[Info-vax] Hiring maintainers for legacy VMS systems

[Kerry Main]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Info-vax [mailto:info-vax-bounces at info-vax.com] On Behalf Of
> Simon Clubley
> Sent: 12-Sep-14 3:27 PM
> To: info-vax at info-vax.com
> Subject: Re: [New Info-vax] Hiring maintainers for legacy VMS systems
> 
> On 2014-09-12, David Froble <davef at tsoft-inc.com> wrote:
> > Jojimbo wrote:
> >> Do you really care about finding your replacement?  If you are open
> >> about your plans and management doesn't make appropriate staffing
> >> adjustments that's not your problem.  To retire means you don't work
> >> there anymore. You have no responsibility to that corporation
> >> anymore. Walk out the door and don't look back, time is now yours to
> >> use as you see fit.
> >>
> >> Regards. Jim.
> >
> > While your suggestion appears logical, I would suggest that there are
> > various levels of "feeling responsible" that different people have.
> > It's a bit like "owning responsibility to see needful things happen" vs
> > "I'm here for the paycheck".
> >
> 
> As my job will almost certainly (>95-99% sure) not exist in a few
> months and hence I will be looking for new employment (probably
> non-VMS given the VMS market position) these are issues I am giving
> a great deal of thought to recently.
> 
> Jim's attitude is something I find it hard to imagine ever doing myself;
> for me, duty and responsibility are the words which keep coming to
> mind.
> I find it hard to imagine a situation in which I would ever leave any
> half-decent employer in the lurch.
> 
> And just to head this off, my job disappearing is nothing to do with
> VMS as such. The company I work for was owned by a really, really,
> decent
> person who was also a great technical guy; the kind of person you could
> have long detailed technical debates with and who was a very long time
> DEC user (right from something called CTS-300 (or maybe CTS-500)
> through
> to the current VMS setup).
> 
> However, times change and people retire. The new owners are decent
> enough people but they are not technical people, and this combined
> with the fact they are using industry standard packages in their
> other operations means it's not viable for them to continue with
> an in-house development setup at this one company they have just
> acquired. This is something I can totally understand.
> 
> However, to come back on topic, I also know I feel a strong sense of
> duty and responsibility to help them move the existing data into their
> setup assuming they go that route. If I found a job, I could never
> just give them the minimum notice period and just walk away. That goes
> contrary to everything which I believe.
> 
> > While I personally have much more respect for the former practice, I
> > will admit it's a 2-way street, and while some companies value the
> > former, others act in ways that justify the latter.
> 
> I hope I never find myself in the latter situation. :-)
> 
> Simon.
> 
> PS: The above was a bit longer than I anticipated, but like I said,
> I have been giving this a lot of thought recently. :-)
> 

It used to be said that the average number of placements in a lifetime
is 5, but newer thinking is that this number is currently around 8 or 
even more.

Having left HP / Compaq / DEC in 2012 after 34 years, I can say it is
always hard to have to come to the decision that it is time to move
on and do something else.

The old school thinking of a job for life is rapidly disappearing and
In retrospect, I likely would have been better off to leave HP a lot
sooner than I did. 

Note that I said I left HP and not retired. To me retirement is when
one decides not to any work anymore - period.

So, instead of being negative about one door closing, one needs
to be positive about the new doors opening - even if it does seem
scary right now.

Regards,

Kerry Main
Back to the Future IT Inc.
 .. Learning from the past to plan the future

Kerry dot main at backtothefutureit dot com