I have made my living as a - what do you call it? - computer programmer, software engineer, systems analyst - since 1987.

Some observations on my career, and the state of the workaday world in general.

I know I can be a damned good employee; I've done it before, and I can do it again. 

But it has not gotten any easier.  Oh, the work itself hasn't changed a great deal; it's still a matter of figuring out how to make a machine do what you want it to, and then doing it.  The capabilities of the machine have grown, and the languages one uses to communicate with the machine have evolved.

What's gotten harder is finding a good job and keeping it.  With a few exceptions, like government work (and even that's increasingly going to contracting), there is no such thing as a permanent job in the field.

I was laid off in 2004 from a company I'd been with for 5-1/2 years.  I knew parts of the system better than anyone else, but I was laid off a) to meet budget goals in preparation for the sale of the company, and b) because I wasn't busy enough.  A few weeks ago, that company advertised for someone to do what I was doing.  I applied for the job but heard nothing back.  No one else could possibly have been better qualified.   What were they afraid of?

Perhaps I opened my mouth too many times, or they thought I'd ask for too much money; I don't know.  When I worked there, I was dedicated with all my faculties to the success of my employer.  "All my faculties" include critical thinking, asking questions like "Is the benefit of doing X worth its cost?," and "I think there's a better way to do X."  Lest you consider me a malcontent, I assure you that a) I WAS overruled from time to time, and in each case I accepted that fact humbly, and b) it wasn't I who said one day, "Morale is so bad here that we don't even get up to go to the bathroom anymore."  I have kept in touch with my former coworkers, and I know that the best and brightest have left that company one way or another.

After a period of unemployment lasting over a year, I accepted a contracting position with another big company.  Although I did work on a couple of enjoyable projects with people who were smart and good to work with, there were other projects where I had to wonder why I was there. 

I presume that I was "hired" because I had some expertise in programming; yet, in cases when I produced a product which a) worked according to the specifications I was given, b) was simpler and more efficient than what it replaced, and c) was straightforward, without any tricks,  I was told that "It's not the way we do things here," and "No one will understand what you did."  Hey, I was NOT producing code that only geniuses could understand; I was producing code according to best practices, well-documented procedures right out of software manuals, and the company's own programming guidelines. 

If the company's permanent employees can't understand a well-written program, why were THEY hired, or why aren't they TRAINED, as I have been, so that they can do so?  I have to think that that ignorance, resistance to change, and turf-protecting behavior will eventually spell the decline of that company.  Again, I assure you that I was not alone in my frustrations; every other contractor I met there had the same observations.

As I write this in June 2006, I'm waiting for my next job - a six-month contract doing Oracle programming -  to start.  It was supposed to have started two weeks ago, but the client is having problems getting the CFO to sign off on the funds to pay me.  So I was hired before the funds were approved?

I know that a certain amount of B.S. just comes with life and work, and I can take it as well as dish a little out.  But is it asking too much to be treated with some respect?  Respect means first, recognizing my intrinsic value as a human being, i.e., not trying to jerk me around, and second, recognizing that I have some intelligence and a whole lot of experience that just might come in handy.  In return, I will give an employer the best job that I can.