less hectic than mornings. So much so that I start working on near zero priority tasks such as create training documents for processes.

Food arrives, I leave office to wash hands. Another department head exclaims, IT! Great! I thought you all left for the night, we've been down almost an hour and are losing money come quick. Preferring to instead remote in over dinner I asked for the device name (no ticket for this issue had been created btw). It's not the computer, but the printer they said. They tried everything (they said) but couldn't get rid of error message.

I'm lead to ops manager, the one who asked the other guy who got me. We get stopped four times by patrons along way and I hang while they're fixed.

Ops manager asks me for key to get into device. I don't have keys, don't have clearance for keys. I contact my boss who said the very dude I'm talking with is the one.

We talk with several heads who all point in different directions and ultimately learn it's manager b who unlocks the room and manager c who unlocks the device, all of which must be escorted by security. Four of us... All taken away from our busy duties. For paper. The printer was out of paper. Special paper that's locked elsewhere, but I held tight incase paper wasn't the issue (these printers suck, I've worked with several already and solution isn't always the same.)

This time it was just paper.

Rewashed hands, debriefed the VP I had to get involved to cut through earlier key noise, while he didn't know the answer he was able to get manager c involved which was an ordeal not mentioned.

He responded with, my shift ends in three minutes head out early before somebody else grabs me.

Midnight. Went from 8:30-9pm to midnight.. for nothing, nothing that needed me, truly.

These stories make it sound like you don't work for an organization with its shit together.

Get out.

Generally speaking, if your company feels more like a dysfunctional cult that does things for ritualistic+loyalty reasons rather than practical ones, get out.

IT/Software career thread: Invert binary trees for dollars.

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