Now that’s a reasonable goal, a lot more reasonable than killing yourself making lots of money so you can afford sports cars. I doubt there is any job in IT that is going to last for 20 years. I jumped fields twice in 35 years and things move faster now.
I bet you can do a lot more than you think you can do. I found that if you have a good skill set and find a place where others are good but no one has your specialty - but they need it - you may never take over the place, but you’ll become so vital your job is secure. And project management is a good one - my daughter does it and has had no trouble finding good jobs, though she knows nothing about programming.
So the number one way to not lose your shit is to do something you think is fun. I like to hack, and my last project was a tremendous but vital hack job. I wasn’t nearly appreciated enough, but I enjoyed every minute of it.
That’s a good point. Even my wife struggles to remember what I actually do and when I meet up with family and friends I can’t ever recall work being a major topic of conversation.
Heck, my younger brother went to Cambridge and got a PhD and you’d think whatever he does would be notable or important to him or me but damned if I know what he does for a living now. Something in academia I believe.
I was roped into a high stress, highly confidential project back about 30 years ago (I’m retired now) that lasted about two years. I worked 10-12 hour days M-F, and a minimum of 8 hrs a day on Saturday and Sunday…and I had a nearly one hour commute. By the time I left that project, I was so burned out that I never really recovered for the rest of my career. I wasn’t in my 20s at the time (in my 30s), so maybe I wasn’t young enough? But I was physically and emotionally wiped out and took a looooong time to feel somewhat close to normal again.
We worked with Arthur Andersen consultants , and they provided lots of perks, and while the perks were fun, they did not compensate for the stress.
The only thing I remember now as a positive was that when someone from my prior team was shanghaied into our "project from hell (we really called it that because the confidentiality meant we couldn’t actually say what we were working on) near the end of the project, he reviewed my code and was effusive with his praise. Prior to that he always kinda looked slightly down his nose at me (because I was a woman). It meant a lot that he said he didn’t think he could have done it (and make it work!) in the time we had to do it. Thankfully, his respect lasted beyond this point.
I had a Project From Hell…
I’d been working 50-60 hrs/wk. That was do-able before I had kids, but was too much time at work when I had two little ones.
(It’s funny, thirty years later they wax nostalgic about running all over “Dad’s office building” evenings and Saturdays… it’s because I was working! I was neglecting you, and you’re missing a chance to resent me." But, no, they loved it)
Then I was put in charge of The Big Project, and luckily it was exciting and creative and a blast… because it took 70-80 hrs/wk. for a month (I mean BILLING that many hours, was probably there over 80).
And did the kids give me a break? Noooo, I had to run home, do bath time and read a book before bed, then I could rush back to work til 2 or 3 am…
Near the end of it, I said “If I keep working here, I’m never going to get to know my kids. Something’s got to give.” I finished the project (it was awesome, thanks), and started looking for a more sane profession. Ended up teaching…
I took quite a pay cut, but it was worth it. I do NOT regret that at all.
We’ve got a limited time on this planet, and I traded too much of it for money. Now I’m retired with a very humble pension, but… I. Have. Time.
That reminds me of this commercial:
I have to say that I don’t understand how people can do this long-term either. In 2019 (when I was 28) I had a month(?) long period where I had to work straight through all the weekends. I think most of the weekdays were about 9 hours for me and the weekends were only maybe 6ish but I was still completely burned out by the end. I don’t think I even started to recover mentally until the quarantine started and I had a bit of a lifestyle shift to doing less work and refocusing on getting exercise and doing my own cooking (and sleeping in).
Also during that period the guy who I guess was my boss at the time (it was a bit complicated) had a 1-year old and the whole situation was a complete nightmare for him. At one point there was a Friday where we didn’t have a deadline or anything that week so most of us could leave around 5. One of my coworkers was trying to talk him into going to a bar with us and he said “I haven’t seen my son in 3 weeks”.
After I abruptly quit my last (final?) pharmacy job, because it was literally killing me, I told one of the maintenance people at the compound, if you will, where I lived (large apartment and duplex community) what had happened and that I would soon be moving as a result. He told me that his previous job had involved some travel but did pay 90K a year, and after his third heart attack, his doctors told him, “You are not to return to this job.” He replied, “But how am I supposed to take care of my family?” and they replied, “You can’t do that if you’re dead.” So, he did quit that job, and they sold everything that didn’t fit in their car and moved to this area of rural Missouri where his wife had relatives, and even though the pay cut was enough that his wife had to go back to work, they were all much happier and he was healthier too.
That his wife went back to work was not as big a shock to the family’s lifestyle as some people might expect, because she had been talking about doing that anyway.
I may already have mentioned this in this thread, but one of my neighbors is a mail carrier, and for a while, she was working 7 days a week, up to 16 hours a day, something that doesn’t mix well with single parenthood (or having any kind of life, for that matter). She got a doctor’s order that she is not to work more than 8 hours a day, and they’re all dealing with it. IDK where the kids’ dad is, and it’s not my business unless she wants me to know.
One of the second level managers at my project from Hell was famous for missing the birth of one of his children because he had an important meeting.
When things went to hell he got fired just like those who tried to have some kind of a life. Working insane hours is no guarantee of success.
Yeah, the boss who pushed us so much, and who was making incredible bucks doing it, got fired for embezzling.
Last I googled him he was living up in the mountains and making little artsy documentaries.
Hmmm. My understanding is that working insane hours, never taking vacations, and letting no one else near your work are signs of embezzling.
Not necessarily. What you might be thinking of is where banks force their employees to take mandatory time off as a fraud prevention control. The idea is if a trader or whoever is running a fraud or hiding losses, it would fall apart and be easier to detect if they weren’t there to maintain it.
Don’t get me wrong. It’s a little bit about the money. But I would like to have some bit of career progression and be generally good at what I do.
Project management sucks. It’s the least secure job out there IMHO. At least it sucks in startup-ish tech companies. IME, companies won’t get rid of salespeople unless they don’t make their numbers. And they won’t get rid of the technical people who actually know how to do the work because they are in short supply. But it’s easy to get rid of the people who don’t do anything besides run meetings and update calendars. Particularly if their projects are off track because they were never set up for success to begin with.
That’s kind why IT is kind of shitty in general as a profession (at least compared to other 100 hour a week jobs) and why so many people in this thread have experience the dreaded “death march project from hell” causing them to work 60,80,100 hour weeks (presumably with no sports car to show for it). It’s because the company you worked for bought some technology it didn’t understand, couldn’t find enough people who actually know how to implement it, and didn’t want to invest in any project management or oversight that might actually provide visibility into how much of a mess it is. So they will throw bodies and hours and outsourced consultants at it until it either completes or the budget runs out and leadership finds a scapegoat.
And it’s all driven by a very Silicon Valley mindset of turning some half-baked idea into a viable(ish) product so you can cash out as quickly as possible.
I think it’s a bit of a different mindset from finance or medicine or law where those 100 hour weeks the analysts, associates and medical residents work exist to weed out those who can’t handle the work and to provide them with the skills and knowledge they will need in their careers.
Working long hours in and of itself isn’t inherently stressful IMHO.
For most people, productivity starts to decline after 50 hours of work and takes a nosedive after 55 hours. A few years ago I remember watching something about the number of hours medical residents were putting in. A lot of older doctors had the attitude of “I had to do it when I was younger so these wimps can buck up and do it too” ignoring the fact that having inexperienced doctors making medical decisions while fatigued and stressed is just bad for the patient.
It isn’t about productivity it’s about culture. These places have a culture where it’s advantageous to be seen putting in the effort even if that effort isn’t all that productive. They had to do it when they were younger and by God the younger kids are going to have to go through it as well.
And errors by overworked hospital residents can lead to death, as in the case of Libby Zion in 1984.
Apparently 55% of us don’t use all of our vacation time here in the US.
From the article:
Americans left 768 million days of paid time off unused last year, according to research released by the U.S. Travel Association. The study found that 55 percent of Americans did not use all of their paid vacation time. Of the time they took, U.S. workers used nine days to travel.
No exaggeration here? I find it hard to believe that one wouldn’t have a pretty good idea what one’s nonextranged spouse’s/sibling’s occupation is.
I worked at one company where one of my fellow directors was praising one of our coworkers who was on her laptop responding to emails a few hours after giving birth. That might actually be illegal. IANAL. Still made him sound like a douche (which he was). And I’m like 90% sure every date he’s ever brought out with us has been a Russian prostitute.
My gf “works in advertising”. That’s about all I know, other than that she is very good at what she does. I know she isn’t “creative”, but she assigns and oversees and stuff. She has won awards for her work and makes roughly 4X my salary (and I think I’m doing OK).
We arranged some new car insurance two weeks ago and she had get me to walk her through what occupation selections to make for me and to give her a rough description.
As for my brother? no, it just never comes up. I mentioned this fact to my wife and she actually has corrected me on what I thought I did know as I was wrong. And we are in no way estranged. Nearly the same with my sister. She’s senior in a global pharma corp. but I only knew exactly what position she held about 10 years ago because it was the roughly the same as me. Other that that? It really never comes up when we talk.
I don’t know if you are from the USA but if you are having a hard time believing this that may be in line with the original point, i.e. that Americans talk much than we do in the UK about their jobs.
And yet you know where these people went to school. I don’t know that about most of my friends, and don’t always remember for some of my family. Like, I know I’ve been told where my BIL went to school, because it came up that he’s a fan of their football team, but I don’t recall. I don’t think I ever learned where my SILs went to school.
Yeah, “what do you do” is sort of a status marker and a top-level categorization for people in the US. I suspect other countries also have something they use for the same purpose, but I’d guess it’s different. Maybe the town where they come from, or where they went to school, or something like that.
Well, I guess the discussion might boil down to what it means to know what someone does. Because from what you mention, it sounds like you actually DO have a pretty good idea.
And I bet if I asked you more, you’d be able to tell me. Does she go into an office? Travel much? Have direct reports? Have busy seasons? Approve budgets? Who is her boss?
If you know someone’s occupation - say, doctor, lawyer, plumber, accountant - that gives you some idea. Of course, there are all kinds of doctors working in all manner of environments …
My dtr’s fiancee does something in biotech. He’s told me several times, but damned if I understand it. But I could tell you enough to let you know some basics.
And I remember my dtr saying I completely misunderstood what she did in a prior job. But I could tell you her degree, and the field in which she worked. I think she was correcting the specific role she played in the process. Now she thinks it explanatory to say she is a project manager - a job title I’ve long thought somewhat problematic. So I can accurately say she does project management for a medical products manufacturer. But damned if I know what her job is really like. Do you?
I think one problem is with a lot of modern job titles. In previous generations, the title gave some idea of what they do. But many modern white collar job titles really give no idea. Unless you just say “middle manager” or “paper pusher”.
And I recall one BIL getting upset when I said he worked in IT. He is a software developer. OK - but damned if I could explain the difference betw the 2. He works w/ computers for a hospital accreditation agency. Do I not know what he does b/c I mistakenly called him IT?
I am from the US, and I can readily accept that Americans talk way more about their jobs than others. But that is distinct from avowing complete ignorance about how one’s immediate family supports themselves. That truly does impress me as odd. If you are so disinterested in what you and your family do for a major portion of your waking hours such that it doesn’t even get mentioned over the course of years, I’m wondering what the hell you DO talk about?