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YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

I'm a big late to the conversation, but I've definitely had some good recruiters. I dealt with one that got me 25% more than I asked for hourly as well as relocation assistance, and then got me two 10% raises over 3 years. There are a lot of bad ones, but there are definitely some good ones too, and for some of the best jobs out there you're going to have to deal with them because they don't make it onto popular job search sites and are only distributed to recruitment firms to keep the applications down to a reasonable number of pre-screened applicants.

Being a good recruiter is tough because you have to know enough about IT to smell bullshit and find good candidates amongst the piles and piles of terrible resumes that are half populated with lies, and you have to learn that without it actually being your full time job.

I also never let a recruiter get more than 30 seconds into a conversation now without telling him what my expected salary range is so that he doesn't waste my time pitching me on a company that can't afford me.

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YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

There are a lot of older sysadmins. If you get tired of that, quite a lot of the SEs, account managers, and professional services dudes at VARs and vendors are in their 40s or 50s. There are plenty technical jobs out there for people folks in that age range, and as an added bonus a lot of them get you out of operations.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Docjowles posted:

I do struggle with what I want the next steps in my career to be. Thinking 1,3 and 5 years out. I really love doing technical sysadmin work but I also don't really want to be in my 40's or 50's and still carrying the metaphorical pager. Even with a fairly deep rotation and stable-ish environment, being on-call blows. I don't want to do it forever. But neither do I want to go into pure management and stop getting my hands dirty, at least in the near to middle term. I need to identify the mythical "sysadmin that isn't on call" role.

Stop being a sysadmin. Get out of operations. Engineering, architecture, consulting, professional services, pre-sales...these are all technical jobs that provide a lot of opportunity to really get deep into solving technical problems while not being the guy who gets the 3am call when something breaks. I'm on the PS side for a vendor right now and while I occasionally assist with after hours emergencies it's purely by choice. They have a huge support organization that they can call 24/7 so I'm not their first and only line of defense.

There are a ton of jobs like that in IT, but basically none of them are on the operations side.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

I give an "irrespective of anything else I will not take less than $X" to every recruiter that calls me because otherwise I'd have a couple of hours out of every day wasted listening to a pitch for a job that won't pay me anywhere near what I'm asking. You're not locked in to a number just because you mentioned it once on a phone call. You can change your demands as you get further into the interview process and learn more about the responsibilities involved, the benefits, how stable the company is, etc...but you can't get the time back that you wasted talking to someone about a job only to find out that their ceiling is half of what you currently make.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Fiendish Dr. Wu posted:

And: I inherited the role of a guy who I can safely assume was making close to 6 figures

How do you know this? I've seen people get in trouble negotiating before because they assume that the people around them are making more than they are based on hearsay or water-cooler talk.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

skipdogg posted:

I swear these threads make me wonder if I work for some mythical perfect company or some poo poo. I'm celebrating my 10 year anniversary here soon. Started working in one of our call centers while finishing community college and have been promoted multiple times since then. In my current position of Sr. Systems Administrator I'm making a very nice base wage in line with the local market while enjoying such things 22 paid days off, 8 sick days, 90/10 PPO with 500 dollar deductible, paid training, cell phone, hot spot and annual performance bonus (that actually pays out). We're even well funded as a department and get nice equipment. I really don't have anything bad to say about the company at all and have no desire to leave.


Now if my environment wasn't so great, or I did not have the potential to move up I would leave, but you can enjoy a nice career with a company. It is possible. I wouldn't mind working here another 10 years to be honest. I can probably get a 'Lead Sys Admin' title in the next 2 to 3 years which would cap out my earning potential without going into management or consulting. I will say I make an effort to stay on top of technology. Don't be that guy who specializes in something and doesn't keep up with current technology trends. You want to keep a relevant skill set in case something happens to your job.

Part of it is that this thread seems weighted heavily in favor of people who are still relatively early in their career. It gets easier to find the good jobs as you build a resume and your skills are more in demand, forcing companies to compete for you. Though over the past ten years I've had four different IT jobs and none of them were anywhere near as bad as many described here.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Sorry guys, I'd like to post more but I spent all day at work managing the gently caress out of ICMP and I am just exhausted.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

the spyder posted:

Since *company merger* is looking worse and worse now that I've got a taste of how they currently handle IT (it's terrible) and there's no way I'm staying here any longer then I have too, it's time to brush up the old resume. Where do I start? Is the goon-ran resume service worth it? I've started to audit/rebuilt my online presence (so they find what I want them to find, like my IT blog.) But I've got two weak points: resumes and interviews. I can get a decent resume out there and handle phone interviews no sweat, but at the in person tech interviews, I always choke. Any help or resource recommendations (articles, books, ect) are appreciated.

You're in Portland, correct? What kind of work are you doing? I know you gave me your email address in one of these threads and I got caught up in some stuff and didn't get around to e-mailing you, but if you give me an idea of what kind of work you're looking for I can ask around and see if anyone I know is hiring.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Wear slacks and a long sleeve dress shirt, look clean and presentable and you'll be fine in 99.99 percent of interviews. If you've already got a nice suit feel free to wear it, but don't go spend hundreds of dollars on one for an interview.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

MC Fruit Stripe posted:

Wear a suit to an interview because you are not 17 years old.

I've literally never worn a suit to an interview and also only had one person wear a suit to an interview with me. It's not a law firm or a bank. Would you suggest that a woman should wear a formal dress to an interview? If not, then why not?

Seriously, just look loving presentable. Look like you wouldn't be out of place at church or at an upscale restaurant. The actual clothes are much less important than the overall impression of being clean, organized, well groomed, and capable of dressing yourself like a functional adult and not an a gross manchild. No one here has ever lost a job because they weren't wearing a suit for a job where the dress code probably tops out at dockers and a polo.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

SaltLick posted:

I work in a jail and wear the same lovely khakis and polo every day because jail smells like bad easy mac and despair. I went to the interview in a suit. Wear a suit this is easy stuff.

I'm pretty sure I don't want to work in a foul smelling jail though...

skipdogg posted:

You can't go wrong with a nice pair of slacks, a clean crisp button down shirt, good leather shoes, and maybe a tie. Since you all are a bunch of goony bastards, clothing items should be clean, pressed, and fit well. It helps present an overall positive image. Seriously though, make sure the clothes fit properly. Too big/tight shirts, too long pants, inappropriate shoes.. they can make someone look less put together than they intended too.

This is good advice. If you're wearing an ill fitting suit that you haven't donned since 30 pounds ago then you're worse off than if you wore something less formal that fit you better. If you're wearing a suit but you've got a horrible gross beard, or ratty hair, or you smell weird, or your shoes or tie don't match your suit or you just look generally schlubby then you're not doing yourself any favors. The "ALWAYS WEAR A SUIT" thing seems like another instance of people treating IT folks as barely functional aspies that can't be trusted to pick up on basic social cues like appropriate work attire for the position for which they are applying. A suit is meant to be the safest possible choice that even a social retard can't screw up (which is definitely note true). I've also been the guy in a t-shirt interviewing the guy in a suit and it's really really funny. The interviewee told me afterwards that he felt uncomfortable being overdressed compared to myself and everyone else he saw in the office, and that was immediately obvious during the interview.

Anyway, just loving look nice. Look like a person that the interviewer would want to hang out with in a public place. People LIKE attractive people and employers HIRE people they like.

Also, there's a common refrain in here that no one would want to work for a company that judged you for wearing a suit to an interview, but the opposite is true as well...if you show up dressed well for the job you will actually be doing and knock it out in the interview and the only thing that stops you from getting hired is as suit jacket then you also probably do not want to work for those people because their priorities loving suck and your co-workers are going to have been selected based on very specious criteria.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Dilbert As gently caress posted:

Well sorry, every interview I have gone to I've been asked "So what car do you drive"

I have never been asked this in an interview. It's also a terrible way to determine anything about a person, so that's probably why.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

the spyder posted:

Not to drag out the car talk, but I'm curious as to what others drive. I sold my BMW and I can't keep driving my Rx-7 40 miles a day. Plus I can't fit a server in it, well except maybe an old R210. I regularly transfer 1U-4U devices between offices and I really hate driving our company van. I'm thinking either a small crossover SUV (Mazda Cx-5) or wagon (BMW/Audi) is my best bet.

CTS-V wagon is the logical and practical choice.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

You basically have to have a degree to enter the workforce at this point. You may get 1-in-a-million lucky and land a good first job without it and work your way up, but the glut of college graduates means that HR departments can afford to toss out anyone who doesn't have a four year degree purely on principle. Get a four year degree if you want a job.

I say this as a person who does not have a degree and got phenomenally lucky landing a first job and haven't been unduly hindered by my lack of one, even for potential management positions. But I was very lucky and I started in IT 10 years ago before the education boom and the 2008 recession meant that the market was flooded with degree-havers who would work for slave wages.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

lampey posted:

Now more than ever a degree is less important to a career in IT. If it is important at a later date there are increasingly non traditional options like WGU to get a degree.

Having a degree only getting more important in every other field in the world, why would you think that IT is the exception? Going back to school and getting a degree when you're settled in to work life is a lot less appealing than doing it when you're young and relatively free from other responsibilities.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Misogynist posted:

There are certain areas where that's true. For example, the technology industry has a much healthier startup scene (quantitatively, anyway) than a majority of other fields, and most of these companies tend to be looking for young, doe-eyed professionals who fit their countercultural ideals. Software development as a profession has tended to lean heavily towards self-taught programmers, partly because many computer science curricula haven't been updated since Fred Brooks wrote 30 years ago about building one to throw away. Entry-level helpdesk positions tend not to have degree requirements because they're aimed at people in their late teens and early twenties, which confuses some people into thinking that degrees aren't useful in a desktop support or sysadmin track.

It's true that your odds in many technology jobs are better than they would be in other professions, if you're coming at them without any kind of degree at all. If someone finds themselves in this position, the questions he or she needs to ask are:

  • What is my lack of a degree going to do to the salaries I can expect to earn in the kinds of companies I expect to work for?
  • What jobs will I have a very difficult time getting without a degree?
  • What skills will I develop more slowly on account of having not gone to college?

My problem was with the assertion that it's *less* important than ever to have a degree in IT. It's less important than in many other fields, certainly, but just like everywhere else the large number of people graduating from college every year is raising the bar for entry level jobs to the point that many that once didn't require, or at least strongly prefer a degree, now do. HR departments will almost always prefer someone with a degree to someone without, all other things being equal, and the number of people entering the workforce with degrees is only getting larger. Having some experience or coding projects to your name is useful, but if you're going up against people who have those things and also a 4 year degree your resume is getting moved to the bottom of the pile.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Comradephate posted:

I'm only doing this because we're discussing soft skills and education: complementary, not complimentary. :spergin:

That's a very lovely certificate you have there.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

lampey posted:

The increasing commoditization of IT means that individuals require less job specific knowledge to perform the needed roles, and it takes less time to learn than previously. A bachelors degree is not without merit, but many of the experiences that result in a being well rounded can be learned while on the job. If someone was 30 years old and wanted to get into IT should they get a 4 year degree first?

You just keep making statements that don't actually have any obvious relationship to reality as if they were self-evidently true. And yes, a 30 year old who wants to get into IT should also work towards a 4-year degree because he will already be behind many of his peers on the job ladder and the lack of a degree will hold him back even more. You don't get a degree to make you better at your future job (though it might do that), you get a degree to get a better job, which will ultimately mean that your future jobs are also better because you started from a better place.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Tab8715 posted:

I wouldn't be surprised if they make you sign some kind of wavier - employee must remain here for X amount of days or foot the bill for training.

There's no training required to get a clearance.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Glass of Milk posted:

This is not necessarily true anymore- http://www.giac.org/certifications/dodd-8570

Depending on the job requirements/category, you may be required to obtain some sort of certification.

Those are requirements to work as a contractor, not to hold a clearance. I am cleared secret because I consult with a DOD agency, but I am not required to meet the training requirements because I do not work for that agency as a direct hire or contractor.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

lampey posted:

Do you still need to know how to setup an exchange server? How to host a website? VOIP PBX?

What do you actually do? Because I find it hard to believe that you've been around IT very long if you think no one actually needs to know how to do these things.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

I just do storage and I still use PS to get information about our Exchange environment on a fairly regular basis. When you've got 100s of mailbox DBs doing anything by hand is not realistic. And, of course, as stuff like that moves off prem more jobs are created an cloud service providers and those jobs are going to require more skills than your run of the mill sysadmin has, not fewer.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Inspector_666 posted:

The point isn't what you said, though. The point is that even a modest increase will make a huge difference. 2 years is a long time.

Well, there's no guarantee that you will get the same percentage raise if you start at a higher number. You may just start near the cap for that position and stay there. That's still better than having to work your way up there though.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Tab8715 posted:

How the hell do you guys get let alone find gigs that offer 5-weeks of PTO? Or even get it approved to be able to use?

Find jobs at companies that aren't terrible? Take time off when you want because it's part of your compensation and if they don't let you take it then they are stealing from you?

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

MC Fruit Stripe posted:

Yesterday I asked two senior sys admins to figure out what we need for a particular environment, get quotes, and buy it. They seemed confused by this, in a way that told me they thought it was beneath them. I pressed a little bit and one of them stated that they haven't done that in a long time.

Am I living my life backwards? I thought that was a more senior task, being able to identify what's needed for a project, and then run with it without any further intervention. Their reactions were as though I'd just asked them to man the helpdesk for a little bit.

Is buying stuff now a job for your newest sys admin or something?

This is probably because they have no idea how to do any of that stuff.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

HatfulOfHollow posted:

And that shouldn't imply anything bad about them. I've spent nearly my entire career in the large enterprise. Every company I've worked for has had a team of people who deal with the money and handle getting quotes and actually paying for things. The architects and senior engineers in these companies only spec out new systems and then hand it off to procurement to get quotes. I haven't had to actually talk to a salesperson in the past decade.

If someone asked me to buy hardware I'd give them a deer-in-the-headlights stare because I wouldn't even know where to begin.

That's probably the exception, and not the norm. Most companies aren't large enough to justify the expense for dedicated architects so sysadmins often pull double duty.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Zero VGS posted:

I'm not replaceable in my opinion (or my boss's opinion) because I do the work of two people at the wage I'm paid and I purchase $10,000 worth of equipment on eBay every month for years with my own credit card. I'm immediately reimbursed, but because there's no such thing as a company card and all the approved channels are up to ten times as much money for the same things (kickbacks way up the ladder I think), the CFO set me up as a vendor so I can buy this way legit. I save the place 100k a year (I itemized it for the CEO to prove it) in a way that no one else is willing to do. But my gripe is this job pays me what they think they can get away with, not what they think I'm worth. This was my attempt to flip the script.

You're so irreplaceable that they can't be bothered to pay you anything like a competitive wage for your position? And because you have a credit card?

Almost nobody anywhere is truly irreplaceable and the people that are aren't underpaid.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Whether you can count on a bonus or not depends entirely on how your employment contract is structured. Generally if they don't lay out specific criteria for receiving the bonus, and don't include hard numbers describing how much it will be, then you probably shouldn't count on it. Anything that you want and expect to be paid should be detailed in the employment contract along with the criteria for receiving that pay. Anything they promise beyond that doesn't exist.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Looks like I'm going to be leaving NetApp to go to a VAR and be a Pre/Post-Sales Consultant. Slightly less money, but they have unlimited PTO, zero-dollar health care (for the employee, at least) and some other nice perks, in addition to giving me a chance to work with some technology that I haven't gotten to play with as much since I've been at NetApp. Should be a nice change of pace. NetApp is a really excellent company to work for though, and if you ever get a chance I would highly recommend it. They treated me really well.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Tab8715 posted:

What is pre or posts sales anyhow?

Pre-Sales: Meet with the customer, discuss their needs and requirements, propose hardware/software purchases that will help them meet those requirements, come up with plan to implement the stuff you've just sold.

Post-Sales: Actually implement that plan.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

SamDabbers posted:

Wouldn't we all. I guess it's just too much to expect a boss to have your back in the face of unreasonable demands, run interference when you're trying to get things done, and shield you from corporate politics.

I've had plenty of decent to great bosses. This thread can be pretty fatalistic sometimes and it leads to people thinking that there are no good jobs, good bosses, or good companies out there, so they should just suck it up and suffer. You have to be proactive about looking for those things and advocating for yourself, but they are out there.

Alternately, work to become the boss and do things the right way.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Pantology posted:

This is accurate, but do note that often Pre-Sales' plan is a PowerPoint slide with a single bullet reading "Post-Sales Will Figure it Out."

Well, part of the appeal of the new position is that I will be doing both pre and post sales, so I won't have to worry about the all too common problem of pre-sales making impossible promises and post-sales getting blamed for failing to deliver them. There's a certain logic to being forced to eat your own dog food. A lot of companies, tend to split the two roles because it's tough to find people who have the soft skills required to handle the sales side of pre-sales and also the solid technical skills to do post-sales. It's much easier to just hire two different people with two different skill sets.

skipdogg posted:

drat Nips, you're going to leave NetApp? Isn't that one of the best places to work in the country? Pre/Post sales can be fun I guess, I would get tired of the meetings and power points though.

Like I said, NetApp has been really great, it was just time for a change. The new company is a NetApp partner (along with Nimble, Tintri, VMware, Cisco, Comvault, and a bunch of other crap I'll get to play with more now) though, so I'll still be doing a fair amount of NetApp work. I also like the customer facing stuff, so I don't mind the meetings and powerpoints and demos and all that. I'll also get to teach and probably develop some training curriculum, which will be different and could be fun. Mostly the variety of the new gig appeals to me. Things can get a little stale working for a vendor.

air- posted:

So I'm a post sales consultant right now and my company hired a bunch of "solution architects" who really have made my life far more miserable instead of helping me out.

What's a solution architect supposed to be responsible for? I mean other than having an absurdly full calendar, and when I do get them in a meeting, they fumble and stumble in front of the client.

Also NippleFloss, I'd like to hear more about NetApp, mind if I contact you over pm?

Like so many other job titles in IT, Solutions Architect can mean a lot of different things. My title at the new company is actually Solutions Architect, but it's really just consulting. I've seen Solutions Architect used as a title for a variety of different roles (some slightly different, some very), but generally they're the big idea person. They come up with the overall framework for how some IT problem is going to be solved. They might do the high level design of a new data center, or they might map out the relationships and dependencies between different parts of a new application coming online, or they might be in charge of determining how you will orchestrate your cloud resident data-center, or how you would deploy the different pieces of a sharepoint farm and how they fit together...they sit down with the customer and do the overall design, but someone else generally manages the technical details and deployment. But like most IT titles, it's very fluid.

And yes, feel free to PM me about NetApp.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Docjowles posted:

I'm sure it can vary, but does a pre-sales engineer typically work on a commission basis like "normal" sales? Or are you getting paid the same amount whether or not the deal gets closed?

If it's a pure pre-sales role it's almost always commission based in my experience.

Pantology posted:

I greatly prefer that model. Someday...

Agreed. Have been in post-sales for the past 3 years, having to take the blame for and then try to fix someone else's mistake is deeply frustrating. At least if I screw up the pre-sales part I know I've earned the abuse.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

CLAM DOWN posted:

He said "Work more efficiently and don't get taken advantage of", implying the onus is on the employee to not get taken advantage of by the employer. That's the part I disagreed with.

You should always, as an employee, be looking out for yourself. Yes, it would be awesome if labor law or cultural standards kept employers honest in their dealings, but they don't. Some employers are great, but there are also unscrupulous ones that will not hesitate to take advantage of you if you let them. There is a pretty common attitude in America that employers are doing you a favor by employing you, and you don't have the right to ask for anything beyond the paycheck they are gracious enough to give you. The nice thing about IT is that it's important enough, and the skills are uncommon enough, that a good IT worker is not easily replaceable, so you have more leverage than a lot of employees. You should always be prepared to use that leverage when you're being asked to work for many extra hours without compensation.

If you're in a job where you are being asked to work extra hours and you have not laid out your expectations for compensation for those additional hours then you need to remedy that. Whether it's comp time, overtime, or a simple understanding that when things are busy you'll work extra, but when things are slow you're coming in late and leaving early, you need to advocate for yourself. You should also be looking for a new job consistently if you're not being fairly compensated. And when you negotiate with that new employer you should lay out your expectations and ideally get them formalized in your offer.

Labor in America has been so browbeaten that most of us tacitly accept that employers have all of the power because legally they do. But they still NEED employees for their business to function, and as much as they'd like you to believe it, employees aren't fungible. Any one isn't just as good as any other. You should be mindful of that and be comfortable letting your employer know that you're mindful of it, and that you expect to be treated fairly in return for your labor because an employment contract goes both ways, and needs to be a mutually beneficial exchange.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Inspector_666 posted:

I want to find one of these places.

I've never worked at a place that didn't at least offer comp time at one-to-one for overtime hours and I'm going on my fifth job.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Inspector_666 posted:

I get paid for work outside of specific hours, but the idea that you could leave early if nothing was happening is like, the holy grail.

Of course, I guess that would require that I get out of helpdesk type stuff.

Correct. Get into project oriented work and then hours behind much less important than meeting deadlines. Meet your deadlines early and you'll have more free time.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Misogynist posted:

lol if you actually believe this is true

Obviously it's not literally true, but experiments have borne out that people prize relative wealth over absolute wealth.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

Tab8715 posted:

If I disconnect and re-connect it's not necessarily going to "takeover" the same windows/session I had open previously? Is this the standard behavior or is usually device dependent?

The serial connection is always (there may be a caveat here somewhere, but for standard devices assume always) a continuous connection to a single session. There is no session management, it's just a direct connection in to whatever is happening on the "physical" console, whichever tty device that maps to. So yes, log out. Ive connected to devices before and found myself already logged in as root or admin because the last user didn't log out.

YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

FISHMANPET posted:

Now imagine the chef comes out and tells you this instead.

I think most people would think that was pretty cool, and a nice gesture.

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YOLOsubmarine
Oct 19, 2004

When asked which Pokemon he evolved into, Kamara pauses.

"Motherfucking, what's that big dragon shit? That orange motherfucker. Charizard."

FISHMANPET posted:

I have no doubt they would love it. They'd also love it if their meal was free, but that doesn't mean they should do it. That doesn't mean it's a good idea. And I'm sure at least one person would say "hey why aren't you cooking my meal instead of telling me it's going to take longer?"

Making your customers happy is quite often more important than being as efficient as possible, this is not a strange or foreign concept. Get away from work that requires customer interaction if you don't want to deal with the oft required social aspects.

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