Who owns the pager?
I hate on-call. I hate doing it, and I hate asking other people to do it, which is a slightly awkward position to hold when you've spent a decent chunk of your career around systems that other people expect to be awake all night. Nice gentle start then... The annoying bit is that on-call is also, in one form or another, necessary. We built a world where people expect software to work at three in…
On-call duties in the tech industry can be an unwelcome burden, with many professionals dreading the responsibility. The one who holds the pager, ready to spring into action for issues like a malfunctioning RAID controller or expired certificates, often bears the brunt of the inconvenience. This is not just about fixing issues, but about enduring out-of-hours expectations and a lack of normalcy in one's personal life.
The cost of on-call extends beyond the immediate incident response, affecting personal plans, social activities, and even sleep patterns. It is a hidden price that is often underappreciated, with many engineers feeling the strain of missing out on personal time. While larger organizations may implement a follow-the-sun approach, where different time zones can share the on-call load, smaller companies often fall back on rota systems, which can be seen as a form of social pressure rather than a practical solution.
These rota systems can lead to burnout and push capable engineers away, as they grapple with the idea of working odd hours and the associated stress. The key to a better on-call system, it seems, is to make it an opt-in and opt-out arrangement, with a fair compensation for those who choose to carry the on-call duty. This would acknowledge the personal impact of such responsibilities and help in attracting and retaining the right talent in the industry.
Written by urgent.news from Dev.to's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — it may contain errors, so check the original before relying on it.
