Overtime Compensation
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You know what? I've been working for the same company for 19 years. I have survived more economic turns of the wheel than I can count.
Snowman58 wrote:
You are obviously not a team player
Wrong. In my department, I have the unofficial position of Departmental Sh!t-Job Boy. As the DSJB, I administer our department server, our source control system, our automated build process, and a host of other activities that keep our development group operating efficiently. Most of this is voluntary, and I consistently receive appreciative remarks on my appraisals for stepping up and doing all the crap nobody else wants to. In case you're wondering, this is on top of my regular responsibilities as one of the three senior developers in a group of 12.
Snowman58 wrote:
You are undermining the moral of the rest of the team by holding yourself above the "pain" of getting the task done on schedule
Not hardly. It's fairly rare that we, as a group, have to put in overtime. I've done it occasionally, when others have done so, even when I was only tangentially involved in the crisis at hand. The biggest reason we have to put in overtime is that we are overcommitted by engineering management. Our group of 12 supports 5 products, some of which have 2 or 3 active branches, along with any number of special projects. Our running joke is that we always have to figure out which of our half-dozen number-one top priorities we are supposed to be working on.
Snowman58 wrote:
You are demonstrating that you are not interested in the success of the company
Bullshit. My contribution to the success of the company is doing the best job I know how to do, in the most efficient manner possible. Overtime burns people out and increases the error rate. It's a losing proposition.
Snowman58 wrote:
Every aggressive company has crunch times when it expects its salaried employees to put in additional effort
Some companies make it a policy for it to always be crunch time. I've worked for a couple of those in the past. A company will take advantage of people who don't say no to overtime.
Software Zen:
delete this;
Fold WithGary R. Wheeler wrote:
Overtime burns people out and increases the error rate. It's a losing proposition.
Amen. I once worked from 7 am to 10 pm, and my co workers had shown up for work at midday. I told my boss at 10, I can stay here and write bugs, or I can get some sleep. The image of the hero coder working through the night, does not gel with reality.
Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista. Read my blog to find out how I've worked around bugs in Microsoft tools and frameworks.
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No abuse intended, but if you worked for me, you would be high on the layoff list during a downturn. The reasons are: 1) You are obviously not a team player - you may have gotten your assignment done on time, but you could be helping others with their assignments. 2) You are undermining the moral of the rest of the team by holding yourself above the "pain" of getting the task done on schedule. 3) You are demonstrating that you are not interested in the success of the company; therefore the company owes no loyalty to you. Every aggressive company has crunch times when it expects its salaried employees to put in additional effort. As long as it is not an ongoing practice, it is the price you pay for not having to punch a time clock and a higher salary than a shop worker.
Melting Away www.deals-house.com www.innovative--concepts.com
modified on Sunday, August 2, 2009 11:48 PM
I think people have been pretty hard on you here. I think all your points are valid. Your only mistake is that you were a little hard on Gary who is a regular. :)
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Hallelujah, brothers and sisters, say it again!
Software Zen:
delete this;
Fold With Us![^]YEAH!
You can't turn lead into gold, unless you've built yourself a nuclear plant.
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3) You are demonstrating that you are not interested in the success of the company; therefore the company owes no loyalty to you. Loyalty from the company? Does that even exist anymore?
dighn wrote:
therefore the company owes no loyalty to you
Loyalty from a company? Arf! I think even in Japan these things are gone.
You can't turn lead into gold, unless you've built yourself a nuclear plant.
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dighn wrote:
Loyalty from the company? Does that even exist anymore?
In small companies, yes, because of the inevitable personal relationships (it's hard to fire someone you know and like). In large companies not at all. Not because there aren't the same relationships as above, but because the decisions typically come from other departments where you are just a number.
10110011001111101010101000001000001101001010001010100000100000101000001000111100010110001011001011
MidwestLimey wrote:
In small companies, yes, because of the inevitable personal relationships (it's hard to fire someone you know and like).
Size does not matter! Actually that reminds me a story of a manager who was doing his best not to fire anyone. And he was doing a good job at it. Unfortunately, a change in capital structure pushed him out. First thing the new manager did was to lay off people!! The funny part is the compulsive layoffer was laid off eventually. :doh:
You can't turn lead into gold, unless you've built yourself a nuclear plant.
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You know what? I've been working for the same company for 19 years. I have survived more economic turns of the wheel than I can count.
Snowman58 wrote:
You are obviously not a team player
Wrong. In my department, I have the unofficial position of Departmental Sh!t-Job Boy. As the DSJB, I administer our department server, our source control system, our automated build process, and a host of other activities that keep our development group operating efficiently. Most of this is voluntary, and I consistently receive appreciative remarks on my appraisals for stepping up and doing all the crap nobody else wants to. In case you're wondering, this is on top of my regular responsibilities as one of the three senior developers in a group of 12.
Snowman58 wrote:
You are undermining the moral of the rest of the team by holding yourself above the "pain" of getting the task done on schedule
Not hardly. It's fairly rare that we, as a group, have to put in overtime. I've done it occasionally, when others have done so, even when I was only tangentially involved in the crisis at hand. The biggest reason we have to put in overtime is that we are overcommitted by engineering management. Our group of 12 supports 5 products, some of which have 2 or 3 active branches, along with any number of special projects. Our running joke is that we always have to figure out which of our half-dozen number-one top priorities we are supposed to be working on.
Snowman58 wrote:
You are demonstrating that you are not interested in the success of the company
Bullshit. My contribution to the success of the company is doing the best job I know how to do, in the most efficient manner possible. Overtime burns people out and increases the error rate. It's a losing proposition.
Snowman58 wrote:
Every aggressive company has crunch times when it expects its salaried employees to put in additional effort
Some companies make it a policy for it to always be crunch time. I've worked for a couple of those in the past. A company will take advantage of people who don't say no to overtime.
Software Zen:
delete this;
Fold WithGary R. Wheeler wrote:
Overtime burns people out and increases the error rate. It's a losing proposition.
So true! This is an illusion to think overstressed workers are more productive. The only good it does is flattering the egos of those who believe in such things.
Gary R. Wheeler wrote:
Some companies make it a policy for it to always be crunch time. I've worked for a couple of those in the past. A company will take advantage of people who don't say no to overtime.
Which is a perfect nonsense!
You can't turn lead into gold, unless you've built yourself a nuclear plant.
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How does everyone typically get compensated for overtime? Pay, time off, a thanks, more overtime...?
Trollslayer wrote:
Meetings - where minutes are taken and hours are lost.
Shelby Robetson wrote:
How does everyone typically get compensated for overtime? Pay, time off, a thanks, more overtime...?
Generally none of the above. Although technically I am never asked to work overtime, however I do get in trouble if the job is not finished on schedule. It's usually my fault that I don't always take this into account when I am asked how long something is going to take. The problem with a fudge factor is if I make it longer than some time schedule dictates the project can and will get simplified in some way that looks on the surface to reduce the work however in reality it may or may not reduce the time it takes to finish.
John
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No abuse intended as well but people with your mentality are exactly why corporate life is hell. And, as someone who employes extremely efficient and self sufficient programmers I would never hire you. The reasons are: 1) You obviously are not a balanced individual - you try and make up for your lack of any semblance of a meaningful life by attempting to force people to work additional hours without compensation. Why? Because you never had the balls to tell someone 'no'. 2) You are undermining your co-workers moral. You think that because you experience 'pain' due to your inability to meet your deadlines then everybody else should be miserable. 3) You over-think and over estimate your importance to the company. Every intelligent company that runs into a crunch time realizes that their good employees need to be treated well and compensated for their time. You obviously have never worked for a quality employer and have no clue how important it is to keep your core team working effectively.
Sovereign ingredient for a happy marriage: Pay cash or do without. Interest charges not only eat up a household budget; awareness of debt eats up domestic felicity. --Lazarus Long Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece. --Ralph Charell
:thumbsup:
You can't turn lead into gold, unless you've built yourself a nuclear plant.
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I get to keep my job! :-D
A guide to posting questions on CodeProject[^]
Dave Kreskowiak Microsoft MVP Visual Developer - Visual Basic
2006, 2007, 2008
But no longer in 2009...So you really think doing overtime will protect you from a layoff? :wtf: :wtf: :wtf:
You can't turn lead into gold, unless you've built yourself a nuclear plant.
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How does everyone typically get compensated for overtime? Pay, time off, a thanks, more overtime...?
Trollslayer wrote:
Meetings - where minutes are taken and hours are lost.
A thanks and more overtime
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Me? Absolutely nothing, and I don't allow overtime for the team. In almost all cases, requiring overtime is an indication that I screwed up.
"WPF has many lovers. It's a veritable porn star!" - Josh Smith
As Braveheart once said, "You can take our freedom but you'll never take our Hobnobs!" - Martin Hughes.
This is refreshing to read a post like this. :thumbsup:
You can't turn lead into gold, unless you've built yourself a nuclear plant.
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No abuse intended as well but people with your mentality are exactly why corporate life is hell. And, as someone who employes extremely efficient and self sufficient programmers I would never hire you. The reasons are: 1) You obviously are not a balanced individual - you try and make up for your lack of any semblance of a meaningful life by attempting to force people to work additional hours without compensation. Why? Because you never had the balls to tell someone 'no'. 2) You are undermining your co-workers moral. You think that because you experience 'pain' due to your inability to meet your deadlines then everybody else should be miserable. 3) You over-think and over estimate your importance to the company. Every intelligent company that runs into a crunch time realizes that their good employees need to be treated well and compensated for their time. You obviously have never worked for a quality employer and have no clue how important it is to keep your core team working effectively.
Sovereign ingredient for a happy marriage: Pay cash or do without. Interest charges not only eat up a household budget; awareness of debt eats up domestic felicity. --Lazarus Long Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece. --Ralph Charell
:thumbsup: too! :-D
A train station is where the train stops. A bus station is where the bus stops. On my desk, I have a work station.... _________________________________________________________ My programs never have bugs, they just develop random features.
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I charge straight time. Realistically, I get a lot accomplished in a week and it is only true emergencies that cause me to work longer hours. Of course I am self-employed. If I were an employee of a company I would work whatever hours were initially agreed when I was hired and no more without compensation. Unpaid overtime is slavery.
Need custom software developed? I do C# development and consulting all over the United States. A man said to the universe: "Sir I exist!" "However," replied the universe, "The fact has not created in me A sense of obligation." --Stephen Crane
Ennis Ray Lynch, Jr. wrote:
Unpaid overtime is slavery
So true! And you do not even get to publish your free work on codeproject!
You can't turn lead into gold, unless you've built yourself a nuclear plant.
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By expecting that it'll become regular operating procedure. :( That is, if you're lucky enough to have a manager that doesn't expect 70-80 hours a week to begin with (and yes, I was told in no uncertain terms at a job I had about 20 years ago that I was expected to put in 75 hours a week, salaried.) Marc
I'm not overthinking the problem, I just felt like I needed a small, unimportant, uninteresting rant! - Martin Hart Turner
Marc Clifton wrote:
to put in 75 hours a week
This is so 80's. I guess this was a time when they had to overcompensate for the 70's ;)!
You can't turn lead into gold, unless you've built yourself a nuclear plant.
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How does everyone typically get compensated for overtime? Pay, time off, a thanks, more overtime...?
Trollslayer wrote:
Meetings - where minutes are taken and hours are lost.
By slacking off later.
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I think people have been pretty hard on you here. I think all your points are valid. Your only mistake is that you were a little hard on Gary who is a regular. :)
I think he's making a hell of a lot of assumptions. 1. He doesn't know Gary. 2. He doesn't know Gary's company or history at said company. 3. He has no idea what Gary's success rate (projects finished) compared to his peers working overtime. The dude sounds fresh out of school and totally unprepared for life in the real world where snap-judgments are anything but cut and dried. I'd fire his @$$ for the amount of disruption his self-fulfilling attitude would bring in to any environment. The world has enough experts I'm just looking for someone who doesn't need extra money from me to finish a project on-time. Now that's called a team player. Morons!
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I think people have been pretty hard on you here. I think all your points are valid. Your only mistake is that you were a little hard on Gary who is a regular. :)
Eh... The mistake would be that he didn't really have to be "hard" on Gary at all: putting Gary in a hypothetical scenario and making assumptions as to his work ethic and attitude based on his response to a specific question wasn't at all necessary, if Snowman58's intention was to, say, emphasize the value of teamwork. This sort of response - "If i was your boss..." - is strangely frequent on CP, and i've never quite figured out why. Maybe because i've never been someone else's boss, it's hard for me to appreciate the temptation to look at everyone as a potential underling such work inspires... :-\
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3) You are demonstrating that you are not interested in the success of the company; therefore the company owes no loyalty to you. Loyalty from the company? Does that even exist anymore?
dighn wrote:
Loyalty from the company? Does that even exist anymore?
No.
Trollslayer wrote:
Meetings - where minutes are taken and hours are lost.
-
You know what? I've been working for the same company for 19 years. I have survived more economic turns of the wheel than I can count.
Snowman58 wrote:
You are obviously not a team player
Wrong. In my department, I have the unofficial position of Departmental Sh!t-Job Boy. As the DSJB, I administer our department server, our source control system, our automated build process, and a host of other activities that keep our development group operating efficiently. Most of this is voluntary, and I consistently receive appreciative remarks on my appraisals for stepping up and doing all the crap nobody else wants to. In case you're wondering, this is on top of my regular responsibilities as one of the three senior developers in a group of 12.
Snowman58 wrote:
You are undermining the moral of the rest of the team by holding yourself above the "pain" of getting the task done on schedule
Not hardly. It's fairly rare that we, as a group, have to put in overtime. I've done it occasionally, when others have done so, even when I was only tangentially involved in the crisis at hand. The biggest reason we have to put in overtime is that we are overcommitted by engineering management. Our group of 12 supports 5 products, some of which have 2 or 3 active branches, along with any number of special projects. Our running joke is that we always have to figure out which of our half-dozen number-one top priorities we are supposed to be working on.
Snowman58 wrote:
You are demonstrating that you are not interested in the success of the company
Bullshit. My contribution to the success of the company is doing the best job I know how to do, in the most efficient manner possible. Overtime burns people out and increases the error rate. It's a losing proposition.
Snowman58 wrote:
Every aggressive company has crunch times when it expects its salaried employees to put in additional effort
Some companies make it a policy for it to always be crunch time. I've worked for a couple of those in the past. A company will take advantage of people who don't say no to overtime.
Software Zen:
delete this;
Fold WithGary R. Wheeler wrote:
Some companies make it a policy for it to always be crunch time.
That is what prompted this thread.
Trollslayer wrote:
Meetings - where minutes are taken and hours are lost.
-
No abuse intended, but if you worked for me, you would be high on the layoff list during a downturn. The reasons are: 1) You are obviously not a team player - you may have gotten your assignment done on time, but you could be helping others with their assignments. 2) You are undermining the moral of the rest of the team by holding yourself above the "pain" of getting the task done on schedule. 3) You are demonstrating that you are not interested in the success of the company; therefore the company owes no loyalty to you. Every aggressive company has crunch times when it expects its salaried employees to put in additional effort. As long as it is not an ongoing practice, it is the price you pay for not having to punch a time clock and a higher salary than a shop worker.
Melting Away www.deals-house.com www.innovative--concepts.com
modified on Sunday, August 2, 2009 11:48 PM
Lets be honest here. The additional hours added in overtime are more than offset by the lack of productivity caused by the destroyed moral. Does any one even argue that statement? So what is to gain by forcing overtime?
Trollslayer wrote:
Meetings - where minutes are taken and hours are lost.