I was looking at a potential new job until it occurred to me to ask about dealing with “on-call” support.
As I work in tech, there is usually an expectation that some level of support is handled off hours in case systems go down. However this position didn’t have any compensation for making yourself available and generally only 15 mins from a phone or computer to support the systems. The best they could offer was “time in-lieu” if you get called, which is basically saying they’ll let you work your contracted maximum hours despite it being unsociable hours.
Fuck that.
After seeing elsewhere someone commenting that they would refuse to on-call if there was also a “return to office”, because if they had to go to the office to work, then how could they possibly support it from home, it made me wonder what other things should I remember to enquire about when interviewing and asking the hiring company?
If the position says you’ll be working directly with the CTO, just say no.
It usually means there is little to no dev team, and the CTO probably whipped together the existing codebase. Worst of all they will fight any attempt to change the patterns they’ve put in place.
“As CTO, I am a unique and special genius with unique and special vision. You exist only to implement my unique and special vision. Expect me to document and define the unique and special vision haphazardly (sometimes literally on the back of a restaurant napkin), if at all, and that I will be hugely critical if you deviate from any of the undescribed features of my unique and special vision.”
Source: have worked directly for more than one unique and special genius.