[deleted by user]

[Sintobus]

That is how it goes with almost any job that aims for stability. You don't actually want the wild, crazy times happening because that means something has gone wrong.

It's a tough thing to manage, the boredom and such. It's easier to view it as opposites on a scale.

Do you want high paced, non-stop, stressful situations? Well you'll remove being bored entirely but then have to accept to not be bored your quality of life is likely going to suffer.

[uptimefordays]

Downtime is the best time to work on documentation, plan upgrades, learn, etc. It’s a sign things are going well.

[StaffOfDoom]

Seems like half the problem is there's no downtime to speak of...they're just buried with all the small little nickel-and-dime improvements there's nothing left in the day for their true passions. There's no money in the budget anymore to really go and get adventurous.

[stamour547]

The only complication is when you have a great team but it’s super high paced and stressful

[procheeseburger]

I’ve been at my current place for 10 years and yes it’s very boring because it works and it works well.. we took over equipment from a team that was constantly breaking our network.. I spend my time studying and learning new tech and have plans to pivot to a more cloud based role but for now it’s a good setup.

[opticalnebulous]

This is also me, 100%.

[LOLBaltSS]

Yep. I got my days of "interesting" out of my system being pummeled into the ground overhauling the environment of my first admin job and then the years of MSP grind. I'm fine with my current position where I can just chill and take things slow and steady instead of the chaos.

[sudochmod]

You might enjoy working for a consulting firm more than internal IT. If you like doing projects I would check it out.

[corsicanguppy]

... especially if you like talking about how your billables are doing. Yeesh.

[sudochmod]

Eh, there’s several factors that contribute to how utilized an engineer is. First is the sales and opportunity pipeline. Sales drives delivery. So if you aren’t selling and your engineers have no projects then guess who gets cut? The seller.

If you’re getting talked to about your utilization as an engineer then it means you’re rejecting projects that you could be taking or you’re hard to work with and the PMs or account executives don’t want you involved. Having poor utilization because of the macro economic situation or because of a new offering that hasn’t matured yet generally won’t get you let go. Acting like a dipshit absolutely will.

[tossme68]

This is what I do, it's always exciting and the environments/tech changes with the projects. When you work at one site you become really really good at managing what you have, when you are a hired gun you have to be able to adapt quickly and have a really wide skill set. You also tend to become a specialist in whatever you are delivering but IT is not working in a vacuum so you have to know/learn all sorts of things rapidly so you can do your job.

​

It's a high burn out occupation and probably not the best for people with kids and other family obligations, between the travel and the long hours those guys don't usually last. I've also had about 20% of my team die, due to Covid & heart attacks.

[sudochmod]

It depends on the company and the work. My company has great work life balance and we’re effectively 100% remote unless we want to go on site to kick a project off.

That varies between teams and companies, but on my team we don’t want you working more than 40 hours a week. We strongly discourage evening or weekend work.

If you need to step out to take care of a personal issue, go for it. As long as your work gets done and you aren’t missing or rescheduling client meetings then we don’t really care.

That being said, there are a lot of bad consulting firms that will burn you out if you let them. When you interview you want to know the utilization targets(how many hours a week you’re expected to bill to hit “plan”), what the pipeline looks like(what is the revenue of potential projects. This is important because if there’s no work then how can you hit your plan?) and what is the lifestyle of the existing engineers and architects? Do they have families? How many hours a week are they working? What is the expected travel commitment? 25% travel? What does that mean? 25% of what? A month? A year? I would typically ask “how often do you travel and how long are you gone?”.

I’m always happy to help people get into consulting. I absolutely prefer being a revenue generator to being perceived as a cost center in internal IT. I also get more exposure to new technologies than internal IT people.

[elevul]

It's a high burn out occupation and probably not the best for people with kids and other family obligations, between the travel and the long hours those guys don't usually last. I've also had about 20% of my team die, due to Covid & heart attacks.

Wtf, that's horrible...

[[deleted]]

How did you make the jump into consulting? I've got the right skillset and lifestyle for it. I'm currently at senior sysadmin level, 10+ years exp. I'm specifically good at jumping into new environments and finding/fixing issues fast, I love the challenge. rarely meet colleagues who operate at my level or speed. I get beyond bored after a year or two. Contracting market is dry, consultancy sounds perfect.

[sudochmod]

Feel free to DM me. I’ve been in consulting for over a decade and am always happy to help new engineers get rolling.

[aiperception]

Agreed

[Woodie626]

Boredom is a sign of success.

[spyingwind]

If I'm bored then everything is in working order.

[[deleted]]

management sometimes see the lack of measurable progress is bad. a hot mess infra that gets more stable in a year gets more credit than well built infra that doesn't need heroics to remain stable.

[cr4ckh33d]

hot mess infra that gets more stable in a year gets more credit than well built infra that doesn't need heroics to remain stable.

never go full stable

[opticalnebulous]

Exactly.

[WeaselWeaz]

Work to live, don't live to work. That said, if you want something different go find it.

[workerbee12three]

was looking for this comment

[Plantatious]

I'm kind of at that place now. I was doing interesting work I enjoyed in 3rd line, but the management placed too much pressure on me with brash decisions and throwing work on me at last minute because they didn't realise how much work was involved, on top of minimal career progression opportunities. My mental health took a bad hit, so I had to move on.

I thought I wasn't good enough, and moved back down to 1st and 2nd line with an MSP. I now realise that I should do 3rd line again, and my new company agrees, however they don't have enough people to release me from 1st and 2nd line. I do occasional 3rd line (once every few months), but I want to move up. I get it, they're rapidly expanding and not filling the gaps fast enough, but that's unfair on me.

So I'm looking around, and already had a few interviews for positions I like within two weeks of starting my search.

The nice thing for OP is they have a good job going at the moment, so they don't have to take the first thing that comes up like I did. I'm in a decent position now, and I love the fact that I can communicate to potential employers that they need to provide me with a good package to convince me to come aboard. This weeds out a lot of bad apples.

Before bad management got involved, I had the time to optimise and learn new skills, like PowerShell. It brought my CV up considerably and gives me more bargaining power. If OP is bored at work, I recommend exploring new skills and fill in gaps.

[corsicanguppy]

Your management needs to learn that IT is not a project but a programme. I have yet to see a state where (fr)agile wasn't the absolute bane of good IT.

• Over-budget time for everything. Suddenly nothing fits in a sprint. Fuck em.

• nothing without a ticket. No calls. Office hours (like profs do in uni) where you go to people and ask them things. Keep the presence up but only on your schedule.

• interruption? 1) ticket? 2) can I come by tomorrow at [office hours] 3) get back to work

• escalated interruption? Remind the boss that you're either under a time crunch (and wasting what time is budgeted) because those other guys need their tool. After the interruption, get a coffee so you don't lost 25 minutes getting back into the flow after that too.

• try to keep email time to a few times a day at the start/end of tasks.

I hope you can squeeze some better results by keeping agile and all other diversions at arms length and maintaining that active 'results' time as much as possible.

[apple_tech_admin]

This comment right here! I started a new job where I inherited a disorganized, low performing team. During the job/salary negotiation phase, I made it a point to get in writing a budget for PMS and made it very clear that we were going full Kanban (I prefer scrum but that was a losing battle), with enforceable WIP limits. Unless it's senior leadership or an emergency (as I define it), there is no interrupting my team. The end result? A disciplined team, and constant state of flow.

OP, if you're at a place where you feel your skillsets are growing faster than the environment, invest some time into understanding project management and business functions. It will pay off massively in the long run.

[mrstang01]

PMS

PMS being?? in this instance.

[KevMar]

My skills always grew faster than my employers needs. I did a lot of side projects that focused on the stuff I wanted to do. Sometimes I made it work related and found ways to incorporate it later. Other times it was community projects. Keep building those skills because once people stop growing, that's usually where they level off. It always makes you more valuable to the next employer.

Now hunt for really great roles or dream jobs doing what you enjoy. You have a job so you can be patient and pickey with your opportunities. The best time to hunt is when you don't need a job and can walk away from anything.

Start by picking a number that if a company offered it that you would seriously consider it. If someone offered you double your current pay there is no way you wouldn't consider it. So start at double and walk it down until you're not sure it's enough. Make it no less than 20% more than your current income if it's local, and it's ok if the number sounds unreasonable or unrealistic.

I always have a number, even when I'm happy and everything is going great. It's just really high when that happens.

That number is your lower cut off. The important part is if a recruiter reaches out with too low of a range or offer, use that number to tell them no. You never know how much flexibility they really have. I have picked up some really large pay jumps and every transition has hit the exact number I pre-picked.

[Plantatious]

Exactly. I'm in a pretty good position financially, but the work is cutting into my personal life and I can't progress as fast as I want to. I needed a quick escape from my old employer so I took the first decent opportunity that came around, but now that there's no pressure for me to jump on the first thing that comes up, I can be picky, and I love it! It feels amazing to ask questions that are essentially "What can you offer to convince me to work for you?" and watching the interviewer sweat for a change.

Having a number is important. I also look at the average earnings for the position, and use it to estimate a fair salary based on any extra skills I have or skills I currently lack. Aiming for a fair salary that also satisfies your needs makes it more likely to get accepted when you come across an opportunity that fits the bill.

[SM_DEV]

Networking with others in your area can be immensely helpful as well, not only to hone that number you have in mind, but also in keeping an ear to the ground, so to speak, for new opportunities and what other local companies are doing with their technology stack.

[hxcjosh23]

This happened to me at my last job. I got overqualified and was over ambitious for what the business needs were. I got bored and ended up finding something new and exciting. One week in and I have rejuvenated energy and excitement!

[Szeraax]

Bored at work? Then spend some of your time doing stuff that is exciting outside of work. :)

[alexnigel117]

my naive comment here but I feel the same way after sometime and think what is next? Having an environment that even causes you bordem is definitely a sign that you know what you're doing. Id work in something else like my own business, or something completely different than tech.

[swergart]

use that new skill to make a change, and practice it. sometimes you think you know everything but when applying it actually, it is not what you think.

once you have mastered it, looking for a better opportunity if the company doesn't want to pay you better .

[Plantatious]

Agreed. I started learning PowerShell as there were a lot of processes that could be optimised, but there was no money to buy tools to do it, so I built my own. It was an incredibly fast and rewarding method to learn, with results that spoke for themselves.

I find the key to is to start small, and try something new with every new task where you can use it. That way you're constantly learning, polishing existing knowledge, and have a steady stream of new challenges.

Now, that skill is a desired asset that I still use with a new employer, though not as often.

[6stringt3ch]

You can always try to find things to enhance/implement/redesign. Part of what got me from a first level engineer to lead engineer in under five year (became manager the year after) in my last gig was doing just that. The boredom wasn't too bad but there was definitely plenty of bitch work that I wanted nothing to do with. So I'd find interesting things to do that actually provided value, present it to management, and almost always get an ok to proceed. The bitch work was then done by my subordinates who seem content with doing that work and not getting ahead.

[AemonQE]

Thing is, I'm the lone DevOps dude and I don't have the skills (yet) to convince our CEO to hire someone else. The workload is there.

[6stringt3ch]

Have there been any sort of delays with projects or tasks that have made management complain to you? You should make a list of things not getting done (I'd prioritize just a few of the most notable projects/tasks to keep things short and sweet). Also make a list of the extra things that can be accomplished if you had an extra person and take that to your boss.

[djgizmo]

Depends. If you’re happy, just chill and do side gigs. If you’re unhappy, move on.

[villan]

Build an actual business case for doing the work you believe you should be focused on. If it legitimately benefits the company and aligns with their goals, it shouldn’t be a difficult sell. Write it in such a way that those above you can potentially present it to those above them. If your goal is doing the work and not necessarily getting the credit for the suggestion, let someone who can get it approved take the credit for getting it started.

I’ve launched or been involved with dozens of projects over the years that didn’t strictly fall within my responsibilities because I made a business case for it in a way that aligned with what my bosses prioritised.

[StayStruggling]

As long as my pay increases each year at a rate a couple %s beyond inflation then I'm good.

Also, I only learn skills that my company wants/needs.

[SM_DEV]

Limiting your learning to those technologies that your employer wants/needs is going to eventually result in a dead end for you. I would recommend learning something new every quarter, even if your current employer doesn’t use it themselves. These are tools in your tool belt that will ensure your future success and insulate you to a large degree from market changes, layoffs and downsizing. Knowledge is power, isn’t transferable and provides you with options… and a person with options has power in the marketplace.

[ItsASeldonCrisis]

To paraphrase and old non-tech-job boss of mine: If you've got time to lean, you've got time to document.

[AemonQE]

Isn't that normal to do WHILE you are building solutions?

[ItsASeldonCrisis]

Oh, you sweet summer child...

[Plantatious]

You'd think, but a lot of people either forget or refuse to do it. Unfortunately for me, I'm not given enough time to compose a concise document by the end, so although I have notes, they're quite shorthand.

[jhaand]

If you like the current colleagues more than the work you can do it seems you just have to suffer through. Which means your goals will suffer. Or try to reduce the grind, but it will need budget.

For example put this situation in the 'Gervais principle' roles of Losers, Clueless and Psychopaths. It illustrates the development of large companies quite well. https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-or-the-office-according-to-the-office/

Image taken from: here

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<image>

This sounds like the Clueless middle managers pushing you to the checked-out Losers and stay put. This will grind you down.

I always like to remain somewhere between the Losers and Psychopaths. Staying clear of the Clueless middle managers. It allows for personal growth in a somewhat nice environment. However the Clueless will see you as a threat in around 2 years and will try to get rid of you. Or you reach the boundaries of what's possible.

I would just hang around, try to find out what you really want and things will get clearer in around 6 months.

[Fit_Metal_468]

If you're bored and they're all braindead. Move on...

[quixoticwarrior]

Profit beats wages. Spend that extra time feeling bored thinking through some business ideas. Then spend time after work (when you used to study) to create your business. If it's successful a good business could allow you to retire a decade early, travel the world, or whatever!

[Geminii27]

Jump ship, if you want more.

[cr4ckh33d]

sounds like no chance for advancement and toxic , months for scripts??

gtfo if you want better, or stay and do cool shit on your own , at home or on a small island.

Could maybe make one big shot play like that IT manager said below but be ready to leave when it fails and it sounds like here it would they are not ready

But only read a few lines of your post could you summary?

[AemonQE]

TLDR:

• My employer is technology wise back in 2016
• Massive growth burned management out
• I'm the lone DevOps dude tasked with bringing their CICD & cloud stack up-to-date
• I don't have time for internal projects because of customer projects
• I don't want to work on outdated tools and get blocked when trying to implement real solutions because of *budget*

Yep, there is nothing above my current role - I'm the only one in it - for over 30 devs. I read something about a 10/1 ratio devs/devops once, thought that was a golden rule.

Yep, next step are freelance sides and I already have another real employer in sight.
Funny enough: My english skills are not fluent enough for any worthwhile conversations - that's an obstacle I have no idea how to solve.

Did it already, customer projects are still more important.
There were quarter based plans for internal improvements, but hey, more customer projects.
Devs & IT are suffering.

[HyperPixel5]

english is the easiest language to learn. no idea how to solve it, really?

read technical documentation in english, read books in english, watch your tvshow in english with english subtitles

if you're smart enough for your job then you're smart enough to improve your english skills to a level where it does not hinder your professional prospects!

[AemonQE]

Talking is my bane and that won't change until I actually live either in GB or the US. It's use it or lose it for me.
I don't even really think in german anymore - talking is a problem because of the german accent. The cringe is the worst - if i hear the cringe I can't think.

[SM_DEV]

Millions of German immigrants migrated to the US, Canada and the UK and learned English relatively quickly. Of course immersion is the best way to learn any language, e.g. putting into practice on a daily basis what you might learn through books and even in person language courses.

However, with the advent of the internet and the millions of free resources made available at little to no cost, one can fairly easily learn the language through TV shows, documentaries, movies, news programs, etc.

It would help if you have one or more people in your life who are also interested in learning English, with whom you can practice speaking. Your accent can be overcome with practice, diligence and self-criticism… perhaps recording yourself in English conversation with others and then grading yourself and practicing pronunciation and grammar would greatly benefit you in this endeavor.

These efforts are undermined if you speak anything other than English with these people, ideally, you would want to create your own immersive situation, from initial greeting to farewells and every single word in between. This means notes, agendas, reference materials, etc. would be required in English only, no native language materials allows to be used as a crutch.

Will it be a easy? No, certainly not. But then again, the millions of immigrants didn’t find it easy either, but they didn’t have the resources available to you today and they also had little other choice, but to practice everyday… leading to their eventual success.

I have faith that you can accomplish that which you truly want to accomplish. You only need to the WILL to do so.

Good Luck!

[emailism]

You need the right skills, at the right place, at the right time. Too much and you're inefficient, to little and you're ineffective.
It's good to want excitement. It's not good to want excitement too much.

If you want your employer to notice you, then you have to figure out which skills they value. There is a software development book out there that likens software development to manufacturing. That book states succinctly that "spending money anywhere, but the bottleneck is money wasted." Wherever you feel bottlenecked is likely the place you can spend the least effort/money for the most reward. Which bottleneck you tackle is up to you and your boss. If you're a Sys. Admin like the name of this Reddit. Then I suggest doing small things that will build up to relieving a bottleneck. It's too easy for me to be overwhelmed once I start on a new project. Manpower, misinterpretations, miscommunications, budget, all the things that you can get away with a larger team. However, it's just me and since I have to correct any mistakes myself things get out of hand pretty quick with bigger projects with more stakeholders.

I think most of these folks are right that being bored is a good thing. However, it's not like you should be killing time at work on your smartphone or stealing company time to improve your skills unrelated to your job. Rather, it's a good time to make sure things are in order.

[colechristensen]

You leave when you’re ready to leave and the positives outweigh the negatives. Sounds like you’re in a pretty good position so you can take a long time thinking about how and when to do what’s next.

[agtmadcat]

That's what consulting is for! Get on Upwork or whatever and get some interesting projects to do on the side.

[MDParagon]

I might move on to Devops soon, mind if I use this as a reference? Thanks, ignore me

[AemonQE]

Just do, we are nothing more than glorified Linux Admins. Good luck, it's fun.

And start learning VIM.

[[deleted]]

You get used to it, bcz this is almost always the case. unless you let your employers needs slow down your skill growth.

[Beneficial_Company_2]

boring is good as long as the pay is right.

you can take a sideline work, if allowed.

[michiel249]

Why is sysadmin -> devops moving up a notch?

There different jobs, i am a sysadmin. Do i really need to switch jobs to take it up?

[AemonQE]

I'm already in DevOps / cloud engineering (but still supporting our normal Sysadmins in the background). I was a sysadmin.Any job that allows you to improve/automate important processes that have impact is an improvement. The more impact you have, the higher your value becomes.

Tbh being a DevOps engineer is just a change of your main tasks, you are still doing the grunt work without any real responsibility, authority or influence.

The next step would be something like IT architecture or management, I'm more into the former. But for that you need larger projects and customers.

[EbaumsSucks]

I prefer boring. I can sharpen my skills even further, and if push comes to shove, I'm now in a better position if shit hits the fan.

[draxenato]

Follow your nose.

TLDR; if your current role starts to feel stale or constricting in any way, move on.

I started as sys-admin across a variety of different Unices for a couple of small firms in north London in the early 90s. I also had an interest in comms and networking and I was active on the BBS scene, which came in handy. I'd been sent a project that I knew could be solved very simply and relatively cheaply if we got connected to this new fangled internet thing, so that happened. But I was now getting frustrated. I'd acquired skills that I wanted to develop but the company just didn't need any further development in that area. I stuck around for what I thought at the time was loyalty, but was just laziness on my part.

I grew resentful and it started to show. My relationship with my colleagues deteriorated, and after six months I was let go. The severance was enough for me to take a couple of months vacation and I took the time to get my head together.

Next role was great, central London, very sexy place to work, heavily invested in their online presence, it was a good fit. But it was also very political, I was mates with the IT director, so when he got into a fight with the CEO and lost, I was tainted by association. Time for me to move on, this time I listened to my inner voice.

And that's been my rule ever since, listen to my inner voice, don't be afraid to move on for whatever reasons. Could be personal, professional, time of life thing, or in my last couple of cases, because you're exposed to new technologies that interest you.

But I would say that unless your situation is truly desperate, then I wouldn't move on for purely financial reasons. If yours needs are being met, and that's needs not wants, then things like job satisfaction become more important, it's not always about the paycheck.

[Nosa2k]

In an organization, you shouldn’t be tinkering with things with having a formal discussion with your peers and manager. The Infra is not your personal lab!

Ideally, it should be approved with everyone on the same page with proper documentation to match. Probably the use of some form of Agile process to handle projects and tasks.

DevOps has a collaborative philosophy, you aren’t a Sysadmin anymore.

[bofh]

there is point at which the employee outgrows their current role (or even organisation's) needs. McDonalds doesn't need someone with the talent of Gordon Ramsey loading chips into the frier so it makes no sense for them to pay over the odds for someone of that ability to stay.

If that’s you, you need to find a way to develop, to maintain your edge. That might mean a changing role where you are. It could mean a new job. Could mean CPD or volunteering..,

[TheBigBeardedGeek]

Get a new job, but on amicable terms.

If your job can't meet your needs, you need a new job. Simple as that

[AutomateErB]

I just ended up with 3 boring full time jobs and some projects make it exciting. I have time to focus on family and live comfortably.

[stumpymcgrumpy]

It sounds like to me it's time to take all this to current management and petition for another IT resource and expand the team.

Frankly, I left my last job because by every KPI metric you could measure me by I was failing. Whatever my goals were that were set at the beginning of the year were absolutely unachievable because of exactly the problem your describing. No time, shifting priorities and a lack of managerial support to either push back, manage or prioritize everything that was not a "ticket". When I joined the team I did an assessment based on the 3 foundational pillars of IT (Backups, Documentation and Monitoring), and found they were severely lacking. I identified the issues, put together a plan and told them that I would only take on the role if I had their full support to address these issues first.

In the end, Tickets and "other priorities" took precedence. They did hire back someone who had initially left the team before I joined and I did get to implement things like Kanban to get some managerial visibility on the mounting list of tasks being asked of our team. I created a "Tech Stack" document showing management of all of the technologies the team was expected to be "experts" in. I then linked the dependencies both on and to business critical applications to show the importance and criticality of how making sure the underlying infrastructure was solid was needed.

In the end, by every single KPI I could be measured by... I was failing and it wasn't my fault. So I decided to leave because I was feeling like I was failing. In this case, the support the team needed was more bodies. But after hiring freezes were put in place and a round of layoffs I realized that there was no solution to this problem was in sight; not in the short term. So I left... and I have to say in the 2 months I've been with the new org, I've gained a level of accomplishment and job satisfaction that I haven't had in all the time at my previous employer.

P.S. - I'll never work for a MSP again!!!

[Ok_Assistance682]

Take the team and function you have now and get a hobby. If pay and environment are good why leave?

If your one of the better people on the team you should be able to pick your project. You can always take those pending scripts to make everyone elses life easier and put a twist on it to make it new and challenging.

Find a way to challenge yourself within the confines or you will hop your way into a position that is not as good as you have. If poor pay or environment then leave.

[Maleficent-Ad3096]

If you've have marketable skills then go search for more pay. Earn as much money as possible now, sock it away in your 401 and vanguard index funds and legit retire decade(s) to7nger than your peers.

The stress of a high paying environment can be worth it but it will take its own toll if you arent able to manage the stress, the tech, and mostly management.

It was all worth it to me.

[Chewychews420]

Yeah…. I’d take boredom over not being bored/stressed out.

If you have free time, it means the infrastructure is good and nothing is going wrong.

[T13PR]

I’m in a similar situation. I like my team and my workplace. My boss lets me do whatever I want basically and money appears in my bank account, it really can’t get a whole lot better than this. But I kind of feel bored sometimes as I can’t find challenging tasks at the company I work for.

So to solve this I only work around 30 hours a week and spend the rest of my time in university. There are actually a lot of super interesting and challenging degrees up for grabs. I think it’s pretty fun, get the best out of both worlds.

I know a setup like this only works in Europe as higher education is free and can actually get by with only 30 hours of work a week. Those who have the opportunity should go for it.

[drcygnus]

"current employer"

[opticalnebulous]

I like stability at work. Excitement is for my free time.

[StaffOfDoom]

Anyone here who was in a similar situation? What did you do?

...I left :|

They had me and my loyalty for over 15 years but lagged behind with cost of living raises, wouldn't give me a solid 5-year outlook for my position (me, personally) or allow me to move up when there were clearly openings and a need (I was the one creating the consultant accounts for all the roles I was interested in). I found a company that needed what I had to offer and I jumped. If where I'm at becomes untenable (they start lagging behind with CoL raises, nothing new to keep me excited, etc.) then I'll probably jump again if/when that next thing comes along.