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I automated my job over a year ago and haven't told anyone

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Re: I automated my job over a year ago and haven't told anyone

#271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My point was that they may not even be big enough for one. “Plug and play” might be good enough for now (a shared drive means someone is around though, someone had to set it up).

There are definitely small firms that rely on the young paralegal who is a self taught super user. But that sort of firm wouldn't pay someone 90k for doing a small part of all IT. Slight chance this person was hired as a "case assistant" or "litigation support" and not IT. Firms definitely hire that sort of person--though they usually bill their time--so hopefully the OP isn't submitting fraudulent time entries. But…

I’m still skeptical. I was hired at ridiculous rates once ($2k an hour) to validate DKIM signatures by a small time firm. 90k to be “on call” and validate things seems totally reasonable even from a small firm.

Re: I automated my job over a year ago and haven't told anyone

#272

Ugh that subreddit is just a cesspool. Most of the stories are fake and it attracts the bottom feeders of society. People need work to feel fulfilled. I get that a corporate job may not meet that demand but this idea that you can just eschew any work and be mentally ok isn't true.

> People need work to feel fulfilled. I, too, worry about the idle rich and think we should do something to help them find work.

Vast majority of rich are not idle and live very active life. While they may not do work as you understand it, they do philanthropy, investment, etc. Few if any just stay home to watch TV - which is equivalent of automating work and not telling anyone.

Re: I automated my job over a year ago and haven't told anyone

#273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He is not paid just to transfer files. He is paid to be responsible for the files being transferred. It's not quite the same thing.

Are you sure the boss would agree, if he would fully know and understand the situation?

This is information asymmetry that employers also weaponize to hide the true value produced by each employee. Would employees agree to their salary if they fully understood how much of the value they create is pocketed at various other levels of the org?

Re: I automated my job over a year ago and haven't told anyone

#274
post #26

Many subreddits are simply themed containers of creative writing. With all the media attention the AntiWork subreddit has gotten lately that brings more karma farmers and therefore more fiction. It's an entertaining read, but not likely true.

Funny, I had this exact same thought. The red flags for me were their use of “clock in” and “shift”. Those are not concepts generally in play for IT staff at law firms.

I disagree. Yes, 'clocking in' is not a frequent process for IT people but it heavily depends on the company. My first job was for a company that billed its clients based on hours. Even if it was pretty much ridiculous for us (IT crowd) to do so, we did clock in just like everyone else, so that our billing department had a more 'accurate' representation of how much we worked for that client, even if our work was pretty much shared across all clients.

I'm skeptical of these anonymous texts as well, but 'clocking in' is not a red flag. Also, in my current role I still do 'shifts' when I'm on-call, although I don't 'clock in' anymore.

Re: I automated my job over a year ago and haven't told anyone

#275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I worked at HP over a decade ago it was literally my job to walk into a department and find processes that were automatable, implement whatever program or automation was necessary and gtfo. One of the highlights for me when working there was automating a process which took three people thirty days to perform. I made a point to unnecessarily optimize the program to the point where it ran in a handful of milliseco…

2 jobs ago I had a management level position ("Head of Architecture") for a decent sized engineering multinational. My fondest moments are actually when I helped people do mind numbingly awful tasks by automating stuff - this was not my day job but I had a lot of freedom. One guy was so delighted that I had scripted in less than an hour some ghastly bit of spreadsheet work that he estimated was going to take him a fe…

This is partly why I miss it, sometimes. The work itself is largely pretty easy to do and the impact can be huge. Not just in a time-saving way, but to the people involved and ultimately the company.

I often think about the sheer volume of tasks like this the world over where a tiny Python, or even say, AutoHotKey script could automate it. The amount of hours mankind must spend on utter drudgery astounds me.

Re: I automated my job over a year ago and haven't told anyone

#276
post #160

As someone who definitely agrees that people shouldn't have to work in poor conditions, I still cant help but feel that the anti-work stuff on reddit seems coordinated. Does anyone else get that feeling?

I get that feeling as well, fartcannon. The meteoric rise over the past year of the subreddit just feels artficial. I don't have any evidence outside of the a rapid increase of subscribers. I'm sure there is a large number of people with that sentiment out there, so I'd maybe put it at 40% or less that this is being coordinated by an external actor. The whole sentiment around the subreddit really seems to be amplifyi…

Some of the manipulation seems obvious. Some of it less so. I always felt like some kind ublock origin style plugin that highlights or removes known instances of PR/manipulation/propanda would be helpful. Perhaps an AI trained on press releases from big corps and governments that performs authorship identification for a start. 'The writing style in this post are an 80% match for a press release by linked below'. Kind of like those websites that try to identify fake product reviews.

Theres a high chance that would probably get gamed, too, I guess.

Re: I automated my job over a year ago and haven't told anyone

#277
post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would he be rewarded? They would likely try to save that $90k by replacing him, or give him a lot more work with very little increase in comp. If there's anything I've learned in 10 years, you keep your mouth shut when things are easy because if you speak up they screw you with more work and the same (or nearly so) pay.

This is a very cynical way of looking at things. And maybe rightly so given your experience. Every job I've ever had though there's never been a shortage of work - the few examples that I can recall of whenever one of my engineers frees up a significant amount of time I gave them harder things to do and a recommended a raise (Im a lead not a people manager) to go along with it.

Using "cynical" in looking at the job market when compared to potential abuses is a very boomerish thing.

Us millenials and zoomers see how this society is played out. You work hard for a company - you get more work for same pay.

They demand 2 weeks notice but have no issue in hauling your ass out with no severance on a term.

Managers promise increases and you get 2% , or 1/3 of inflation.

Companies' recruiters target their own employees for their own jobs at $20k more than they're making. And new people (without experience) get more than the experienced ones.

Health insurance costs more and more each year, all the while covering less and less.

And the harassment. Damn, the harassment.

And you, individually, cannot do much of anything regarding the company when negotiating grievances. Unions can, but tech people have this poisonous mindset that they can somehow do better than a union.

So yes, I am /r/antiwork . I've lived through enough of stupid shit. And we're done with it.

Re: I automated my job over a year ago and haven't told anyone

#278

Many subreddits are simply themed containers of creative writing. With all the media attention the AntiWork subreddit has gotten lately that brings more karma farmers and therefore more fiction. It's an entertaining read, but not likely true.

What is the point of karma farming?

Accounts with high karma are sold for all sorts of purposes, for marketing campaigns (reddit is a cesspool of astroturfing) all the way to political campaigns.

https://quantummarketer.com/buy-reddit-accounts/

Re: I automated my job over a year ago and haven't told anyone

#279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are definitely small firms that rely on the young paralegal who is a self taught super user. But that sort of firm wouldn't pay someone 90k for doing a small part of all IT. Slight chance this person was hired as a "case assistant" or "litigation support" and not IT. Firms definitely hire that sort of person--though they usually bill their time--so hopefully the OP isn't submitting fraudulent time entries. But…

I’m still skeptical. I was hired at ridiculous rates once ($2k an hour) to validate DKIM signatures by a small time firm. 90k to be “on call” and validate things seems totally reasonable even from a small firm.

Courts don't actually require you to check hashes like the OP claims. They do remarkably little evidence authentication unless the opposing party contests the evidence. Digital evidence is by default produced to the other side by low quality TIFF files.

If you want to accuse the other side of manipulation, you bring in an expert (who probably bills at nearly 1000 bucks an hour).

I didn't take this as a sign of OP being false because its likely he just doesn't understand why the firm wants to him to validate hashes. The likely reason is other employees fucked up transfers.

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