Office Work Ethic In the IT Industry? 709
An anonymous reader writes "As a recent graduate entering industry for the first time at a large software and hardware company, I have been shocked at what seems to be a low standard of work ethic and professionalism at my place of employment, especially in this poor economy. For example, at my company, the large majority of developers seem to each individually waste — no exaggeration — hours of time on the clock every day talking about football, making personal phone calls, gossiping, taking long lunches, or browsing the Internet (including, yes, Slashdot!). Even some of our subcontractors waste time in this manner. Being the 'new guy,' I get stuck with much of the weekend and after-hours grunt work when we inevitably miss deadlines or produce poor code. I'm not in any position to go around telling others to use their time more efficiently. Management seems to tolerate it. I would like to ask Slashdot what methods others have used to deal with office environments such as this. Is my situation unique or is it common across the industry?"
Wait a few years... (Score:1, Informative)
Yes (Score:5, Informative)
Having worked in numerous fields (probably more than the IT workers who have thus far replied) I can say without a doubt that IT consists of the biggest bunch of slackers I've ever in my life seen. I enjoy it quite a bit, but I'm actually getting to a point where I'm starting to feel a little guilty. But only a little.
IT work can be theoretical (Score:5, Informative)
I love my job. I would do it even if I wouldn't receive financial compensation for it. One drawback is that you can't really work office hours with it, it's hard to switch off iterating a problem in the back of your mind (resulting in several House-esque moments of some totally unrelated thing reminding me to a neat concept that helps me implement an elegant solution).
I guess the point is, different people work differently. Yeah, if someone's browsing for porn or looking at bash.org, they are probably not doing anything useful, but taking a break or if someone looks like he's idling, it's not always the case that they are not doing anything productive.
Re:People aren't robots (Score:4, Informative)
Oh dear. 90% of the people reading this are probably at work.
Nerd Rage in 5... 4...
As a long time freelancer in IT ... (Score:5, Informative)
... and having worked in at least 12 different companies by now, i can tell you that:
a) It depends on the company - company culture, profit margins and the business the company are in all make for more or less hectic enviroments in the IT areas (and others).
b) It depends on the morale of the employees. Recessions actually mean that there are more unmotivated workers around since many which would otherwise left will stay put until "the storm passes".
c) It the depends on the point of the development cycle you are on. For all you know, a week before you joined people were over-stressed and working long hours to make a release and now they are in the decompression period before a new major project is started.
Also and to put it plainly: as a recent graduate you know nothing working in IT.
Let me break this too you now before you learn it the hard way:
Re:People aren't robots (Score:5, Informative)
The solutions to so many design problems pop into my head while I'm walking to get coffee or on my lunchbreak it's not funny.
Re:People aren't robots (Score:1, Informative)
Been there done that. Just working 40 hours a week with little or no breaks and got burnt out. You will understand when you get there yourself. We don't, as a general rule, learn from the mistakes of others.
Re:People aren't robots (Score:2, Informative)
Why is it that coders typically seem to have enormous egos when it comes to their work. Everybody works hard. There's nothing special about coding. My workday include tasks that are both physically and mentally taxing, I often juggle several tasks at once and am held to a very high standard of quality. Man up, buckle down and produce because you don't work in a vacuum.
Computer programs are about the most complex things we create as humans. Even smallish programs have tens of thousands of statements, each unique in its context. You do not state your job, but I doubt your quality requirements are as high and as unforgiving as those for code. If the syntax of a piece of code is wrong it will not compile. If there is some other error, this will likely show up during testing, or, worse, during deployment. I'm doing design document reviews all of the time, and I'm considered fairly strict. But the documents I pass are not nearly as complex and not nearly as error-free as code that passed even mediocre testing procedures. Have you ever written anything where a single misplaced semicolon can break the whole document in bad bad non-obvious ways? Or where every paragraph is manually cross-referenced with at least two more? That's is routine complexity for code...
Re:Not unique across industry. Actually S.O.P. (Score:3, Informative)
Peopleware (Score:3, Informative)
Read Peopleware by DeMarco and Lister, and then take another look at your workplace.
Re:Hang Gliding while being paid to write code... (Score:5, Informative)
If the person was a software engineer, or even a coder, he isn't in "IT". There is a reason why companies have an IT department, and then a completely seperate department called software engineeing. An IT guy needs to be in the building to help employees, repair and replace bad hardware, and do general system maintanence, etc. A software engineer , on the other hand, may well be working on the drive, and while actually hang gliding. This used to piss me off when I worked at a company where the management didn't get this: Just because I'm outside drinking a coffe and smoking a cigarette doesn't mean I'm not working! In fact, just because I'm sleeping, that doesn't mean I'm not working. I have woken many times with the solution to a problem I had been trying to solve for days clear in my mind, that bubbled up from my subconscious while in delta (dream state.)
If you think a true software developer should spend most of his time in front of a computer writing code, then it is you who has no idea what is involved in developing great software.
Re:This isn't 1999. (Score:3, Informative)
unless you're in a western country where there are laws specifically prohibiting this type of firing.
at the larger corporations i've worked at (read: the ones with deeper pockets), firing someone is about a 2-3 month ordeal even if it's an termination required offense (with the exception of breaking the law -- stealing, assault, etc). you have to have a written warning, followed by a 30 day period of being "on watch" followed by a final review. THEN an extra month while the legal team gathers and documents everything.
Why?
Lawsuits. Wrongful termination lawsuits, unless you as the company, can prove beyond the shadow of a doubt, that the person was unable to perform the job you hired them for (working weekends, especially if you can't prove that overtime was mentioned and being payed when the person was hired), the person you filed will win the lawsuit. Then you're a) out of a bunch of money and b) have to offer them their job with the same benefits and position as before. And you'd better be damn well sure about it next time you try to fire them.
Re:People aren't robots (Score:3, Informative)
Quite true.
My first "IT" job, during my Sophomore year, was a contract gig doing simple office installs across four floors.
The contract was for 4 weeks, a week each floor for both me and a fellow friend of mine.
By the end of the first week, we had completed 3 floors and that Friday, went to our supervisor to report we were way ahead of contract schedule.
His response was simple and eye opening-"Don't work yourself out of a job. It sets up a bad precedent that you might not be able to keep up with."
I'm all for working hard and good work ethic, but there isn't a point to showing yourself the door after you've nearly burned yourself out.
Re:Hang Gliding while being paid to write code... (Score:5, Informative)
Your definition of IT and most companies don't seem to jive. What I've seen is that at any company whose business isn't the production of software for others to use, everyone who does "computer stuff" is in IT. In our organization we have "techs", network admins, database admins, programmers, etc, and all of us fall under the umbrella of IT. Hell even our receptionists are in IT even though all they do is answer the phone. It's been the same way at 3 other companies I've worked for. The only exception I've seen is with working with outside vendors, but in that case since they're producing computer software as their business it wouldn't make sense (since in that case almost the whole company would be IT).
Re:Hang Gliding while being paid to write code... (Score:4, Informative)
Companies have shown they have no loyalty to employees.
You can work hard, invent new ideas, and then as the company is profitable, they lay you off and bring in a college grad.
The people that work hard and those that do not get very similar outcomes ( tho I do think hard workers who are "lucky" to fix a problem important to the right manager get better results- so it's a percentage game and part of how I got promoted ).
Most managers don't give a crap about their employees. Our manager went to christmas parties and held none for our staff (despite our recommendations as line supervisors starting weeks before).
Paperwork has reduced our productivity to about 8% of what it was in 2000. As long as your paper work is correct, there can be weeks where you have no new work to do unless you slow down and pace yourself.
I'd go to a smaller company, but the option there is 12 hour slave drive death days and then being told by a manager there is no money for raises and "what have you done for us lately anyway" as happened to a friend of mine.