Thursday, June 4, 2009

Annoy a Liberal, Work Hard

I'm sure you've seen the bumper sticker.

I'm a "Liberal", so why am I working so hard? I work in IT and there is never enough time to make up for the underfunding of our core infrastructure. Yet the projects and initiatives the company pursues never stop and continue at a frenetic pace.

In the corporate world, IT gets treated like liberals do in our society. IT is labeled as a "Cost Center" and our resources and efforts are always considered to be free and unlimited. We put in more hours in support of the company than our "Revenue Center" colleagues, yet we are salaried workers - i.e. no overtime, no comp time, and no commissions for our efforts. By the time you divide our salaries by the number of hours we work, we make less than some of our lesser paid colleagues. No, we don't really get paid the "big bucks" - that is an illusion and an IT "in" joke. All we have is the ambiguous pride that we are salaried "professionals." Another classist label that obscures reality.

We save the company money rather than pull it in. We make it so the company doesn't have to hire more people, eliminate the need for manual processes so peoples' efforts can be focused on more important things, and provide the tools that make all employees more productive. We have little time to quantify these savings because we spend the hours that we have trying to keep up with the neverending demands for our services.

So for the next while - i am going to be on vacation - but I'm working half time so I don't delay roll out on the current important projects and avoid donning the label of "not a team player."

This labeling thing is pretty pervasisve isn't it? I have to say i am enjoying this blogging thing. I haven't been so thought full in years.

4 comments:

  1. MR, I refuse to work when I'm on vacation. It's the company's responsibility to hire enough staff to cover anticipated time off.

    But then, I'm not a "team player." :-)

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  2. BAH!

    Sing on to the choir!

    Over the years our staff has gone from one manager, four full time employees, and two part time graduate assistants, to one manager, one full time employee, and four part time graduate assistants.

    I have no qualms anymore telling people, "I'm sorry, but we just don't have the resources for that."

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  3. MR and I share the same challenges with overallocation and the IT environment. Except I think she should relax for the next two weeks, enjoy the sunshine, and close the computer. (Except for fun, and blogging.)

    :)

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  4. I seesaw between wanting to have a job and income - to wanting to have a life. I took a vocational assessment recently and am looking forward to seeing the results. Reinvent myself again :-)

    Jeri, you tell "she who must not be named", that I'm not going to meet the deadline for the "assimilation" project, and I'll take off and not work ;-) How's that for abdication of responsibility??? LOL

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