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> Working on weekends is not a necessity, but when unexpected crap happens the senior engineers will be called upon whether it's a weekend or not. But the head
by lolinder 3y ago
> Working on weekends is not a necessity, but when unexpected crap happens the senior engineers will be called upon whether it's a weekend or not.
But the headline for that section wasn't "senior engineers spend more time on a formal on call rotation", it was "it’s fine, I’ll finish the work on Saturday."
Unexpected issues should be expected and planned for with a dedicated on call rotation that is almost never used because you're setting time aside during the work week to fix common issues. Unexpected issues shouldn't lead to random senior engineers getting called when they're not expecting it.
And as for "I'll finish the work on Saturday", it's a hard red flag of a bad work environment if that's happening with any kind of regularity. Normal work bleeding onto weekends and evenings should be a five alarm fire that gets addressed immediately in any company that values their employees. It should not be in a list of things to expect as a senior engineer.
- hnfong 3y agoI generally agree with what you say. Except that I think it's more likely a red flag for the author of the article, not necessarily the company (but of course could be), depending on whether which side had the greater authority to set or influence the deadlines. Sometimes it's easier said than done though. At some point of seniority you basically have to make the engineering estimates whether features/tasks could be done within a deadline. If you made a mistake, you might end up having to own it.