A bit off-topic but I hope that the systems/network
administrators out there will find this article a bit
enlightening :-)
- joshua
>UNIX SYSTEM ADMINISTRATION --- December 12, 2001
>Published by ITworld.com -- changing the way you view IT
>http://www.itworld.com/newsletters
>HIGHLIGHTS
>
>* A system administrator's job may appear monotonous on the surface,
> but closer inspection will reveal many appealing rewards to the path
> you've chosen.
>
>
>Staying Happy
>By Sandra Henry-Stocker
>
>A number of systems administrators that I know are finding it very hard
>in these times of layoffs and cautious business plans to even imagine
>what they, in better economic times, had come to expect in terms of
>personal fulfillment on the job. Some only remember that their career
>goals used to be a lot more aggressive than simply staying employed.
>Others notice that their employers or bosses, who might have once gone
>out of their way to ensure that their employees were busy and satisfied
>with their work, are now preoccupied with the larger issue of staying
>afloat. All this at a time when, because of the shift in national and
>personal priorities, many of us are looking for a deeper connection to
>the things that bring value to our lives.
>
>While it may be true that a large percentage of the population is
>looking for meaning in their daily lives, it is probably more true of
>systems administrators than most computer professionals that finding
>happiness on the job is a challenge. Part of the challenge comes with
>the profession itself. Systems administrators are afflicted with
>several specific stresses. It is how they decide to react to these
>stresses that determines whether they are fulfilled or simply
>frustrated.
>
>One of the difficulties that systems administration face is that they
>tend to be at the beck and call of everybody. There are very few
>positions in the typical company that offer so little protection from
>the impatient, the demanding, and the annoyed. To make matters worse,
>and as some of the more vocal of our crowd have often complained, it is
>when you do your job best that you are least noticed and least
>appreciated.
>
>It's also true that systems administrators are seldom in the mainstream
>of their company's business. For this reason, it's nearly impossible
>for them to garner satisfaction from a sense that they've contributed
>to their company's success or to its customer's satisfaction. When they
>work long hours, they're generally doing things that no one else really
>understands or finds interesting. It may take them half the night to
>discover that a memory problem on a server has been interfering with
>the running of some important job -- and about all the troubleshooting
>skills that they can muster. Then, when at the staff meeting the
>solution is reduced to "John fixed a memory problem on server B", it
>sounds like something that could have been fixed in five minutes and by
>anyone off the street.
>
>Systems administrators also suffer from extreme fluctuations in their
>work flow. At times, we're so busy that a phone call from one troubled
>user is been interrupted by several others. At other times, we find
>ourselves searching for something to fix or improve ? something to hold
>our interest for a while -- in an intellectual ? desert of "nothing's
>broken".
>
>Sometimes we work alone and have no one to bounce our ideas against and
>no one to acknowledge the small miracles that we pull off. At other
>times, we work in groups and find ourselves assigned to so narrow a
>slice of the pie that we could fear we could easily automate ourselves
>out of a job.
>
>After ten or twenty years of adding to our skill set, we often remain
>at the bottom of the organizational structure.
>
>Given these deep and abiding challenges, a career in systems
>administration might not seem to have much appeal. There are, however,
>numerous arguments that we can make in arguing for our choices and
>numerous ways that we can derive reward from our work whether or not
>our organizations choose to understand and appreciate our contributions.
>
>One of the benefits of being a systems administrator is that we have a
>good degree of job mobility. Almost any organization needs some of us
>to keep their systems in line. Irrespective of the particular industry
>that we work in, the required skills are pretty much the same.
>
>There are also a lot of sub-specialties that we can delve into as we
>advance and need more challenge. These include networking, security,
>and various types of programming.
>
>Though our numbers at any particular company or site may be small, we
>have a large representation nationally and internationally - even
>organizations like SAGE that focus on our work and our concerns. We can
>reap a certain reward from doing our work well and making good
>decisions as there are many standards that we can measure ourselves
>against that are well represented in books and online.
>
>Perhaps, best of all, we have the satisfaction of an ever-changing
>technology. For "sysadmins", there is always something new to learn and
>always some problem that we have never seen before to keep us on our
>toes.
>
>About the author(s)
>-------------------
>Sandra Henry-Stocker (a.k.a S. Lee Henry) has administered Unix systems
>for over 17 years. In fact, she describes herself as "USL" (Unix as a
>second language) and barely remembers enough English to write books and
>buy groceries. She currently works for TeleCommunications Systems, a
>wireless technology company in Annapolis, MD.
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