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Admin
I was out of the Army for about a year when I was recalled, and got stuck with a bunch of yokels from the Louisiana national guard. I'm in Baghdad, Iraq, and once a week or so we drive a bunch of trucks for an hour and half, sit around and then drive back.
Including prep time, I work at most 10 hours in a week, and some of these idiots are bitching about not having enough time off.
There are thousands of people at this FOB doing fuck all, just sucking up taxpayer dollars.
Admin
I want a job like this. Only in my case I would spend it sleeping until 10am, drinking coffee at the local starbucks, and playing World of Warcraft.
Where can I sign up?? This is like my dream job!
Admin
I want such a job too... a couple of them actually... I think I can do part time for at least 5 companies :)
Admin
Best. Job. Ever.
Admin
When I read the article I kept thinking of Accenture.
Being paid to do nothing only sounds like a dream job to those who haven't tried it. Sounds more like jail to me. I hate, hate, hate being bored.
Admin
Yes. Contrary to popular belief, not everyone loves their jobs. I am good at programming, but it's boring and monotonous. I do it for money. If I can get a job that pays me more money, I'll do that. I am not my job, it does not define me as a person, and it doesn't need to be fun, exciting, or challenging. It's work that needs to be done. We don't all get to be astronauts.
If I could find a job that would pay me while I fiddle around on my guitar and play video games all day, I would do that. Hell I'd probably eventually do some small contract work on the side and get double the pay.
Admin
At the large consulting firm where I worked it wasn't uncommon for someone to spend a couple months on the bench. I met someone who spent at long as 5 months before he got fired. That's really the scary part is that if you are straight out of college, you really need the experience. If you get fired and then try to get a new job, all you're going to be able to say in your interview was "They didn't think I was qualified for anything, and then they fired me". Guess how well that will go. The 5-months guy is now working as a salesman in a computer store -- a major step down from consulting.
The fact is that if you are talented, you won't spend a single day on the bench. As soon as I was finishing one project, they would have me lined up for the next one. If you spend that much time on the bench, then there is something wrong with you... and possible future employers will understand that. After all, who's going to work with someone crappy while paying a talented person to do nothing?
Admin
"they needed a mid-level experienced VB developer."
So, she was over-qualified for the job?
Admin
I have never heard of a company that paid the full pay check whilst benched. Most companies pay 40% - 60% of the total pay.
That's how employment contracts are written.
Admin
One summer in college, I accepted a job through a staffing firm that ended up being a lot like this.
Ostensibly I was hired to set up desktop PCs for employees who were being moved into a new office space, and for maybe the first three or four days of the job that's what I did. After that, the move seemed to be falling behind schedule; I couldn't set up computers that hadn't arrived yet in cubicles that hadn't been constructed yet, so I'd be idle a few hours for every few minutes of actual work I could do.
Within a few weeks, I was getting paid 8 hours of wages each day to drive to the site, do a walk-through, drink coffee and read the paper, take a 3-hour early lunch, do another walk-through, and then drive home.
I consider it the worst job I ever had. Lord knows how Sally could tolerate it for more than a year, or how some professional shirkers made a decades-long career out of it.
Admin
It was beneath her.
Admin
Sure she had an easy life but how long can you possibly milk such a gig? Definitely not from College to Retirement. So eventually you'll have to find another job and I don't think
2001 - 2005 college 2005 - 2010 paid vacation at XYZ
makes for a particularly good resume...
Admin
If you run into something like this consider it study time.
Admin
Seems like this lady should have been smarter. After about a week of sitting around I would have been looking for a new job. It is a miracle (and about as easy to believe) that they kept her that long. If this company did keep her around then they are the enemy in my opinion. Any of you who would do this and not feel as if your cheating, remember this situation the next time you are trying to convince a client that there is value in what you do...
Admin
Wouldn't you be expecting a lay off at any moment? I would have spent the time looking for a new job.
Admin
I'm pleased to say that I get to sleep in past 10:00am every day at my current dev job. But I do at least have to write some code now and then so Sally clearly has me beat. Where do I sign up?
I have to say though, if that's the life I had straight out of University I would have gotten complacent and probably wouldn't have nearly as a good a job as I do now.
Admin
There's the problem right there. If you're fresh out of college and looking to go right into any kind of management, you're going down the wrong path. Managers are notoriously expendable, and without any technical skills you may have a lot of trouble finding work if you are laid off.
Admin
I have worked for a company that did that, but while on the bench you were typically expected to come into the corporate office and do some sort of work on internal apps or training material etc.
Admin
I'd rather be bored doing nothing at home than be bored working at my shitty job.
Admin
Where's the "Profit!" ?
Admin
Could be, though it also smells of EDS.
Admin
So...now I know how people have the time to develop for the Open Source community. What kernel models was Sally involved in?
Admin
This is not a WTF - it's a dream come true. And for those who have suggested that Sally should have looked for a new job, what the hell is wrong with you people? Have you got something against free money? I'd drag that one out for as long as physically possible, I couldn't care less about job security while I'm getting paid for nothing.
Admin
Admin
doing nothing all day? sounds like torture. how can you spend you life, or even a day, doing nothing?
Admin
Other than that being the perfect job, I take one issue with the story. Battleships do not turn slowly, nor do carriers. If you want a ship metephor for something that turns slowly, it is a tanker.
Admin
These situations DO (or DID) exist. I was hired by a computer temp agency and then spent three months on the "beach", as my company called it. Eventually, the client (who was paying the computer temp agency) got their requirements sorted out and hardware ordered, and I started doing actual work. This was many years ago; things may have changed in how this works nowadays.
Admin
BTDT
I had a similar situation around 20 years ago. I got hired to do a project at a major insurance company, when it came to my start date, I was informed that the project had been canceled (about 1 month BEFORE I even interviewed with them).
The first month I was there all they had me do was review the documentation for the canceled project.
The second month, I took 2 weeks of pre-arranged vacation (this was scheduled before I was even hired, my taking the time was my condition of employment).
Months 3-6 I weaseled my way onto a project as a systems analyst
Somewhere around month 7 they asked -- "do you know anything about XYZ???", my answer was no, but I do know "ABC & QRZ -- which is why you hired me in the first place" so they sent me to school for XYZ then I got put into another holding pattern -- "just wait" they said
After the 10th month I finally called a former employer and asked if they had anything open and told them I could start any day.
Admin
If I had a job like this for 11 months, I'd like to think that I'd spend at least 10 months working on some awesome open-source project under a pseudonym.
As an added bonus, at my next job interview, I can point to that project and tell them that I did it in "my spare time" and watch how impressed they were.
Admin
Infosys. Totally sounds like Infosys. I was benched for 2 months before I got bored and started sending out resumes. Glad I did too, b/c like "Sally" anyone who wasn't fired after a year on the bench got shipped across the US to a region they didn't request to do PM work they did not go to college for. Pretty great 2 months though!
captcha: delenit. "Dag-it maw, stop downloadin' all that adware and delenit' already."
Admin
6 years at an IT consulting firm and I haven't done a single day on the bench. But then I came in with 20 years experience, and demand is high for senior infosec consultants.
We usually hire juniors to fill jobs on contracts we already won or are working hard on winning, so a new arrival sitting on the bench is a rare exception. It happens regularly between contracts, and it is necessary for us to have a few guys on the bench so we can respond quickly to customer needs.
Those who spend long times on the bench are those whose resumes don't fit customer's requirements on RFPs. Some resumes are harder to "sell". When that happens we try to give more training to the guy, to make up with missing experience. In rare cases we have to let someone go if we can't find him a contract after some time.
Admin
Oh, It's not due to hate of my profession, it's due to laziness. I could get paid to stay home from any profession, I won't discriminate. You could pay me to not do IT, or not do building contract work, or not do plumbing, or not do farming, I don't mind.
Admin
Deloitte!
Admin
Someone's complaining that they didn't have to work and still got paid? There's your WTF.
Admin
nah, the thing to have done was to wait about a month or so, then start looking around. get hired and have both jobs. then when they finally called for a job tell them you quit. that way you still get to collect 2 paychecks for a year.
Admin
The issue with the job wasn't that it wasn't good, it was, in fact, too good. The issue is that when the company starts to downsize, I'm sure its going to be looking for all the people that it's paying to sit and do nothing first.
In a project manager role, there isn't much you can train for. It is experience. Experience dealing with types of requests, clients, associates, time-lines, deadlines, corrections, bugs, QA, etc.
"Boning up on your skills" on your downtime in this case would be either butting in on other projects for the company, or working for other companies at the same time, a strict No-no for most consulting gigs.
My solution in this case would be to try and butt-in to someone else's project at the company, but not do someone else's job for them, just shadow them mostly. Learn as much as possible, and at least get facetime as trying to be productive.
Admin
Am I the only one here that doesn't see this as some kind of dream job? Sure it would be nice to get a steady paycheck with no responsibilities and to have a bunch of free time. But, when this job ends, and it will eventually end, what do you put on your Resume? What do you tell the next company about your experience, especially if this was your first job out of college?
After a month or two of doing nothing, I'd be getting paid to go on job interviews and find something that will actually advance my career. I compare that job to the one I have now and it's no contest. My current job is much more desireable. It keeps my busy, but it's fun work and the people I interact with are fun too. Sitting around at home with nothing to do on a regular basis doesn't seem that exciting to me.
Admin
I had a contracting job once where after working a couple of contracts for about a year, I was on the bench for several months. At first they had me coming in to the office to study up and learn some new skills, but pretty soon it became, Just sit at home and we'll call you when we need you. While I understand this sounds like a dream job, I found it very stressful: I kept thinking, How long will they pay me to do nothing before they just fire me?
The idea of sitting around the house doing nothing, just watching TV or playing computer games or whatever, sounds great for a while, but I wouldn't want to spend my life doing that. On the other hand, if something like this happened to me now, I have all sorts of pet projects in the back of my head that I'd love to work on, some computer-related and some not, from Open Source projects to charity work to writing a novel, never mind finally getting my back door fixed ...
Admin
Damn...looks like the secret's out!
But if Sally is like most PM's I know, she can barely use Excel or Microsoft Project. Any REAL technical work is far beyond her scope of knowledge.
If it weren't for the steady paycheck, I'd be seriously looking to get back on the technical side of the house.
Admin
Almost definitely accenture. I've worked with those people before. . .
Admin
Admin
Just so you guys know the company that she worked for was Infosys Technologies. I used my bench time to find a new job and polish my MW2 skills
Admin
I enjoy my job...What I would enjoy more however is having 24 hours a day to myself to do what I wanted while being paid the same.
In the end I would likely still spend hours a day coding because I actually enjoy doing that but it's always nice to be able to do projects on your own time, at your own directing.
Also it's nice not having to wake up at 7AM, or being able to randomly go some place for a day/days at a time.
Admin
Hey Sally,
I live in the Seattle area. Want to go out on a date?
You're buying.
Admin
You are allowed to go places other than work and home. you know that right? If you don't have to work, that doesn't mean you have to sit at home. There's like... stuff out there.
Admin
Captcha: nobis. The government has nobis meddling in what farmers do and don't grow.
Admin
What is all this talk of quitting and finding another job? I can see doing the last half of that..
Admin
Admin
Admin
When did the site become "The Daily BTW" (Better Than Win)?
But seriously, that has to be the first article I've ever read here where I thought, "Yeah, I could work for them". Especially amazing considering it's a consulting position, not a coding position.