An interesting Salon article this morning talks about the current working conditions for I.T. workers and makes an intriguing suggestion:

When an Internet worm like last summer's MSBlaster cascades through the networks of unprepared corporations, knocking servers off-line, admins like myself put in 16-hour days for as long as needed to get things running properly again. When the network goes down or the power goes out, we are the first ones on the scene to bring things back online, no matter what time of night it is. Holidays, vacations and personal commitments are secondary to our availability to work in an emergency. We are asked to work mandatory unpaid overtime and be held prisoner by our pagers, all under the constant threat that our jobs may be eliminated or sent to some distant and cheaper land.

Unfortunately, for most people in I.T., the days of getting overtime pay have ended. So, what do we now get in return for sacrificing our time? A small raise in our base pay? Sometimes. Extra bonus money? Not in this economy. Compensatory days off? Yes, but it never makes up for the time put in. A pat on the back? Maybe, but those "attaboys" are quickly forgotten. The only thing that information technology workers can count on getting in return for their efforts is insomnia, ruined weekends, angry families and stress-induced heart conditions.

During this post-boom era in the technology industry, managers have been telling their underlings that they are lucky to even have jobs, and that they should just take what they can get and wait for the market to improve. But they say these things knowing that, individually, each person has little power to make things different for him- or herself. It makes a person wonder: In the face of longer hours, cuts in pay, and the outsourcing of jobs overseas, why haven't more I.T. workers organized themselves into unions? (emphasis added)

I'll go you one better. In smaller companies that don't have admins, the entire technical team can get pulled in for as long as needed. Programmers can get repeated downtime calls in the middle of the night.

As I.T. has become the backbone for so many companies, we need to think about how we're going to maintain this dependence, while still taking care of our workers. Assuming geeks will take care of it because “it's the right thing to do, and they don't have lives anyway” is NOT copacetic.

Not to mention untrue. I do too have a life! :)

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