(no subject)

[hiroe.livejournal.com]

Just got back from the sit-down with the owner. Hit him hard and fast, but was firm and polite about all of it.


Three primary issues:

1) My workload is unreasonable, and often approaches impossible for a single individual. Each truck has 3-4 crew members, and approx 70 pieces of equipment. Each client has maybe 2-3 people that need attention. For dealing with the crew/clients, the company has: two Acct execs, two salespersons, two crew managers, and the owner himself and his wife. That's eight people handling the same workload worth of trucks/clients that i deal with as a single individual. I often have multiple issues at the same time, that all require high-level support; i regularly get to resolve issue 2 on the phone while driving out to fix issue 1 in person. I *need* some additional help.


2) Compared with national averages for the types of work i do, and the responsibility load i have, i am significantly underpaid. Source One, the company we call when i need an x-ray tech in bumfuck nowhere, charges $100/hour for travel, and $150/hour for service; i guarantee you the guy driving out to do the work probably makes well better than $30/hour (it may be closer to $50).

Breakdown of some of the types of work i do, and their average rate of pay: (per google, didn't dig too deeply, but he'll never notice.)
Machinist: $21/hr
Electrician: $22/hr
Calibrator: $23/hr
Tier 1 phone tech support: $23/hr
Electronics repair: $25/hr
PC repair: $25/hr
Field repair technician: $27/hr
Bio-med repair: $29/hr
Tier 4 phone tech support: $29/hr
X-ray QC records management: $30/hr
Circuit-board design/engr: $35/hr
Network Analyst: $55/hr
Radiation Safety Officer: $73/hr

Me: $16/hr.


3) My workload is regularly added to by the both admin staff/accounting and the field techs, often through total lack of concern for their own job responsibilities, and sometimes outright negligence. Some recent examples: i've had to dig out and reprint two receipts for accounting (they lost them); checked PF13 for cal because of supposed bad results (found it completely within tolerance and linearity, wtf); multiple sets of equipment have not been returned to the office despite my requests (necessitating i chase down the tech on the phone to berate them); and one guy failed to secure a laptop properly so it fell off the desk and got beat to death bouncing around the inside of the truck (no repercussions for him, an hour of work for me to rebuild it). All of which is in addition to my regular duties.

I also shared that the vast majority of people i discuss this with tell me it's time to cut bait and walk; but as i've been there 5 years (and want to get a mortgage next year) and am very familiar with the job and it's unspoken side benefits, i'm a bit loathe to just give up on it without trying to salvage it first.

He then admitted that all of this was essentially correct; and he will discuss this with my boss next week. I know that my boss will hit him with even more evidence of precisely how fucked up this place is, as we're giving him the one-two punch; hopefully it'll pay off.

Comments

[aylinn.livejournal.com]

good luck.

Nice going, getting your boss to help you with the negotiations!

[hiroe.livejournal.com]

As far as bosses go, he's pretty good. Loves to be a ball-breaker, but he generally shines that light on the people who really earn it; so most of the abuse i take from him is of the good-natured variety.

[inahandbasket]

not 100% sure exactly what it is you're doing, but you are direly underpaid if you really do half the things listed there. If they don't believe you, tell them to find a resume from someone who CAN do all the things you do, and ask what their requested salary is.
That'll shock 'em good.

[squigit.livejournal.com]

Want to shock them more? Have them check out a contracting company for what it would cost to have someone do it.

[hiroe.livejournal.com]

It's an on-site health-screening company. We've got a bunch of trucks with mobile doctors' offices in them, that test employees at plants and factories all over the country for osha compliance. Each employee screened gets an audio test, a vision test, blood draws, fecal occult samples, pulmonary function test, glaucoma test, ekg, chest x-ray, and fitted for a respirator. I repair all the equipment, calibrate it as needed by legal guidelines (mostly annual), maintain all the cal and film processor QC data, do all the state x-ray registration paperwork, make sure the machines pass state inspection, provide 24-7 phone support for all of it, and do some development on how to increase reliability. Anything i can't fix on the phone or get someone else to fix for us, i get to fly out and repair myself.

[inahandbasket]

I hope you work in the middle of nowhere, because here in Boston that would be at least two people each making roughly 75k at a guess.
Good luck with your fight!

[hiroe.livejournal.com]

Suburbs of a major northeast city.

[redhillian.livejournal.com]

"fecal occult samples"

Heh. I know what this actually is, but it certinly looks like tying to find the shite-demons within...

Sorry, I'll be quiet now :)

[jimbojones.livejournal.com]

People who are capable of (and do) a broad spectrum of work types normally assigned to several people rarely get paid as much as any single one of the people it would take to replace them. I don't know WHY, exactly, but that's pretty standard. Maybe because people who invest so much time learning so many skills don't spend as much time learning to negotiate? I dunno.

[margaretc.livejournal.com]

I've noticed this too, and I don't know what to do about it either. It is a good bit better for me than it used to be, but still...

[110billion.livejournal.com]

Tier 1 phone tech support: $23/hr

Makes my last job feel like slave labour at $AU18/hr.

[nyquilusa.livejournal.com]

Try doing tech support in a rural college town where Tier 1 phone support is paid starting at $8/hour - recently raised to compete with a higher minimum wage. As techs quit, new college students eagerly replace them.

[blkrabbitofinle.livejournal.com]

Had that problem at a company I contract with from time to time. When I began working there they had a Tier 1 team who had been there for ages, knew the users, knew the techs, knew the systems, generally just knew their shit. I know that helpdesk tends to get a lot of flak from the upper tiers but I will never again doubt that a good, skilled helpdesk as the first point of contact is invaluable. I left for a while then came back; not sure precisely what had happened, but the old staff were gone and we had a rotating door of min-wage college students coming through now. They didn't know the users, they didn't know the techs, they didn't know the systems, they didn't know shit. By the time they'd started to be there long enough to get things together a bit better you suddenly had a fresh wave of newbies. For the rest of my time there I essentially took a small posse of smart, pro-active and polite long-timers under wing and although it's essentially more work to teach someone else how to do something (especially in a system that was as 'customized' (*coubrutalized*gh) as this one) than just go in and do it yourself, whenever I had the time I would let them know and when they got calls they couldn't answer, they would IM me and I would either tell them it wasn't something we dealt with and explain why, then explain who it goes to and why, or if it was something we dealt with that the helpdesk could fix, would walk them through (sometimes a few times, just like when I was learning) how to resolve it themselves, or if need be and it was something that did need to be escalated to me would just tell them to flick it in through. It meant they were getting their resolved call rates right up, they were really eager to learn as much as they could and had the chance to, and it meant both that we were getting less unnecessary calls passed through to us and it was also quicker to ask them to 'spread the word' about something (i.e. a certain problem that they'd be getting repeat calls about that they could easily fix) than to actually try and get it passed through the 'official' route (AKA through management).

Those guys kept me sane, I have to say.