My little piece of IBM heaven

[mickj]

Well the management in our group has mandated that we are all required to work 8 1/2 hours of overtime each week until the end of the year. They are asking us to get 'creative' in ideas to add hours. I currently don't even have 40 hours of real work to do a week. I don't feel that it is ethical to bill my clients for anymore that 40 unless there is actually more work to do. IBM seems to be going downhill fast. Hopefully they will lay me off :-)

[CuppaJoe]

Hope they didn't put that in writing!

[KB]

That's awful about the billing issue; however I've been there more times than I care to remember.

I'm involved in the non payment of overtime class action suit for California because of the IBM requirement on my former account for working and billing a minimum of 44 to 45 hours per week.

I got tired of waiting for them to lay me off and quit 2 years ago. Don't miss it, either.

[lrak]

Try to get out of Global Services. The rest of IBM doesn't seem to work the same way.

[teejayevans]

Originally Posted by mickj

Well the management in our group has mandated that we are all required to work 8 1/2 hours of overtime each week until the end of the year. They are asking us to get 'creative' in ideas to add hours. I currently don't even have 40 hours of real work to do a week. I don't feel that it is ethical to bill my clients for anymore that 40 unless there is actually more work to do. IBM seems to be going downhill fast. Hopefully they will lay me off :-)

Given the push to move much of the work offshore, the only thing this
would accomplish is showing how expensive US is. This may be just a
local manager's idea of showing how much work the have to try to
protect against the next round of resource actions.
I think the Mafia is a big holder of IBM stock and given Sam (CEO)
an ultimatum. Clearly IBM is getting very aggressive about cost cutting,
etc.
TJ

[bssc]

Our Megacorp is an IBM client. I will have to look out for this since we have a strict 40 hour work week.

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Hey, the good news is that a team of bureaucrats at IBM took some time to cobble together rules for how you, as an employee, are supposed to behave when engaged in virtual worlds like Second Life...

IBM rules govern workers in virtual worlds - Online World - MSNBC.com

You can start banging your head on the wall now.

[Webzter]

We just announced that we're flipping our infrastructure group to IBM. I'm guessing the rest of us aren't too terribly far behind.

[kcowan]

It is normal for consulting companies to drive their people to bill 44-48 hours a week. This is to help fund sick leave and holidays. In a big company like IBM, this means that the total time expended during the week is likely to be 60 hours (10-20% down time for meetings, emails, posting on ER forums).

I suspect many states frown on that kind of work week, especially without overtime pay. The other choice is to code the time doing your emails to a customer account. (Like lawyers do...)

[cube_rat]

I work for megacorp who has outsourced their entire infrastructure to IBM. I'm not even going to comment on the horrible service and myriad levels of paperwork and time to get things done. Sorry, someone mentioned "IBM", so I needed to rant a little I'd like to go further, but can't...

[Helen]

This is one advantage of working for the government. I get comp time when I work past forty hours per week.

Of course I still am on call every other week and don't get any comp time unless I get a call. I can't tell you how pissed I get at having to stay within a two hour drive of work every other weekend. That means no backpacking, no road trips, etc.

Six more years ...

[packrat44]

While working as the office manager and estimator for a small construction company 30 years ago I found one of the superintendents was padding his billing hours to a long-time client. I confronted him and was told I had no ownership in the company and he had 5% ownership (son-in-law to the owner): therefore, he intended to continue the practice. I found new employment a few days later with a more reputable construction firm and submitted my 2-weeks notice.

You should always maintain a strong set of ethics even if your employer or co-workers do not.

[BunsGettingFirm]

Originally Posted by lrak

Try to get out of Global Services. The rest of IBM doesn't seem to work the same way.

I did a quick search for jobs on IBM's web site, and it would appear that most of the jobs are in consulting or services, but you're saying that this is the armpit of the organization?

[BunsGettingFirm]

Originally Posted by packrat44

While working as the office manager and estimator for a small construction company 30 years ago I found one of the superintendents was padding his billing hours to a long-time client. I confronted him and was told I had no ownership in the company and he had 5% ownership (son-in-law to the owner): therefore, he intended to continue the practice. I found new employment a few days later with a more reputable construction firm and submitted my 2-weeks notice.

You should always maintain a strong set of ethics even if your employer or co-workers do not.

This is absolutely the right stance because when the sh*t hit the fan, and it will, who do you think they are going to blame, the relative of the owner or some stranger who found out but agreed to sweep the dirt under the rug. Smart move.

I would actually go one step further and anonymously tip off the customer.