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> pressures are somewhat unfairly around whether you are billable or not which is not really in your control as an engineer. Oh, well said there. Worked consul

> pressures are somewhat unfairly around whether you are billable or not which is not really in your control as an engineer. Oh, well said there. Worked consulting for 13 years, and this was the main source of stress. You feel like it's your fault—and are sometimes treated by management like it's your fault—because you're on salary and they have nothing for you to work on. Emphasis on 'they'. That feeling of being on the chopping block, unsure of whether you'll be laid off or not, recurred independently about 3-6 times a year.

cableshaft 2y ago
Wow, 3-6 times a year? At my firm I've been on the same project for almost a year and a half, and the previous project was over a year. I did have about 6 weeks of downtime in between them though, and if they were doing layoffs then maybe they would have given me the axe. I did knock out a cloud certification during that downtime though, which was beneficial to them for keeping their partnerships. Did your firm just never get any extensions to projects? My firm tries pretty hard to get those any chance they get. Or were they all like due diligences or something?
- karaterobot 2y ago
  The longest I ever worked on a contract was 2 years, the shortest was probably 2 hours. Most projects were 1-3 months. At the company I'm thinking of, they kept a public list of people who were "on the bench", which meant they'd finished a contract, and the company didn't have another one for them yet. In sports, being on the bench sort of implies that you can't cut it, but 99% of the time that's not how it was.
quintes 2y ago
I agree professional services can stress you out. Being billable means you’re on multiple projects at some points if you’re good and if you’re not you’re benched. I need to figure out if I go back to professional services again as it can be a strain and I’m late stage career principal/ enterprise architect that joining a company to work on “cool projects to put on your cv” is not a selling point any longer
- karaterobot 2y ago
  I think about it sometimes too. There were pluses and minuses. The money was actually quite good, and there is a certain luxury in being able to say "this ain't my product, I'm just a hired gun, I'll be gone in a couple months and y'all will have to deal with your dumb decisions" rather than having a feeling of ownership that extends beyond the quality of your own work. In other words, doing what you're told as best you can, instead of trying to fruitlessly to fight against the structure and inertia of a dysfunctional company.

cableshaft 2y ago

Wow, 3-6 times a year? At my firm I've been on the same project for almost a year and a half, and the previous project was over a year. I did have about 6 weeks of downtime in between them though, and if they were doing layoffs then maybe they would have given me the axe. I did knock out a cloud certification during that downtime though, which was beneficial to them for keeping their partnerships. Did your firm just never get any extensions to projects? My firm tries pretty hard to get those any chance they get. Or were they all like due diligences or something?

karaterobot 2y ago
The longest I ever worked on a contract was 2 years, the shortest was probably 2 hours. Most projects were 1-3 months. At the company I'm thinking of, they kept a public list of people who were "on the bench", which meant they'd finished a contract, and the company didn't have another one for them yet. In sports, being on the bench sort of implies that you can't cut it, but 99% of the time that's not how it was.

quintes 2y ago

I agree professional services can stress you out. Being billable means you’re on multiple projects at some points if you’re good and if you’re not you’re benched. I need to figure out if I go back to professional services again as it can be a strain and I’m late stage career principal/ enterprise architect that joining a company to work on “cool projects to put on your cv” is not a selling point any longer

karaterobot 2y ago
I think about it sometimes too. There were pluses and minuses. The money was actually quite good, and there is a certain luxury in being able to say "this ain't my product, I'm just a hired gun, I'll be gone in a couple months and y'all will have to deal with your dumb decisions" rather than having a feeling of ownership that extends beyond the quality of your own work. In other words, doing what you're told as best you can, instead of trying to fruitlessly to fight against the structure and inertia of a dysfunctional company.