new work schedule
Fri, 11 Apr 2014 22:58:17 +0000
I went to the IRS web site to get tax forms. I was (randomly?) selected to do a customer satisfaction survey - an extra window/tab opened to use later for the survey after I finished with the IRS site. The survey window appears to be dead. It has 4 links, but they're support (useless) and advertising for the survey company. The IRS site could have been better, but I found what I was looking for. Neutral votes for the IRS, strong negative for the survey itself.
http://apps.irs.gov/static_assets/js/foresee/tracker.html?siteid=0&name=irs.gov&domain=irs.gov
Near the end of April we were told that the new contractor's takeover of our systems would happen June 1. Yesterday (April 10) we found out it's happening next week (Apr 15). Many of us are going to be working new schedules, and no one's happy with them. We all have 9-hour shifts with a 1-hour break. (The old way was 8.5 and 0.5.) But at least 3 of us are expected to do part of our shift at home, and part at the office. If you want to assume that we can all do that commute in an hour, a commute is not a break. My commute is either on the Metro or on a bike. I can't eat during my commute. Apparently the reason for the at-home work is that there are things that need to be done at 04:30 and 23:00, and there is no way to get to or home from the office with public transportation those times of day. (If I leave here at 23:00, I can get the subway to Ballston, but no bus home from there; 3-mile walk.)
Wednesday 00:16
This was the first day of the new shifts. (The first day of the new subcontracting.) It has been decided that our mid-shift commutes count as work time! That makes this arrangement much more palatable. Putting a 60-90-minute commute in the middle of the work day makes the day seem longer, but we still had our same commutes when the work day wasn't split, so I couldn't see pushing the argument to count it as work time. On the other hand, for some people these commutes are not at good commute times, so this compensates somewhat. For most of the others, it puts one part of their commutes in the rush, and puts the other part in a dead time - e.g. commuter rail runs during the rush with margins, and not at all in the middle of the day; same for slugging (riding free with drivers who want enough bodies for the HOV lanes). I'm still going in (later, but) mid-day, off-peak, and I will probably be coming home earlier - there's a(n unimportant) scheduled task at 21:00, and often I wasn't home by then. (I wasn't home by then tonight.) If I leave the office after 21:00, I can't be home in time for the tasks scheduled at 22:00. So I'm going to have to consistently leave before 20:00. A downside of that is I tend to get most productive after 18:00, and that will be cut short. I'm not going to be nearly as productive after I get home, working on the laptop they've provided.
Wednesday 11:06
I think I'm going to like this new schedule - 15:00-24:00, with an hour break and a commute, and the commute counting as work hours. Since I work until midnight, no one is going to expect to hear anything from me in the morning. (Although someone did phone me at 09:30 today for the combination to the safe, which he should have known, since he's been here far longer than I have. He also could have called our NOC (Network Ops Ctr), since they also have a safe with the same info in it.) No morning meetings. The commute home, the one that's in the middle of my shift, is the longer commute (timewise). On the bike it's uphill - the towpath out of DC is a gentle climb, and whichever crossing I take of the Potomac has steep climbs on the Arlington side. On the METRO the timings just don't work as well, and I almost always have waits for the trains and buses, and there's nothing to do but stand there.
[This entry was originally posted as http://syntonic-comma.dreamwidth.org/662328.html on Dreamwidth (where there are
comments).]
I went to the IRS web site to get tax forms. I was (randomly?) selected to do a customer satisfaction survey - an extra window/tab opened to use later for the survey after I finished with the IRS site. The survey window appears to be dead. It has 4 links, but they're support (useless) and advertising for the survey company. The IRS site could have been better, but I found what I was looking for. Neutral votes for the IRS, strong negative for the survey itself.
http://apps.irs.gov/static_assets/js/foresee/tracker.html?siteid=0&name=irs.gov&domain=irs.gov
Near the end of April we were told that the new contractor's takeover of our systems would happen June 1. Yesterday (April 10) we found out it's happening next week (Apr 15). Many of us are going to be working new schedules, and no one's happy with them. We all have 9-hour shifts with a 1-hour break. (The old way was 8.5 and 0.5.) But at least 3 of us are expected to do part of our shift at home, and part at the office. If you want to assume that we can all do that commute in an hour, a commute is not a break. My commute is either on the Metro or on a bike. I can't eat during my commute. Apparently the reason for the at-home work is that there are things that need to be done at 04:30 and 23:00, and there is no way to get to or home from the office with public transportation those times of day. (If I leave here at 23:00, I can get the subway to Ballston, but no bus home from there; 3-mile walk.)
Wednesday 00:16
This was the first day of the new shifts. (The first day of the new subcontracting.) It has been decided that our mid-shift commutes count as work time! That makes this arrangement much more palatable. Putting a 60-90-minute commute in the middle of the work day makes the day seem longer, but we still had our same commutes when the work day wasn't split, so I couldn't see pushing the argument to count it as work time. On the other hand, for some people these commutes are not at good commute times, so this compensates somewhat. For most of the others, it puts one part of their commutes in the rush, and puts the other part in a dead time - e.g. commuter rail runs during the rush with margins, and not at all in the middle of the day; same for slugging (riding free with drivers who want enough bodies for the HOV lanes). I'm still going in (later, but) mid-day, off-peak, and I will probably be coming home earlier - there's a(n unimportant) scheduled task at 21:00, and often I wasn't home by then. (I wasn't home by then tonight.) If I leave the office after 21:00, I can't be home in time for the tasks scheduled at 22:00. So I'm going to have to consistently leave before 20:00. A downside of that is I tend to get most productive after 18:00, and that will be cut short. I'm not going to be nearly as productive after I get home, working on the laptop they've provided.
Wednesday 11:06
I think I'm going to like this new schedule - 15:00-24:00, with an hour break and a commute, and the commute counting as work hours. Since I work until midnight, no one is going to expect to hear anything from me in the morning. (Although someone did phone me at 09:30 today for the combination to the safe, which he should have known, since he's been here far longer than I have. He also could have called our NOC (Network Ops Ctr), since they also have a safe with the same info in it.) No morning meetings. The commute home, the one that's in the middle of my shift, is the longer commute (timewise). On the bike it's uphill - the towpath out of DC is a gentle climb, and whichever crossing I take of the Potomac has steep climbs on the Arlington side. On the METRO the timings just don't work as well, and I almost always have waits for the trains and buses, and there's nothing to do but stand there.
[This entry was originally posted as http://syntonic-comma.dreamwidth.org/662328.html on Dreamwidth (where there are
comments).]