Job and General Employment Thread

[dodint]

I'm too tired and lazy to google it but if your new micromanaging supervisor mentions that any after hour (and weekend) calls to your employer provided cell phone should be returned within two hours that's effectively being on-call 365 days a year, right?

He slipped that into a meeting yesterday. One of the reasons I keep this job is because once I step away from my desk I can just shut it off. My position requires OT on an as-needed emergency basis (and I'm paid for it) but in the past it has always been planned, not emergent.

I hate that my new supervisor is effectively turning me into the shitty government employee that I always loathed. I'm now concerned about the nexus of position descriptions, labor codes, and timekeeping regulations.

[NTP66]

Yeah, that's exactly what that means. Your supervisor is a clown.

[dodint]

When we were on the conference a team member direct messaged me and said "He's trying to ruin Christmas, isn't he?" I laughed. We're both former Marines and this feels like a virtual Recall Formation.

[faftorial]

Yeah, that's exactly what that means. Your supervisor is a clown.

[meow]

If feel like if your employer provides you a phone, you are on call 24/7/365, but that isn’t often communicated to the recipient.

[skullman80]

This Friday is my last Friday I will work this year. Since we can't carry over vacation (only sick time), and can't sell it back.... I have a whole bunch saved up from this year. So I took every Friday off in December, and then the last two weeks of the month...so I have a nice 17 or so day stretch off at the end of the year (factoring in company holidays and such).

[NTP66]

If feel like if your employer provides you a phone, you are on call 24/7/365, but that isn’t often communicated to the recipient.

That's definitely not the case. Most of IS where I work has company phones, but only a small portion of them are on-call. That's what on-call is for.

[meow]

If feel like if your employer provides you a phone, you are on call 24/7/365, but that isn’t often communicated to the recipient.

That's definitely not the case. Most of IS where I work has company phones, but only a small portion of them are on-call. That's what on-call is for.

Yes, but it sounds like that was communicated to them. That’s my point. Employers give someone a phone without telling them if it means they are on call or not, but they assume the employee knows that they are . Good for your company for being transparent with it.

[dodint]

If feel like if your employer provides you a phone, you are on call 24/7/365, but that isn’t often communicated to the recipient.

We have phones because we (used to) travel and (used to) do field site visits on a routine basis. I've been here 4 years and this lower level manager is the first one ever to mention you *must* carry your phone with you after business hours.

If that's the rules, fine. But I think he's done this without thinking and there isn't anything to back it up. I can choose to run down the regulation and case law and present it proactively, or just call his bluff and show him it's unenforceable when I don't answer.

Just to reiterate, I like the guy. He's just wrong on this particular issue.

[NTP66]

That's about when I'd be turning in my work phone.

[iamjs]

When I first my current company, they asked if I wanted a company phone or the allowance. I opted for the allowance since I wasn't required to be on call and off hours calls were few and far between. Since I had an app on my phone that tied in with our phone service provider in the office, it would allow me to take calls through that app while giving the impression that I was calling from the office.

Fast forward to sometime in March 2020 in the early days of quarantining. Somebody in the office decided to share my cell number, and it spread through the office quicker than COVID. I was getting calls at 1030 at night from somebody requesting access to a third-party site that one of our departments uses regularly. Of course I didn't pick up. About two weeks later and after the 4th or 5th call that was late into the night, I asked for a company phone.

I still get calls/texts to that number even after adding my mobile number with the note that "any calls to the previous phone number ending in xxxx will not be reviewed or returned." Even worse, my personal number has made it to a few vendors that remind me weekly that they would like to meet up to review services, hardware, etc.

[RonnieFranchise]

My company went to Bring your own Device a few years ago. They will put their VPN, etc on your personal phone and give you $50 a month which you have to submit an expense for. The latest ios update blew all the corporate stuff away and it is glorious. Think I will forego the $50 from now on.

[faftorial]

My company went to Bring your own Device a few years ago. They will put their VPN, etc on your personal phone and give you $50 a month which you have to submit an expense for. The latest ios update blew all the corporate stuff away and it is glorious. Think I will forego the $50 from now on.

We used to have that for laptops ($100/month) to use our own but the new corporate overlords made us use company controlled computers when they took over.

[mikey]

The mikey pto thing, maybe offer an option to make it a one time thing because of covid in case you don't win

I ended up framing it that way...I wasn't sure if I was giving away a negotiating point or not by doing that...so I said, "covid era", leaving me enough room to rope 2021 into it...

Culminating in a 20 minute telephonic debate with the CEO, this failed. I ended it with, "Look, I tried to do this clean and the right way...now, I have to waste time figuring out how to get around the rule..."

So, I have my plans for the day all set...

[dodint]

Telephonic? What era sent you here?

[blackjack68]

My Performance Review paperwork still includes “telephonic” in it.

[iamjs]

Our building actually had a fire drill today.

From what I saw on our sign-in sheet, there were four people here today. If you don't count the guy who just kept walking to his car, want to guess who was the only one that went outside?

[mamaemeritus]

If you don't count the guy who just kept walking to his car

This made me laugh really hard.

[meow]

Yeah that dude has it right. Peace out

[blackjack68]

I’ve done that. If it’s after 3pm, I’m gone.

But not first thing in the morning. Maybe he was going to grab some breakfast.

[iamjs]

Nope, he's definitely gone. He asked me if I could sign him out on the sign-in sheet prior to getting in his car.

We don't have any official in-office hours right now, so people come and go as they please. I'm usually in by 8 and if I'm lucky I leave by noon and work the rest of the day remotely. There is another department that has people intermittently showing up around the time that I'm leaving. It's weird in the sense that if you need to get a hold of someone who has shown up to the office since we kinda reopened, you don't know if they're here or working remotely. However, if I ever needed to get a hold of anybody remotely, they have been mostly available.

[willeyeam]

*firmwide email from COO letting everyone know that a certain thing changed and this certain thing is available to everyone on a research tool we have*

*Email to ulf - hey ulf, you're the expert in this area and I'm having trouble finding this, can you send it when you have a chance?*

*One hour later IM to ulf - hey, see my email? Not to rush you but can you do that?*

*Me, waiting until 4pm to send now*

[DigitalGypsy66]

*Me, waiting until 4pm to send now*

One of my favorite things about using enterprise Gmail is the "Scheduled send" feature. Answer an easy question, but don't want to get into a back and forth with the recipient right now? Send it the next morning or after work hours. It's great lol

[NTP66]

That's available in Exchange/Outlook, as well, and comes in handy.

[meow]

I have a hard time processing that ulf is an 'expert' in anything