Where to exit IT?
There are millions of articles with advice on how to enter IT, and I will show originality and write a story about how I entered and exited IT, and I have no regrets at all. From time to time, former colleagues call me back, but the very thought of returning terrifies me. I will write down those disadvantages of the sphere that for some reason it is not customary to talk about. Every day we see millions of articles about how people got into IT and are happy, while losers like me try to remain silent and forget. But I will be an exception, maybe this information will help someone and know, dear reader: there is a way out of IT.<, Slackoverflow and other sites with technical articles, watch training videos on YouTube, most often after hours. In our company, it was the norm to give a week to master, say, Docker, and it doesn’t matter that you previously only worked with Git: sit down on the weekend and learn, and then report and go through a test with a lead in a video conference.
Total control. Endless video calls and reports, group and personal. Sometimes it seems like you can't fart without writing a report. In the morning everyone discusses what they did yesterday and goals for the new day. In the evening, what they managed to do and what were the ups and downs, they ask questions. Particularly toxic companies will also have a time tracker to track whether you stayed in the toilet 5 minutes longer than expected.
You constantly have to prove that you shouldn’t be fired. At least once a week there are one-to-one calls with the lead, where you need to prove that you are worth the money they are paying you. You feel like a schoolboy who was called to the principal. Terribly unpleasant! In other areas, on the contrary, I was praised and persuaded not to quit, but in IT I was often afraid that I would not pass the test or that they would ask me to quit after passing it. The latter happened twice, exactly when the time was approaching vacation, and it was the same for other employees: even on vacations, companies save money. Instead of providing leave, they simply ask to resign and look for another candidate. If you refuse to quit, they make your life unbearable and try in every possible way to crush you mentally.
Too much communication with colleagues. How does the average person imagine an IT specialist? Like a lonely social phobe who has virtually no contact with anyone, only sends the finished code to his superiors. As an ideal job for introverts. This is absolutely impossible in life. It’s not easy for HR to test soft skills this way: you’ll have to communicate with colleagues and leads too often. Each task will need to be discussed with a lot of people from the team, each of them will tell their version of how it should be completed, and why you didn’t do it perfectly. During the working day, it is a common occurrence that 3-4 people write to you at the same time about the same task, or about different ones. The latter is even worse, you have to change the environment, and we had two parts of the front – old and new – and two parts of the back – in PHP and Golang.
With SVO, another minus has appeared in the IT sector – blocking Russian phones in Google Edsthe inability to create an advertising campaign on Facebook, and to watch YouTube you need to turn on VPN, and it – even a corporate one – greatly slows down the work.
Nepotism. With the departure of foreigners in Russian IT, it is confidently gaining strength. Previously, mother’s boys who don’t know anything further than the “Hallow World print” didn’t keep it, but now I hear this from many acquaintances and have met it from personal experience. There is a high probability that you will work, and some conditional Vasya, who is the leader’s nephew, will sit and rest, or even get in the way.
Harmful to health. I gained a record weight in less than a year of working in IT: I went from 70 kg to 107! Although I went to the gym almost every day, the company paid 50% of it. This, of course, is very individual, but sedentary work and looking at the monitor is not very good for your health: you gain weight and your eyesight deteriorates.
Most likely you will have to buy good equipment for the job. Previously, it was provided temporarily by a company for free rental: computers, laptops, iPhones. Nowadays, almost nowhere will newcomers be provided with anything, they will only ask for it. Your old, simple laptop with 4 GB will not support the environment you need for work, you will have to buy at least 16 GB. The most difficult thing about phones is that you need different models for work and game development: you need a gaming computer, but they cost 100 thousand rubles each. By the way, in the photo for the article there is a computer with 2 monitors that I was given for work.
Distance from relatives, loved ones, friends. While working in IT, I divorced my wife, became nervous and even aggressive from constantly working almost 24 hours at the computer, and was even more furious from a bunch of interviews. In addition, you will have too little free time to maintain social connections.
Many people, having gone through all this hell, hold on gritting their teeth because it’s a pity to lose the result of sleepless nights – their stack of skills acquired through tears, a place on the team after dozens of unsuccessful interviews and test assignments. People find themselves in a so-called golden cage: they are also afraid of losing the good income they have gained through years of study and intellectual work. If you leave IT, where will you go? To the cash register at Pyaterochka for 40 thousand? At the Ozone pick-up point for 30 thousand? I was scared too, but I found salvation in warehouses and I’m sure that in Russia there are many other well-paid jobs, but they don’t take so much of your nerves and health. It’s not for nothing that many IT companies provide psychological services.
