Reply to: Volcanic Walkouts.....

[Diver]

President Bush famously has one of these on his desk, so you're in good (?) company.

I give this the scariest post of the year award

[al_cam]

I've only once taken a contract for more than 3 months... it was the 6 monther with AB A*t*m*tive... the longest 6 months of my life, and then they extended by 5 weeks... was I glad to see the back of that place... tulipe rate, tulipe work and generally tulipe... even the bits that weren't tulipe were tulipe... and it's located right next to Amersham International, who produce radioisotopes...

I'm new to the contractor game - I thought, long contract = great.
Lesson learned though...
Having said that, I'm a project mangler so the gigs tend to be for the duration of the project, and most decent projects are more than 3 months.

I have a different countdown though - months until mortgage paid off.
It is a great motivator... Thankfully the rate isn't tulipe...

[thunderlizard]

Countdown clock

President Bush famously has one of these on his desk, so you're in good (?) company.

[Sysman]

"I knew a guy who had a count down clock program on his desktop "

I did myself one of those which counted down the number of seconds I had left on my contract. Didn't go down too well when I had it showing 2 weeks into a 3 month contract

Wha not pick some sporting event you are keen on that coincides with the end of the contract?

Could be a bit of a b*gger if the only thing you can find is the Outer Mongolian Tiddly Winks semi-final though.

[lukemg]

Friend of mine was on a contract and got a new boss, few weeks later he was hauled in for a chat and told he had used the work phone for £22 of personal calls over the last few months. He reached into his pocket, pulled out a large wad of notes peeled off 3 tenners and said 'I trust we won't need to have this discussion again' and went back to his desk.
Few weeks later, pulled in about some other minor issue, I believe it was looking at the BBC site at lunchtime, he simply replied 'yeah, ok, I thank that will do for me, bye'. Walked to his desk, collected his gear and used his pass to open the automatic doors. As they closed behind him he flicked the pass back through and left - happy days !

[BoredBloke]

"I knew a guy who had a count down clock program on his desktop "

I did myself one of those which counted down the number of seconds I had left on my contract. Didn't go down too well when I had it showing 2 weeks into a 3 month contract

[Bagpuss]

Was insulted by a senior manager (he'd been in the pub most of the day), promptly dropped him and walked out. No assault charge, last invoice was paid and immense satisfaction was had.

Didn't hurt the career prospects one bit, the same agency still calls from time to time despite being told to fuck off.

Hello MF, how's the shop going?

[nucastle]

My first ever contract ended a fortnight ago, and i lasted a full 6 weeks there .... within the first week i was applying for another contract cauase the environment was just so toxic due to one single individual who just brought the whole place down in terms of morale, and his working style (he was the architect, and me the developer he never wanted).

between the time i handed in my notice and about 2-3 weeks before leaving, i had loads of 'say one more thing and im walking out' moments .... but i talked myself down every time. The fact it was in brussels and i was working away from my home 5 days out of 7 made it totally miserable.

The managers and agent were gutted to have me leaving, and tried multiple techniques to make me stay, but in the end i was just firm to my notice, worked it properly, and even though i gave this one bad egg the freeze out basically .... never 'lost it' with him.

I dont think throwing toys out of prams is ever going to do any real good in the long run - theres other, more devious ways of achieving the same thing, without giving yourself a reputation.

[Rantor]

Was insulted by a senior manager (he'd been in the pub most of the day), promptly dropped him and walked out. No assault charge, last invoice was paid and immense satisfaction was had.

Didn't hurt the career prospects one bit, the same agency still calls from time to time despite being told to fuck off.

Thanks for the replies, just been for a walk to calm down a bit. Not sure who to clatter anyway - too spoiled for choice.

It is an odd situation. No pimp involved,direct rolling contract plus I have other irons in the fire so I should be able to leg it without p1ssing on my frites.

The client seems to be hell-bent on sabotaging their own business and that's their lookout. They have been warned for nearly a year by me and some other external guys that they are heading for trouble. This has now come to pass and they now want to sort things out in as dysfunctional a way as they got themselves into the hole. Again its their lookout.

Problem is they want me to to resolve a large part of this (theoretically doable and quite interesting) but at the same time they make it effectively impossible to do so. What vague vestige of professional pride I have (really not much) made me want to stay and make it work but now they are focussing on pre-allocating blame and shovelling all and sundry responsibility onto the few vaguely capable bods in the hope that all the bad things will go away. These people will go the extra mile to make the possible become impossible.

Three languages used to discuss issues that maybe one in five of them can understand anyway.

No wonder that bloody eurofighter took so long to build!!!!

I think the problem lies with me for even thinking of staying.

All I need now is for DA to explain how I don't understand what the client really wants

[FGB]

I ventured back into permiedom post dot.com bubble and after the 3 month probation period I told them they didn't meet my minimum required standard and left.

It turned out that they were still liable for the agency finders fee as I'd been there for 3 months LOL.

[Zorba]

I knew a guy who had a count down clock program on his desktop

So did I. When I saw it, I decided there and then not to extend him.

[al_cam]

And write the number of hours left on each page of your diary...

Unless like me, you are on week 17 of 40 - 23 more weeks is just plain depressing...

[Cliphead]

Was insulted by a senior manager (he'd been in the pub most of the day), promptly dropped him and walked out. No assault charge, last invoice was paid and immense satisfaction was had.

Didn't hurt the career prospects one bit, the same agency still calls from time to time despite being told to fuck off.

[timh]

I knew a guy who had a count down clock program on his desktop

When I was permanent, I wrote a little "count down to the weekend" screensaver (where 'the weekend' was 17:00 on a friday). Within a couple of months about 200 people in the company were using it. I was eventually reprimanded.

I've nearly walked out on a contract, but in the end agreed to a reasonable compromise which involved a project manager being forbidden to talk to me, and for a new tech lead to take over most of his job. It's worth making a fuss if there's no other option.

[al_cam]

Very, very nearly did it 2 weeks ago but thankfully it was a Friday and the boss wasn't around. Cooled down over the weekend, went in on the Monday and calmly and openly explained my frustrations complete with evidence to support and ideas to help. Things are a better now, not perfect, but bearable.

So, don't chuck the toys, do it constructively and appear helpful then just lie back and think of the money, fulfil your contract and get out at the end of it complete with an intact contract history and another reference.

If you must bale out then just lie about illness or some family commitments so you can leave on good terms. You never know when losing it will come back to haunt you.