No Good Deed Goes Unpunished
6:58:54 AM 08.10.09
No good deed goes unpunished
June 4, 2008
It's the early 1990s and this sysadmin pilot fish is working for an IT contracting company, assigned to a data center running lots of Windows PCs and a few Unix servers.
"I'm the general admin reporting to their very junior project IT manager," says fish. "In a year, I create several remote administration tools for Windows, oversee migration to Windows 3.11 and generally do such a good job the client decides to not only renew the contract, but significantly increase the scope and value."
Unfortunately, fish has already automated his work so completely that there's nothing even remotely interesting to do.
So fish asks for a transfer. Denied. Then he asks for, say, some slightly different work that might be less boring. Denied.
Then he finds another job and submits his resignation.
But he happens to mention to his boss who the new employer is. Big mistake.
"This manager digs around and finds that my current employer has a subdivision that has a contract with a subdivision of my new employer that prohibits recruiting employees of each other's companies," fish says. "It's only for people on that particular project, but that doesn't stop him from giving it a really good go."
First, the contracting company threatens to sue fish's new employer if it hires him. That doesn't work, but the contracting company is able to arm-twist fish's new employer to contract him back to work for the contracting company -- which then assigns him right back to work for the client with the automated-to-boredom data center.
Turns out that the contract with that client is up for renewal, and fish has done such a bang-up job that his continued presence is part of the deal.
When fish finds out, he's irritated that no one has offered any sort of raise or incentive to stay. "Instead, I'm forbidden to mention to the client that I have resigned or that I want to leave," says fish.
"I'm bothered by this seeming lack of ethics, not to mention the heavy-handed approach to staff retention, and threaten to immediately quit both companies. The contracting company finally relents and lets me move to my new position -- four months after I tried to leave in the first place.
"The kicker? After spending four months of trying to get me into their team, the new employer lays off the entire department eight months later."
http://blogs.computerworld.com/no_good_deed_goes_unpunished_0
It's the early 1990s and this sysadmin pilot fish is working for an IT contracting company, assigned to a data center running lots of Windows PCs and a few Unix servers.
"I'm the general admin reporting to their very junior project IT manager," says fish. "In a year, I create several remote administration tools for Windows, oversee migration to Windows 3.11 and generally do such a good job the client decides to not only renew the contract, but significantly increase the scope and value."
Unfortunately, fish has already automated his work so completely that there's nothing even remotely interesting to do.
So fish asks for a transfer. Denied. Then he asks for, say, some slightly different work that might be less boring. Denied.
Then he finds another job and submits his resignation.
But he happens to mention to his boss who the new employer is. Big mistake.
"This manager digs around and finds that my current employer has a subdivision that has a contract with a subdivision of my new employer that prohibits recruiting employees of each other's companies," fish says. "It's only for people on that particular project, but that doesn't stop him from giving it a really good go."
First, the contracting company threatens to sue fish's new employer if it hires him. That doesn't work, but the contracting company is able to arm-twist fish's new employer to contract him back to work for the contracting company -- which then assigns him right back to work for the client with the automated-to-boredom data center.
Turns out that the contract with that client is up for renewal, and fish has done such a bang-up job that his continued presence is part of the deal.
When fish finds out, he's irritated that no one has offered any sort of raise or incentive to stay. "Instead, I'm forbidden to mention to the client that I have resigned or that I want to leave," says fish.
"I'm bothered by this seeming lack of ethics, not to mention the heavy-handed approach to staff retention, and threaten to immediately quit both companies. The contracting company finally relents and lets me move to my new position -- four months after I tried to leave in the first place.
"The kicker? After spending four months of trying to get me into their team, the new employer lays off the entire department eight months later."
http://blogs.computerworld.com/no_good_deed_goes_unpunished_0
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