On-call unhappiness
Apr. 4th, 2005 07:12 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mattlistenerI just got added to the Systems on-call rotation. An anticipated eventual side-effect of my going full-time, this entails a week of responding to automated pages for production systems any hour of the day, plus being the default person responsible for work that has to be done off-hours (ie reboots, server moves, baby-sitting planned power outs, etc). There's currently 10 people in the rotation, so it's 1 week on, 9 weeks off.
There is no additional compensation for on-call. There *was* a stipend for the first few years I was there, and then a big to-do when it was taken away. One engineer left over it, and I suspect a couple others who left later started looking then. The notion of compensation for on-call is now a political dead-end. They do at least give comp-time in exchange for off-hours work.
I know a lot of IT support folks have on-call as a normal part of life. Myself, I've never done IT on-call before. There's a lot that I know, from working 7 years there, but there's a lot that I don't know since I never got involved in the engineering side or off-hours stuff. I anticipate using the week before my first shift to do a whole bunch of research and talking to experienced on-call people, so I have the best chance of putting issues to rest quickly.
I do have prior experience with on-call in another form. When I figured out I wanted to study Client-Centered Therapy, my highest priority was working out where to learn it. That emerged to be the course in Scotland, but wasn't going to start for another 6 months. So I asked myself, what can I do *now* to start exploring this passion? That led me to the Anti-Violence Project, a suicide/rape/hate-crime/domestic-violence hotline for the Chicago area queer community. I did the training, signed up for four 12-hours shifts per month (8pm-8am), and started carrying the pager. Callers get an answering service who take the fundamentals, go straight to 911 if warranted, and otherwise page the AVP on-call person. My job was #1 listen empathically, #2 offer relevant information where needed, #3 refer. I can handle that!
It was awful, but it took me a few months to realize that it was awful. The calls went ok -- I took something like 3 calls in 11 shifts. But the time between calls I couldn't get anything productive or satisfying done. I wasn't consciously occupied with being on-call, but I eventually realized that I wasn't making any plans those evenings, and consistently spending them wasting time and stressed out.
Maybe IT on-call will be easier on my head since it'll just be servers and revenue on the line rather than the real danger of bodily harm.
My first shift starts May 20th.
There is no additional compensation for on-call. There *was* a stipend for the first few years I was there, and then a big to-do when it was taken away. One engineer left over it, and I suspect a couple others who left later started looking then. The notion of compensation for on-call is now a political dead-end. They do at least give comp-time in exchange for off-hours work.
I know a lot of IT support folks have on-call as a normal part of life. Myself, I've never done IT on-call before. There's a lot that I know, from working 7 years there, but there's a lot that I don't know since I never got involved in the engineering side or off-hours stuff. I anticipate using the week before my first shift to do a whole bunch of research and talking to experienced on-call people, so I have the best chance of putting issues to rest quickly.
I do have prior experience with on-call in another form. When I figured out I wanted to study Client-Centered Therapy, my highest priority was working out where to learn it. That emerged to be the course in Scotland, but wasn't going to start for another 6 months. So I asked myself, what can I do *now* to start exploring this passion? That led me to the Anti-Violence Project, a suicide/rape/hate-crime/domestic-violence hotline for the Chicago area queer community. I did the training, signed up for four 12-hours shifts per month (8pm-8am), and started carrying the pager. Callers get an answering service who take the fundamentals, go straight to 911 if warranted, and otherwise page the AVP on-call person. My job was #1 listen empathically, #2 offer relevant information where needed, #3 refer. I can handle that!
It was awful, but it took me a few months to realize that it was awful. The calls went ok -- I took something like 3 calls in 11 shifts. But the time between calls I couldn't get anything productive or satisfying done. I wasn't consciously occupied with being on-call, but I eventually realized that I wasn't making any plans those evenings, and consistently spending them wasting time and stressed out.
Maybe IT on-call will be easier on my head since it'll just be servers and revenue on the line rather than the real danger of bodily harm.
My first shift starts May 20th.
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no subject
Date: 2005-04-05 01:08 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-04-05 05:01 am (UTC)By then I plan to have a plan in mind for what I would do if I were to quit entirely. Once I'm secure in that I'll be comfortable to dictate terms.
no subject
Date: 2005-04-05 01:16 am (UTC)There's a bizarre irony in how you don't want to be working full-time, but they won't let you out of it, whereas I know a few people who want to work full-time and can't find a job.
no subject
Date: 2005-04-05 05:06 am (UTC)I was actually quite lucky to have that part-time situation for so long. I dropped into Boston right in the beginning of the .com boom and the y2k brain-drain. It was "You know unix and scripting? You're hired!" Now we're passing over people with 10 years' experience who are highly buzzword-enabled.