Hours I work/PTO
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@scottalanmiller said in Hours I work/PTO:
@Dashrender said in Hours I work/PTO:
@scottalanmiller said in Hours I work/PTO:
@Dashrender said in Hours I work/PTO:
I'm not sure I agree that I'm mixing that.
I can see why you would say that, but if you need/want dedicated days where you simply don't have to worry about being on call at all, then you need to be on vacation - which is what I need the convention days specifically listed above to be.
I don't mind spending even 30 mins on the phone helping something in a jam when I'm at an amusement park ( I spend at least that long this weekend while at a party helping a doc figure out why they couldn't get into their favorites - by the way, A+ to ScreenConnect on Android!) But if there is something less than a full catastrophe, I don't except to leave that park if I'm working a schedule like you're talking about.
But we didn't say that you'd have to leave the park. Being out of touch is a normal thing. No different than being in a service free zone or being on an airplane.
I do classify the park differently from the convention, and I do realize you never said I'd have to leave - but come on, there will be times where work has to be done that just can't be done reasonably at a park. So this means you either a) have to be prepared to leave, because you are the end all be all for a problem solution, or b) you're simply off that day and unreachable. I'll grant you that 90% of the time or more a few mins on the phone will probably solve most problems and leave the rest to be fixed when you get home normally, but that other 10% is what bites
But you are assuming that it is always you that has to do that work.
And when it is me that must do it, I can sit in a quiet spot with my tablet and deal with it. Even for hours if needed.
In fact, I have done so. It has happened exactly once. Would have been easier to leave but that would ruin things for the kids. Dad having to sit aside for a hour or two does damper things a bit, but it is better than cancelling.
Twice if you count walking out of a session at Spiceworld 2013 to deal with someone royally jacking up a SQL server. But since work paid for Spiceworld in the first place, I don't really count it.
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One thing I struggle with greatly is work-life separation - and my understanding is that @scottalanmiller just does not separate them in his preferred employee model / whatever you want to call it.
When I go home and I'm not on call you best believe I am not checking emails. Nor do I want to. It's bliss being able to just leave it alone and have that weight of responsibility off of me.
Also vacation - it's not a vacation if you're answering emails. It's absolutely not a vacation if you HAVE to answer emails / calls.
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@MattSpeller said in Hours I work/PTO:
Also vacation - it's not a vacation if you're answering emails. It's self moderated not a vacation if you HAVE to answer emails / calls.
See, I've always said exactly the opposite. If you force me to not check my emails, I can't take a vacation because I don't know that things are okay. But why would anyone want to disconnect fully from work if their job is awesome? That's what I don't understand. Why work a job that you want to take a vacation from? Why not work a job that you'd dread taking a vacation from?
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@scottalanmiller said in Hours I work/PTO:
@MattSpeller said in Hours I work/PTO:
Also vacation - it's not a vacation if you're answering emails. It's self moderated not a vacation if you HAVE to answer emails / calls.
See, I've always said exactly the opposite. If you force me to not check my emails, I can't take a vacation because I don't know that things are okay. But why would anyone want to disconnect fully from work if their job is awesome? That's what I don't understand. Why work a job that you want to take a vacation from? Why not work a job that you'd dread taking a vacation from?
There is a yawning chasm of disconnect between our view points that makes the grand canyon look pitiful.
I love my job. Clearly you do too.
Why on earth you'd want to take it with you on vacation is absolutely beyond my understanding. That is the f'ing DEFINITION of vacation!
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@MattSpeller said in Hours I work/PTO:
Why on earth you'd want to take it with you on vacation is absolutely beyond my understanding. That is the f'ing DEFINITION of vacation!
Right, I don't want to take it on vacation, I don't want a vacation from it. I would define loving a job as being one you would desire not to take a vacation from. If you want to take a vacation, then I totally understand why you'd not want to take the job with you. It's wanting to take a vacation that confuses me.
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Now things sucked at a prior job. There I was the lone IT guy. required to work 8-5 M-F and 8-12 Sat. Place sucked.
On April 25, 2008 at 10:18am I am in the f[moderated]ing delivery room with my wife when the phone rings (because i was slightly too distracted to silence it). I glanced at the caller ID and rejected the call then silenced the phone. It was the company.
4 minutes later my first child was born.
You know who called? The owner. The same person I was required to call whenever I was not going to be in. He damned well knew where I was.
You know what he wanted? His email was down. Turned out to be a RAID 5 disk failure. You know how I know? I went back to the f[moderateding office as soon as my wife fell asleep.
I can relate a shit ton more issues with that place. Suffice it to say, it was not my problem, but I still had to work almost the whole week. Instead of the vacation time I had been approved for.
TL;DR Screw the 8-5 job mentality.
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@scottalanmiller said in Hours I work/PTO:
@MattSpeller said in Hours I work/PTO:
Why on earth you'd want to take it with you on vacation is absolutely beyond my understanding. That is the f'ing DEFINITION of vacation!
It's wanting to take a vacation that confuses me.
That's cool man - you do you.
I am going to leave it right there.
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@scottalanmiller said in Hours I work/PTO:
@MattSpeller said in Hours I work/PTO:
Why on earth you'd want to take it with you on vacation is absolutely beyond my understanding. That is the f'ing DEFINITION of vacation!
Right, I don't want to take it on vacation, I don't want a vacation from it. I would define loving a job as being one you would desire not to take a vacation from. If you want to take a vacation, then I totally understand why you'd not want to take the job with you. It's wanting to take a vacation that confuses me.
So you never want to take a vacation?
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@Dashrender said in Hours I work/PTO:
@scottalanmiller said in Hours I work/PTO:
@MattSpeller said in Hours I work/PTO:
Why on earth you'd want to take it with you on vacation is absolutely beyond my understanding. That is the f'ing DEFINITION of vacation!
Right, I don't want to take it on vacation, I don't want a vacation from it. I would define loving a job as being one you would desire not to take a vacation from. If you want to take a vacation, then I totally understand why you'd not want to take the job with you. It's wanting to take a vacation that confuses me.
So you never want to take a vacation?
Define vacation? You want to go someplace and enjoy something? If so, he does that.
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@MattSpeller said in Hours I work/PTO:
@scottalanmiller said in Hours I work/PTO:
@MattSpeller said in Hours I work/PTO:
Why on earth you'd want to take it with you on vacation is absolutely beyond my understanding. That is the f'ing DEFINITION of vacation!
It's wanting to take a vacation that confuses me.
That's cool man - you do you.
I am going to leave it right there.
My whole point was... find work that you love so much that you don't want a vacation from it. Not just work that you love enough to put up with.
I don't feel a need to take a vacation from my hobbies, either. I do them because I like doing them. I don't look forward to not doing my hobbies. Or like playing video games. I realize that those things I naturally vacation from by simply not doing them from time to time, but that's only because I get busy, not because I'm vacationing from them.
I think vacations are a bad concept... the idea that work sucks so much that we need time away from it. Yeah... when work sucks you absolutely do. But wouldn't it be better to fix the problem rather than to bandaid it?
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@JaredBusch said in Hours I work/PTO:
@Dashrender said in Hours I work/PTO:
@scottalanmiller said in Hours I work/PTO:
@MattSpeller said in Hours I work/PTO:
Why on earth you'd want to take it with you on vacation is absolutely beyond my understanding. That is the f'ing DEFINITION of vacation!
Right, I don't want to take it on vacation, I don't want a vacation from it. I would define loving a job as being one you would desire not to take a vacation from. If you want to take a vacation, then I totally understand why you'd not want to take the job with you. It's wanting to take a vacation that confuses me.
So you never want to take a vacation?
Define vacation? You want to go someplace and enjoy something? If so, he does that.
That is exactly where we are differing. Also exactly the correct answer.
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@Dashrender said in Hours I work/PTO:
@scottalanmiller said in Hours I work/PTO:
@MattSpeller said in Hours I work/PTO:
Why on earth you'd want to take it with you on vacation is absolutely beyond my understanding. That is the f'ing DEFINITION of vacation!
Right, I don't want to take it on vacation, I don't want a vacation from it. I would define loving a job as being one you would desire not to take a vacation from. If you want to take a vacation, then I totally understand why you'd not want to take the job with you. It's wanting to take a vacation that confuses me.
So you never want to take a vacation?
I travel, I do fun stuff. I never vacation unless I'm working a less than loveable job and even then, I've taken a total of two vacations in my adult life... one was my honeymoon and one was the backpacking trip around Europe... and that last one was only sort of a vacation, as @Minion-Queen I was still around, just lightly.
So no, I never vacation.
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@JaredBusch said in Hours I work/PTO:
@Dashrender said in Hours I work/PTO:
@scottalanmiller said in Hours I work/PTO:
@MattSpeller said in Hours I work/PTO:
Why on earth you'd want to take it with you on vacation is absolutely beyond my understanding. That is the f'ing DEFINITION of vacation!
Right, I don't want to take it on vacation, I don't want a vacation from it. I would define loving a job as being one you would desire not to take a vacation from. If you want to take a vacation, then I totally understand why you'd not want to take the job with you. It's wanting to take a vacation that confuses me.
So you never want to take a vacation?
Define vacation? You want to go someplace and enjoy something? If so, he does that.
Yes, I do that all the time. But I never stop working (for any serious length of time) nor would I want to. I dislike not getting to work, because I do what I love doing. It's not the only thing that I love doing, hence why I travel. I love getting to work from those places, too.
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Scott doesn't want to take a vacation from his job, yet him and the fam - well wait, nevermind... Even though Scott does some side work for NTG, we all have to remember, he's more or less retired now. working when he wants to (granted that's still a lot of the time doing tasks for NTG).
I really can't imagine any job that any person wouldn't want to have a change of scenery for a bit. Of course one of the very first things you must have to have Scott's type of setup for is a team of support personal - it's can't be a one man shop like JB mentioned, or many of us here on ML have today.
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@Dashrender said in Hours I work/PTO:
Scott doesn't want to take a vacation from his job, yet him and the fam - well wait, nevermind... Even though Scott does some side work for NTG, we all have to remember, he's more or less retired now. working when he wants to (granted that's still a lot of the time doing tasks for NTG).
I really can't imagine any job that any person wouldn't want to have a change of scenery for a bit. Of course one of the very first things you must have to have Scott's type of setup for is a team of support personal - it's can't be a one man shop like JB mentioned, or many of us here on ML have today.
Hire @Bundy-Associates to handle it for you. Screw those NTG people...
errr......
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@scottalanmiller said in Hours I work/PTO:
@MattSpeller said in Hours I work/PTO:
@scottalanmiller said in Hours I work/PTO:
@MattSpeller said in Hours I work/PTO:
Why on earth you'd want to take it with you on vacation is absolutely beyond my understanding. That is the f'ing DEFINITION of vacation!
It's wanting to take a vacation that confuses me.
That's cool man - you do you.
I am going to leave it right there.
My whole point was... find work that you love so much that you don't want a vacation from it. Not just work that you love enough to put up with.
I don't feel a need to take a vacation from my hobbies, either. I do them because I like doing them. I don't look forward to not doing my hobbies. Or like playing video games. I realize that those things I naturally vacation from by simply not doing them from time to time, but that's only because I get busy, not because I'm vacationing from them.
I think vacations are a bad concept... the idea that work sucks so much that we need time away from it. Yeah... when work sucks you absolutely do. But wouldn't it be better to fix the problem rather than to bandaid it?
Do you think this is a reasonable expectation for more than 1-5% of the working population? I sure don't.
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@Dashrender said in Hours I work/PTO:
I really can't imagine any job that any person wouldn't want to have a change of scenery for a bit. Of course one of the very first things you must have to have Scott's type of setup for is a team of support personal - it's can't be a one man shop like JB mentioned, or many of us here on ML have today.
And I think that few people would agree with you more than me. Which is why I think nearly all really great jobs provide for a change of scenery and any good IT job has to either be just a part of the IT puzzle and/or has to involve a lot of other people.
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@Dashrender said in Hours I work/PTO:
@scottalanmiller said in Hours I work/PTO:
@MattSpeller said in Hours I work/PTO:
@scottalanmiller said in Hours I work/PTO:
@MattSpeller said in Hours I work/PTO:
Why on earth you'd want to take it with you on vacation is absolutely beyond my understanding. That is the f'ing DEFINITION of vacation!
It's wanting to take a vacation that confuses me.
That's cool man - you do you.
I am going to leave it right there.
My whole point was... find work that you love so much that you don't want a vacation from it. Not just work that you love enough to put up with.
I don't feel a need to take a vacation from my hobbies, either. I do them because I like doing them. I don't look forward to not doing my hobbies. Or like playing video games. I realize that those things I naturally vacation from by simply not doing them from time to time, but that's only because I get busy, not because I'm vacationing from them.
I think vacations are a bad concept... the idea that work sucks so much that we need time away from it. Yeah... when work sucks you absolutely do. But wouldn't it be better to fix the problem rather than to bandaid it?
Do you think this is a reasonable expectation for more than 1-5% of the working population? I sure don't.
Yes, I think that it surely is. I also don't think that most people care enough to pursue it, they just don't prioritize life happiness like they could. Many prioritize "following societal rules" or "doing what their parents did" or "following the path of least resistance."
It's like eating healthy. Will more than 1-5% of the population ever do it? No, they just don't care enough. Is it realistic for most people to do it? Yup.
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@Dashrender said in Hours I work/PTO:
Scott doesn't want to take a vacation from his job, yet him and the fam - well wait, nevermind... Even though Scott does some side work for NTG, we all have to remember, he's more or less retired now. working when he wants to (granted that's still a lot of the time doing tasks for NTG).
Well, that is how my employment works as mentioned in the other thread. So it is not like @scottalanmiller's situation is unique. And I am certainly not retired.
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@JaredBusch said in Hours I work/PTO:
@Dashrender said in Hours I work/PTO:
Scott doesn't want to take a vacation from his job, yet him and the fam - well wait, nevermind... Even though Scott does some side work for NTG, we all have to remember, he's more or less retired now. working when he wants to (granted that's still a lot of the time doing tasks for NTG).
Well, that is how my employment works as mentioned in the other thread. So it is not like @scottalanmiller's situation is unique. And I am certainly not retired.
And I worked this way prior to retirement, and not solely at NTG, either.
