Unionize IT
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From the CP news email http://www.infoworld.com/archives/emailPrint.jsp?R=printThis&A=/article/08/09/04/36NF-union-for-tech-workers_1.html[^] This subject comes up from time to time and I've dismissed it as impractical. As the article points out, most IT people, developers especially, are an independent lot. However, after suffering through several extremely poor managers and unreasonable bosses in the last few years it would be nice to have a grievance process, or somewhere to turn when you do everything in your power to do your job but still get shafted.
only two letters away from being an asset
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From the CP news email http://www.infoworld.com/archives/emailPrint.jsp?R=printThis&A=/article/08/09/04/36NF-union-for-tech-workers_1.html[^] This subject comes up from time to time and I've dismissed it as impractical. As the article points out, most IT people, developers especially, are an independent lot. However, after suffering through several extremely poor managers and unreasonable bosses in the last few years it would be nice to have a grievance process, or somewhere to turn when you do everything in your power to do your job but still get shafted.
only two letters away from being an asset
Unions are sooo last century. :-D
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From the CP news email http://www.infoworld.com/archives/emailPrint.jsp?R=printThis&A=/article/08/09/04/36NF-union-for-tech-workers_1.html[^] This subject comes up from time to time and I've dismissed it as impractical. As the article points out, most IT people, developers especially, are an independent lot. However, after suffering through several extremely poor managers and unreasonable bosses in the last few years it would be nice to have a grievance process, or somewhere to turn when you do everything in your power to do your job but still get shafted.
only two letters away from being an asset
Even if you were in a union, what are the chances of your current (or any) employer choosing to recognise it? Slim to none, I should think.
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From the CP news email http://www.infoworld.com/archives/emailPrint.jsp?R=printThis&A=/article/08/09/04/36NF-union-for-tech-workers_1.html[^] This subject comes up from time to time and I've dismissed it as impractical. As the article points out, most IT people, developers especially, are an independent lot. However, after suffering through several extremely poor managers and unreasonable bosses in the last few years it would be nice to have a grievance process, or somewhere to turn when you do everything in your power to do your job but still get shafted.
only two letters away from being an asset
When there is a large labor pool willing to do the job for less money. In manager math 5 employees at the cheapest labor rate = 5 units of production per hour + big bonus for being under budget. It doesn't matter than an experienced developer can run circles around an entry level developer. The best Union a developer has is to just quit. (And it is a good one too)
Need software developed? Offering C# development all over the United States, ERL GLOBAL, Inc is the only call you will have to make.
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Most of this sig is for Google, not ego. -
From the CP news email http://www.infoworld.com/archives/emailPrint.jsp?R=printThis&A=/article/08/09/04/36NF-union-for-tech-workers_1.html[^] This subject comes up from time to time and I've dismissed it as impractical. As the article points out, most IT people, developers especially, are an independent lot. However, after suffering through several extremely poor managers and unreasonable bosses in the last few years it would be nice to have a grievance process, or somewhere to turn when you do everything in your power to do your job but still get shafted.
only two letters away from being an asset
Keep unions the hell away from me.. You DO have a process... leave. Unions breed an entitlement attitude... Entitlement breeds lazyness...
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Unions are sooo last century. :-D
Agreed. Though the article does mention a professional organization similar to the AMA.
only two letters away from being an asset
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Keep unions the hell away from me.. You DO have a process... leave. Unions breed an entitlement attitude... Entitlement breeds lazyness...
Ray Cassick wrote:
Unions breed an entitlement attitude... Entitlement breeds lazyness...
lazyness breeds the dark side.
----------------------------------------------------------- "When I first saw it, I just thought that you really, really enjoyed programming in java." - Leslie Sanford
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Keep unions the hell away from me.. You DO have a process... leave. Unions breed an entitlement attitude... Entitlement breeds lazyness...
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Agreed. Though the article does mention a professional organization similar to the AMA.
only two letters away from being an asset
I've known a few programmers who ride motorcycles, but I don't see how that helps. :-D
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From the CP news email http://www.infoworld.com/archives/emailPrint.jsp?R=printThis&A=/article/08/09/04/36NF-union-for-tech-workers_1.html[^] This subject comes up from time to time and I've dismissed it as impractical. As the article points out, most IT people, developers especially, are an independent lot. However, after suffering through several extremely poor managers and unreasonable bosses in the last few years it would be nice to have a grievance process, or somewhere to turn when you do everything in your power to do your job but still get shafted.
only two letters away from being an asset
Mark Nischalke wrote:
have a grievance process
It's called quitting.
"The clue train passed his station without stopping." - John Simmons / outlaw programmer "Real programmers just throw a bunch of 1s and 0s at the computer to see what sticks" - Pete O'Hanlon "Not only do you continue to babble nonsense, you can't even correctly remember the nonsense you babbled just minutes ago." - Rob Graham
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Keep unions the hell away from me.. You DO have a process... leave. Unions breed an entitlement attitude... Entitlement breeds lazyness...
Ray Cassick wrote:
You DO have a process... leave.
And if it isn't your choice to leave?
Ray Cassick wrote:
Unions breed an entitlement attitude... Entitlement breeds lazyness...
Absolutely agree, though I would hope higher educated people would not succumb to this attitude.
only two letters away from being an asset
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I've known a few programmers who ride motorcycles, but I don't see how that helps. :-D
Could have a biker rally in the parking lot :-D
only two letters away from being an asset
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From the CP news email http://www.infoworld.com/archives/emailPrint.jsp?R=printThis&A=/article/08/09/04/36NF-union-for-tech-workers_1.html[^] This subject comes up from time to time and I've dismissed it as impractical. As the article points out, most IT people, developers especially, are an independent lot. However, after suffering through several extremely poor managers and unreasonable bosses in the last few years it would be nice to have a grievance process, or somewhere to turn when you do everything in your power to do your job but still get shafted.
only two letters away from being an asset
It's easy for experienced developers to quit and get a better job in America right now. I think that little detail is responsible for their disinterest in unions more than anything else. I haven't been on the job market since getting a new job almost 2 months ago, but I still get calls from recruiters wanting to fill positions all around the nation because my resume was on the internet within the past few months. And when I politely decline, they always give me their contact information to see if I have any friends with similar qualifications who might be interested (and then proceed to ask me to keep in touch in case I'm ever on the job market again because they have a ton of positions they are still trying to fill).
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Ray Cassick wrote:
You DO have a process... leave.
And if it isn't your choice to leave?
Ray Cassick wrote:
Unions breed an entitlement attitude... Entitlement breeds lazyness...
Absolutely agree, though I would hope higher educated people would not succumb to this attitude.
only two letters away from being an asset
Mark Nischalke wrote:
And if it isn't your choice to leave?
Then you have a decision to make. But it is still your decision. You cannot MAKE an employer treat you better if they don't want to. Well, you can MAKE them but it will still not be a good situation in the long run.
Mark Nischalke wrote:
I would hope higher educated people would not succumb to this attitude.
I agree here also, but I have seen it happen before and it surprisingly does not take long.
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Could have a biker rally in the parking lot :-D
only two letters away from being an asset
A number of my coworkers convoy to the giant local one from the parking lot each year.
Today's lesson is brought to you by the word "niggardly". Remember kids, don't attribute to racism what can be explained by Scandinavian language roots. -- Robert Royall
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It's easy for experienced developers to quit and get a better job in America right now. I think that little detail is responsible for their disinterest in unions more than anything else. I haven't been on the job market since getting a new job almost 2 months ago, but I still get calls from recruiters wanting to fill positions all around the nation because my resume was on the internet within the past few months. And when I politely decline, they always give me their contact information to see if I have any friends with similar qualifications who might be interested (and then proceed to ask me to keep in touch in case I'm ever on the job market again because they have a ton of positions they are still trying to fill).
Apart from the late ninties, I'd guess there's about a 5 year period after graduating when it's tough(er). Now it's a doddle at 11. Though even in the midst of the '01 meltdown, with only 3 yrs experience I still got an offer after 6 weeks, for the same salary. I will say, having now sat on both sides of the table, there's a problem with some of the 'geekier' members of our profession wrt interview skills though.
I'm largely language agnostic
After a while they all bug me :doh:
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From the CP news email http://www.infoworld.com/archives/emailPrint.jsp?R=printThis&A=/article/08/09/04/36NF-union-for-tech-workers_1.html[^] This subject comes up from time to time and I've dismissed it as impractical. As the article points out, most IT people, developers especially, are an independent lot. However, after suffering through several extremely poor managers and unreasonable bosses in the last few years it would be nice to have a grievance process, or somewhere to turn when you do everything in your power to do your job but still get shafted.
only two letters away from being an asset
Mark Nischalke wrote:
be nice to have a grievance process, or somewhere to turn when you do everything in your power to do your job but still get shafted.
We have one here... it doesn't work. My first boss here asked me to something rather unethical, I dropped an anonymous tip. Since only one group would know, and he can't punish me, he punished the entire team. A union would only complicate the process. I left my last employer, and even with my first boss here being a jerk, this place is by far better than my last employer. I think the best choice is still look for a job. A union can keep you from having to look for a job, but both you and your boss would be miserable in the process, only the union would be happy. I am not sure that is realistically better.
_________________________ Asu no koto o ieba, tenjo de nezumi ga warau. Talk about things of tomorrow and the mice in the ceiling laugh. (Japanese Proverb) John Andrew Holmes "It is well to remember that the entire universe, with one trifling exception, is composed of others."
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From the CP news email http://www.infoworld.com/archives/emailPrint.jsp?R=printThis&A=/article/08/09/04/36NF-union-for-tech-workers_1.html[^] This subject comes up from time to time and I've dismissed it as impractical. As the article points out, most IT people, developers especially, are an independent lot. However, after suffering through several extremely poor managers and unreasonable bosses in the last few years it would be nice to have a grievance process, or somewhere to turn when you do everything in your power to do your job but still get shafted.
only two letters away from being an asset
I agree with another post in this thread, in the USA it is currently just too easy to find high paying jobs. Back a few years ago, I would have said yes, as much of the work was getting outsourced and the USA job market was heading downhill quickly. At that time, some employers were offering senior developers $35K-$40K which was previously what were paid for webmasters (notice, not web application developers, but those throwing together websites with graphics and text). In the future though, when job market tanks again, I would imagine the talk of Unions will come up again.
Rocky <>< Recent Blog Post: Google Chrome Considered Harmful
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From the CP news email http://www.infoworld.com/archives/emailPrint.jsp?R=printThis&A=/article/08/09/04/36NF-union-for-tech-workers_1.html[^] This subject comes up from time to time and I've dismissed it as impractical. As the article points out, most IT people, developers especially, are an independent lot. However, after suffering through several extremely poor managers and unreasonable bosses in the last few years it would be nice to have a grievance process, or somewhere to turn when you do everything in your power to do your job but still get shafted.
only two letters away from being an asset
They'll never unionize IT because programmers hate being told how to think.
"Why don't you tie a kerosene-soaked rag around your ankles so the ants won't climb up and eat your candy ass..." - Dale Earnhardt, 1997
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"...the staggering layers of obscenity in your statement make it a work of art on so many levels." - Jason Jystad, 10/26/2001