Apathy and Frustration

[Crossroads]

So I sit here at the clientco this morning facing another day of trying to unpick the mess that is a general lack of clear objectives against which I can write a strategy document for them.

I'd rather be doing some infrastructure design or implementation where I actually get to *do* something, and it's reaching breaking point.

I should be feeling the love for the role - Architecture, Strategy Design... done it before, quite enjoy it sometimes, but it's just not floating my boat, even with the big rate attached. I can see what needs to be done, just can't seem to articulate it. Maybe I need a holiday. Maybe I need to go and sharpen some technical skills and to hell with the rate.

Has anyone willingly done that and got any good experiences - i.e. leaving a senior architecture role and going and doing 3rd/4th line support? Was it a refreshing change to be hands on? Was it a big mistake?

Is it just me, or do others find themselves thinking "Why am I doing this?" Lighthearted motivational strategies and equally exit strategies appreciated. It's a long time to Friday :-)

[zoco]

I fully empathise with your situation. Corporate IT can be excruciatingly boring and tedious to work in.

I wouldn't look at 2nd line support or development as a way out though. I've been in my current role for 4 weeks and I still haven't started coding. In fact, the work I've been hired to do has been signed off and I saw the project plan yesterday. I could do that work stood on my head in less than a week. The reality of the situation is that I will spend 3 months mired in bureaucracy and getting to grips with their Godawful in house CMS.

Probably what you should do (and I should have known better in accepting this gig but I was lured by the rate) is look at working for a smaller company. The rate will be lower and your workload more demanding but you're more likely to be in charge of what you are doing and will be free from all the usual bollocks. You'll probably find you need to be a bit of a jack of all trades and will learn a lot of new stuff on the job but,eh, that's the challenge and I enjoy rising to it.

I guess that the downside is that these small gigs are usually fairly short lived - they don't have money to burn like the big companies so I normally find I come in, spec it up, build it, test it and support it for a bit then that's my lot. I normally find I've had my fill by then anyhow so I'm happy to look for a new role (and who wants to be a permie-tractor anyway?).

If I were you I'd be tempted to throw in the towel but it depends on what your motivations are. How long have you been in the gig? I've just started this one but I'm probably in too deep now. I'm on a 6 monther but am going to hand in my cards in a month's time so that at least I've got a 3 month stint on my CV.

I also don't know what your skills are but I'm Microsoft MVC,JQuery front end stuff so I really don't worry about the bench and have never had trouble finding a gig.

anyway - don't let the bastards grind you down!
.By the way, you can't be that apathetic - I see you posted this from your desk at 7.30 am!

[Spacecadet]

So I sit here at the clientco this morning facing another day of trying to unpick the mess that is a general lack of clear objectives against which I can write a strategy document for them.

Instead of trying to write strategy against unclear objectives, first work on distilling a set of objectives which you can work against.
What can't be clarified will need to be designed to be flexible.

Once you've sorted out the objectives you'll feel a lot happier about planning the strategy.

[Chunk]

Try working for the Beeb.

It's a real yawnfest

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ!!

[BrilloPad]

Keep calm, keep invoicing, keep posting on cuk.

And stop whining.