Happy. But skeptical. I like the people I work with, I have a ton of flexibility, and I’m so well paid that it’s a little weird. I like this stuff, and would do most of it for free. But the MegaCorp I work at has been tightening their screws with worker hostile stuff: removing benefits, changing pay structures, trying to force me to go to the office, and etc. All that changes how I look at what I’m doing. They are, of course, psychopaths. I always knew that but thought I found a comfortable little groove in the system to do things I like with people I like. Now… Less. There’s an undercurrent of coercion that makes me feel a little icky, and now I’m more ready to roll the dice on change and seeing what’s next.
My main career is supposed to be as a team lead in mechanical engineering. Through a lot of unfortunate event I became a full time Python Dev at my last job which I quitted due to lack of recognition. Through similar events I’m now the “official” sysadmin for two companies. Here’s the thing, I love doing sysadmin work, went and got my rhel certs, built a homelab, all that stuff. I’m a Linux nerd to the bone. But FML I’m now stuck rebuilding two whole ecosystems built on top of hyper-v and active directory. I like my job in a sense but I also hate that I’m now stuck being paid in line with the mechanical engineering field while working more on the IT side. Working on my CS degree rn.
It’s good. The pay is good and it’s very flexible. I get to work with some pretty cool technologies (especially Kubernetes). I’m glad that I have an opportunity to improve my skills in these areas where I’m honestly not that good. I work with brilliant people, most of whom are better than me in almost every way possible. I should be grateful.
But I’m bored. I feel like I’m just maintaining other people’s work and that I’m not really building anything novel. I feel like I’m just tweaking and maintaining things that are already mostly finished. I don’t feel like I’m learning as much as I’d like to. It’s very mentally challenging too - which feels like it should be a good thing, but after a while, I just want to be assigned something that I feel confident that I can do without too much trouble or difficulty so I have some spare energy to focus on other things that I find more interesting.
I’m really wondering why I feel like I’m in a rut lately. I took a nice long holiday break, and yet I still haven’t got much done so far this year. I’ve been sick, and still feel a little burned out from the inevitable pre-holiday rush. I also think there’s definitely a bit of wintertime depression at play too. So I’m hopeful that things will get better soon if I just bear on and wait for a bit.
I’m still looking at new jobs, but very casually and being very picky about it. It’s hard to say if the right thing to do is to change jobs or just change my outlook on life instead. I feel like the smart thing to do is to stay and wait for my mood to improve. I really don’t want to change to a new job, just to find myself feeling the exact same way a couple more years down the line. But all the same, I just want to look around and see what’s out there. As I go through the applying/interviewing process, I think I’ll get a better feel of whether the problem is me or my job.
Sigh. Is it too early to retire yet? I’ll be 30 in just a few more years, surely that’s old enough…
Anyway, thanks for posting this. Would definitely like to see it become a regular topic!
Earning well enough to look forward to a life of living in an apartment I don’t own until I die but not enough to buy my own house. Sad thing is that I’m probably in the top 10% of earners in my job in my country. And yet I’m not doing anything engaging. Nothing I’m doing actually is essential to the world. The world could do without the things I’m forced to make.
I feel stuck and the only thing that helps with that feeling is writing opensource stuff. Nobody I know of actually uses my stuff, so maybe it’s as useless as my job, but at least it’s out in the open and could potentially inspire somebody else.
The meme of IT staff becoming handymen or farmers might be me soon.
I’m mostlyhappy with my job, the benefits and pay are relatively good. however, I’m becoming more and more disabled and I’m not sure how much longer i can do it. and that scares me, because I’m not skilled enough to replace the pay I’m getting here (custodial) or the pension.
I put in my 2 weeks the other day. It lasted less than 8 months but they were miserable ones.
I don’t have any alternatives lined up yet, hoping to switch into something devops.
Eh, its fine. I get paid OK, I work remote full time, health benefits are good.
I’d like more pay of course, and a better structure around what I actually do (I’m considered a specialist, so I’m on… Everything). I’d have to leave consulting for manufacturing or direct to corporate to do that though, which comes with its own issues in both cases.
It’s fine. Could be better. Could be a lot worse.
I’m not.
