What exactly do you do?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

I’m a teacher. Everyone knows what I do. (And I’m fortunate that most people are experts on what I do and how I should do it.)

I know what plumbers do.

I know what firefighters do.

I know what police officers do.

I know what electricians, roofers, cooks, waitresses, and writers do.

But you…you in the office. In the cubicle. In the private office. In the management position. In the…uh…nonmanagement position. You wear a white shirt and a tie. You go to a lot of meetings. You talk on the phone. But…what exactly do you do?

Tell me every detail :slight_smile:

2

Damnit, I’m out.

3

Obviously many of us post on SDMB.

4

I’m a manager. I don’t wear a tie, though, 'cause I’m a chick-type manager. I…manage.
I make sure my staff is doing their jobs correctly.
I answer questions about what they should do about unusual situations.
I handle inter-personal disputes between members of my staff.
I do performance reviews, coaching and counceling, and dole out praise as often as I can.
I make sure they submit their time correctly for payroll.
I vet requests for my department’s services to make sure they are appropriate services for us to provide and that we have enough information and systems rights to do the request.
I train people sometimes.
I coordinate with other managers regarding functions which cross department boundaries. I put out figurative forest-fires when something goes wrong.
I escalate to upper management when something seems too big or political for me to handle.
I make sure my department’s documentation is up to snuff.
I make sure my department is meeting SLA (Service Level Agreements) on the services we perform.
I deal with technical issues and people issues and political issues…

5

I go daily to the private FTP and/or websites run by NPR and Public Radio International, and download a series of sound files of promotional ads for the next day’s, or upcoming weekend’s programming. I open them up in an audio editor, convert them to mono (one channel), fix the playback level so that the peaks do not run over -6 dB, and edit the length to :29.2. From another directory, I copy and paste the “tag”, that is, the announcer saying the day and time of the program, over the music fade on the promo.

When these are all done, I FTP the finished promos to the automation system. Then I log into that, and enter all the promos into the playlist, entering when and what time they can start and stop playing, and when the system can erase them. Sometimes, I assemble promos from programs that have no promos. That’s always fun, to make something out of nothing, and have it come out to :29.2 as well.

At least one day a week, I go into the studio and record the next week’s underwriting announcements. Advertising is prohibited in public radio; underwriting is our equivalent of commercials. We are strictly regulated in what we can say, and how we say it. I take that sound file, edit out all the times I flubbed the cadenza, remove any extraneous noises like mouth clicks, tighten up the editing, and then repeat the procedure for entering the finished underwriters into the automation system. That’s what I was doing when I took a break and saw this thread.

I record interviews for the news department and the classical station. Other personnel take care of those, I just set up the microphones and hit the start button. Occasionally, I record long form programs. If music is involved, I master it before it goes into the program. That involves fixing of levels, and using compression / limiting or maybe reverb, and tidying up the intro and close. Once in awhile, I am called upon to redo someone’s less-than-skilled editing so that no one can tell - except the person who did the bad editing, and me.

The only live radio I engineer is during our spring and fall fundraising drives. I sit at the board for between four and six hours, and try to prevent people who can’t read a clock or take a cue, from either stopping 40 seconds early, or from getting cut off by automation if they ran too long.

The rest of my time is taken up by going through the daily automation logs, to make sure everything goes off as it’s supposed to, adding or deleting instructions and sound files as necessary. And I read the Dope.

6

I am a Quality Engineer.
I manage the ISO9000 Quality Management System for my company.
I audit our company and suppliers to ensure compliance with ISO9000 and planned arrangements.
I inspect product and I disposition non-conforming product. I find ways of continually improving the performance of the company by monitoring Key Performance Indicators and providing guidance on under performance.
I visit the SDMB way too often and am now really envious of fishbicycle.

(BTW I love US Public Radio. It was my introduction to Car Talk.)

7

Wow! This so cool. I’m not interested in working in radio, but, being a radio addict, I’m always interested in how it all works. I’ve always wondered how difficult it is to edit audio. If I’m reading this correctly, the files end up on a computer? Does that make it easier? (I hope I’m not simplifying this too much.) It seems that in the days before computers, this must have been quite a task.

You should do one of those “ask the…” posts.

8

Okay, let’s see. I go to an office every day. I’m kind of in a cubicle, in that there’s a temporary partition wall seperating my desk from the walkway next to it, and a partition semi-wall seperating my desk from that of the woman across from me, (so that we can sit up and talk when we want to, and also have a little privacy when we’re both working hard.) I’m definitely not in a management position.

I’m an internal developer/ ‘all purpose database guy.’

So what do I really do? Well… I design, write, troubleshoot, and test programs used by people in my company. Some of them are interactive website applications, and some are little windows programs that get installed onto the user’s hard drive.

Also, sometimes I do the above stuff for customers that are paying my employers for whatever I do, or for their partner corporations in exchange fof later favors.

I also work a lot with our company’s dedicated database servers… trying to find new ways of organizing information that our programs can work with, responding to requests for information from managers and other professionals. And I do some ‘database admin’ work, which is working with the database software settings, the backup processes, the way it talks with the network etcetera… basically trying to keep it ‘tuned up at perfect performance level’ - in co-operation with the company sysadmin

Any questions??

9

It really is cool! Other people have to work for a living.

Editing can be done by anyone, witness the number of people I’ve seen learn it from scratch. Doing good, or even great, editing takes many years of practice. It’s much easier now, as sound is recorded on a PC as a .wav file (or .aiff on a Mac). You never have to mix two or more sound elements together at the same time, from separate machines routed through a mixer, and try to get it right. You can do perfect crossfades timed down to the frame, on the computer. Plus, you can see a representation of the waveform on the screen, so you can tell what you’re looking at.

Back in the old days, prior to 2002, we used magnetic tape, an editing block, a grease pencil, a razor blade and sticky tape. If you listen to old records, you will hear some of the best cutting and splicing ever done (as well as many examples of the worst). All of those edits were done on tape with a razor blade. On computers, you do not have to do several takes of an edit, you can mark the points you wish to remove, and hit Delete. The major benefit is, that if you got it wrong, there are multiple levels of Undo. Razor blades didn’t come with Undo.

Physically editing tape all day was an exacting, but exhausting job. Now we just tell everyone that we slave over a hot computer all day.

10

I run the Online Creative Services Department of the Australian arm of one of the global internet giants.

On any given day, I could be running brainstorms, coming up with game or promotion concepts, educating clients about what kind of creative works online, meeting with Business Unit heads to figure out how to monetise their properties, writing scripts for presentations, briefing creative agencies when we have too much work on, project managing site builds, arguing with sales people about integrity of the site, coding pages, creating databases, designing mocks and screenshots, calling winners to tell them they’ve won a competition, lecturing about the online environment in classes, and generally trying to push the boundaries of creativity and cleverness online.

My company also owns one a tv station and Magazine Publishing so often I am brainstorming with the “Me’s” from those sections about how we can work together.

I have a very small, but wonderful and quirky creative team who I adore. I absolutely love my job (in case you couldn’t have guessed). :slight_smile:

11

I’ve spent the day sorting through boxes of records from inherited from another management company and reorganizing them to match our system. They are very old records and the chances of anyone actually referring to them after I file them are very, very slim.

12

I’m an RN. Most of what you see on ER is done in RL by nurses, not doctors (but sometimes by residents)-and most certainly not in the ED. Also, unless it’s a code situation, nothing is done as fast as the folks on ER do it (or Scrubs, either). No, I have no interest in dating a doctor-I could have been a doctor myself. No, I am not a glorified secretary, a bitter lesbian or your best wet dream. I am a nurse.
I manage the care of the pt while s/he is in the hospital. I assess their condition regularly and report my finding (if any are significant) to the attending or the appropriate consult. I monitor vital signs, labwork, diagnostics, currents meds (I give these as well); once given, I assess for changes in status. I start IVs, put in catheters, put in nasogastric tubes, give enemas, clean up people, help them eat, help them breath, turn, dress, and walk. I teach them about their condition. I watch for signs of bleeding, infection, dehydration, infarction, inflammation, respiratory distress. I chart my findings and my assessments in the legal document that will protect my ass and show that I did indeed watch and assess that pt. I inform the doctor of changes–and if I dont’ get what I think is the appropriate response/order from him or her, I go up the chain of command–IOW, I advocate for my pts. I walk alot; I talk alot; I get tired. But what tires me most is the lack of understanding from laypeople as to just what nurses do…[/off soapbox now]

(sorry if that got kind of harsh-no offense meant to the OP. Good thread)

13

I think the OP knows all about my job.

14

I manage. And what an appropriate verb it is. Sometimes I only just manage. Sometimes I manage with aplomb.

What I manage is a little science centre. I manage everything about it. Today I’ve:

  • sold tickets, souvenirs and annual memberships
  • presented a planetarium show
  • presented a liquid nitrogen show
  • answered the phone, a lot. Common questions include opening hours and admission prices. I’m dreaming of an automated “press one to hear recorded information about…” system, but we haven’t any money for that
  • chatted with my boss, the CEO of the Trust that “funds” our centre (they pay me and 2 part timers, but that’s about it - the rest relies on our own earnings) about a grant application he’s writing
  • brainstormed a page of interesting lab-based programs for grade 5-6s, for said boss’ application
  • tweaked the roster (I am quite bad at this bit!)
  • hired someone (over the phone, to start tomorrow. Due to the abovementioned badness)
  • written a sucking up letter to a local hardware shop to solicit a donation to assist in our refurbishment
  • rung and organised carpet and lino quotes for said refurb
  • briefed our upstairs tenant, a graphic designer, to start working on the Planetarium’s new look and logo
  • made PA announcements all day, including my favourite one, the closing announcement. The question now is, why won’t they leave?! I get antsy when they won’t leave. I make ever more bitchy announcements. “The time is 4:45, and we are closed for the day. Please make your way to the exit.” (We close at 4:30)

Oh, and I wear a uniform, on days that I’ll be on the floor or presenting something. I have been known to wear a suit, but never a tie. Just doesn’t go well with my XX chromosomes.

15

I’m a municipal court magistrate. I hear cases in trial and decide what should happen - awarding judgments in civil cases if I find liability (up to $3K in small claims, and up to $15K on the regular civil docket), and sentencing criminal defendants to jail (up to 6 mos.), imposing fines (up to $1K), probation (up to 5 years) and/or community service (the sky’s the limit, although I’ve never imposed more than 200 hours) if I find them guilty. I also do legal research for our judges, review and rule upon motions, grant continuances, write longer decisions when necessary, handle garnishments and debtors exams, etc. I serve at the pleasure of the court, but none of my colleagues has been fired in living memory. All of my decisions are subject to the review and approval of the judges, which is given 98.3% of the time (more or less).

The bailiff says “All rise” and people actually do - that was a bit of a shock at first. I’ve been doing this for five years, ever since I left the county prosecutor’s office, and I enjoy it - it’s a good gig.

16

I’m a SAP Functional Specialist (QM/PP/PM/CS).

SAP is a big computer program which can be used to store pretty much any piece of data a business needs and manipulate it in an integrated fashion. Financial data, sales projections, warehouse stocks, lab test results, employee medical information. A company can choose which modules to install: for example, a bank will not need the “warehouse stocks” part but for a supermarket chain it would be essential.

The program has many options; installing it in a company isn’t just a matter of plopping a pile of CDs into every computer. You need to set up several central servers (at least one for testing and training, a second one for “real work”); you need to tell the program which options to use; sometimes, you need to create additional chunks of program; you need to prepare courses, prepare new procedures, and train everybody.

My part in all that is:

  • analyzing how the company works without SAP, what things they would love to do differently, what things they absolutely cannot change (maybe it’s a legal requirement).
  • match it up with the options available in SAP.
  • define what programs will be needed.
  • work with the programmers to make sure the new programs are as needed.
  • set up SAP’s options.
  • prepare courses.
  • prepare new procedures.
  • train people.

And I do it for the Quality (QM), Production (PP), Maintenance (PM) and Customer Service (CS) modules.

I have been doing this job for slightly over 5 years, which in this field is a veteran. Before that I was a Quality Lab Tech and a Researcher; this is very helpful because it helps me understand people’s worries.

17

I am a manager and and do legislative interpretation. They interweave.

18

I’m not cut out for this thread, because I’m right now looking for a job, and everyone knows all about that ball o’ wax.

19

I’m a Registrar. I registrate.

That is, I am the business manager in a relatively large (1000 student) primary school. I make sure the Teacher Aides, the Cleaners, the Groundstaff, the Crossing guards all get their jobs done, and if necessary, I go out and do those jobs on top of my own. On any given day, I may thrust my arm down to the shoulder in a an overflowing toliet, meet with the local member of parliament to smooth over some deal because the Principal is out of the school getting a french manicure, throw out a pair of junkies who are wandering around the playground, write a submission which will win a $800K school block refurbishment, cool out a staff member reduced to tears by stress, supervise up to 15 students who have been removed from classrooms, run a fire alarm and do my Christopher Walken impersonation over the PA (always a highlight), rustle up busses to move 200 students because the dim-wit teacher, overwhelmed by working a five hour day, forgot to book them for an excursion, fix a network crash and deal with “details” which is a eupehmism for finding the money, space, time and everything else for whatever brainfart-de-jour the Principal has decided will be out curriuculum direction.

I need to get another job. Apparently I am not alone - there are 21 vacant Registrar positions in our District alone!

mm

20

I’m a clerical worker. I cleri… um… cate?

I work in a school office within the university. I don’t do much for most of the year, I take in sick notes and record them, take minutes of student-staff meetings, maintain the school website and enrol new students. The enrolment will be a bit hectic, but will only take place once a year, everything else is a bit of a doss.

Hopefully the part time study I’m doing will leave me in a position to take a better (and busier!) job elsewhere.