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Oncall shift should be Tuesday to Tuesday

arthur-johnston.com

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Re: Oncall shift should be Tuesday to Tuesday

#111

Post by natebc »

zeroonetwothree wrote: post #35

In my 20ish years I’ve done every possible day for oncall schedules. I would say each have pros/cons but overall I found it to be a minor difference. Mon-Mon is nice because it’s a logical time to start something fresh at the start of the week. Tuesday is good for the reasons in the post, Wednesday is similar. Thursday is nice because after you’re done you can relax on Friday. Friday-Friday is less common but can be…

Where i work we do Friday 8AM -> Friday 8AM. We changed to that from a Monday->Monday a few years ago. Feedback has been postive. Coming off of on-call on Monday morning was just a major bummer.

Re: Oncall shift should be Tuesday to Tuesday

#112

Post by dangus »

hawaiianbrah wrote: post #88
dangus wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How can the on-call coverage be specified at hiring? Can the company guarantee that my team will never shrink or that the page rate won't increase? What will financially encourage my company to stop paging me overnight if there isn't a labor cost to the company every time an on-call incident occurs? > What if I get injured and my insurance only covers base pay? Insurance payouts can be easily based on wages that incl…

> If you took time off during an on-call shift you would be trading it with a team member, so you would never lose that extra wage. I think this is true in _most cases_, but is not a given. I myself have encountered scenarios where it isn’t true: switching with someone much later in the rotation, only to then end up having to switch again for instance. You could envision a nefarious teammate weaseling out of their fa…

Of course it wouldn’t be hard to figure out a rough average on-call amount to pay during PTO

Re: Oncall shift should be Tuesday to Tuesday

#113

Post by ddingus »

convolvatron wrote: post #107
sed_zeppelin wrote: post #104

I just want to jump in as a minority voice here. In case anybody is reading the other comments and feeling... alienated. I refuse to accept on-call duties, full stop. If a job posting expects it, I don't apply. If a hiring manager says they have it, I do not accept the offer. If management starts talking about maybe implementing it, I protest. If it becomes enacted, I resign. There is absolutely no situation in which…

on call is like hiring civil and structural engineers to build you a bridge over a canyon, and then when they show up to do a site inspection you just push them in. eventually maybe you'll be able to cross.

I love your comment on this. Perfection.

Once, while traveling in an RV for some work related marketing thing, the discussion turned to the lack of fuel economy...

The RV might perform better if the engine powered the RV by blowing fuel right out the tail pipe. Horrible efficiency, terrible for the planet, and, and all the negatives packed right into a quick expression.

Your comment is on point. Solid and I just felt like sharing my appreciation for the morbid fun it contains.

Nice work. Worth a healthy chuckle. Thanks.

Re: Oncall shift should be Tuesday to Tuesday

#114

Post by azemetre »

guessmyname wrote: post #60
canergl wrote: post #58

wrong, oncall shifts should not even exist

I agree with the sentiment, but on-call support is an unavoidable necessity given the critical nature of many systems that underpin modern society. When we talk about on-call, we’re not referring to systems like Netflix streaming a major fight for 65 million users, but rather essential infrastructure like healthcare systems, nuclear power plants, military operations, financial markets, and the vast array of SCADA (Su…

Are you willing to discuss how MSFT compensated you for on call.

Re: Oncall shift should be Tuesday to Tuesday

#115

Post by tengbretson »

sed_zeppelin wrote: post #104

I just want to jump in as a minority voice here. In case anybody is reading the other comments and feeling... alienated. I refuse to accept on-call duties, full stop. If a job posting expects it, I don't apply. If a hiring manager says they have it, I do not accept the offer. If management starts talking about maybe implementing it, I protest. If it becomes enacted, I resign. There is absolutely no situation in which…

This attitude will keep you off the pager rotation, but get used to building meaningless projects or having your expertise relative to the average developer seen as a liability to the org rather than an asset.

Re: Oncall shift should be Tuesday to Tuesday

#116

Post by gedy »

tengbretson wrote: post #115
sed_zeppelin wrote: post #104

I just want to jump in as a minority voice here. In case anybody is reading the other comments and feeling... alienated. I refuse to accept on-call duties, full stop. If a job posting expects it, I don't apply. If a hiring manager says they have it, I do not accept the offer. If management starts talking about maybe implementing it, I protest. If it becomes enacted, I resign. There is absolutely no situation in which…

This attitude will keep you off the pager rotation, but get used to building meaningless projects or having your expertise relative to the average developer seen as a liability to the org rather than an asset.

I disagree, not the OP but there is a time and place in a career for firefighting, similar to military.

I always take responsibility for my own work, even after hours fixes, etc. But active on-call orgs usually are just reaping tech debt that others sowed. Sorry not going to rally for that.

Re: Oncall shift should be Tuesday to Tuesday

#118

Post by stackskipton »

convolvatron wrote: post #107
sed_zeppelin wrote: post #104

I just want to jump in as a minority voice here. In case anybody is reading the other comments and feeling... alienated. I refuse to accept on-call duties, full stop. If a job posting expects it, I don't apply. If a hiring manager says they have it, I do not accept the offer. If management starts talking about maybe implementing it, I protest. If it becomes enacted, I resign. There is absolutely no situation in which…

on call is like hiring civil and structural engineers to build you a bridge over a canyon, and then when they show up to do a site inspection you just push them in. eventually maybe you'll be able to cross.

As SRE, strongly disagree. On Call is like hiring civil and structural engineers then holding them responsible when their poor bridge collapses under the weight of all the traffic.

Sometimes, yes, Devs get called out for stuff outside their control like infrastructure failing. However, at my job, we just had two devs that quit over on call and guess what, their service was one of worst offenders in "Opps, we pushed bug to production."

Re: Oncall shift should be Tuesday to Tuesday

#119

Post by corytheboyd »

I’ve been in so many meetings endlessly searching for the Best Day for on-call shifts to start/end, and feel I have heard it all at this point, every day of the week seems to have pros and cons. Current team just does Monday, because that’s when the week usually starts, and I really don’t want to talk about it anymore lol. If it conflicts with one of the abysmally few US holidays, adjust accordingly, you’re a bunch of smart clever adults, you’ll figure it out.

Re: Oncall shift should be Tuesday to Tuesday

#120

Post by dpcx »

We used to do two week on-call rotations (to follow along with sprint/release cadence). At the beginning of '23, one of our devs asked to be full-time on-call, both because they had sleep issues and so would regularly be awake at 2 am, but also because they didn't like that the other team members wouldn't follow the documented processes.

They don't get paid extra, but they seem to be very happy with the setup.

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