Working over 40 hours?

[Steve Mercer]

sounds to like they want to discourage development to me

[Mandy]

I agree with Mike, define reasonable.  Is someone who’s doing project management work but still getting paid a drafter’s wage reasonable (victim of an invisible promotion)?  Especially in this economy, employers have their pick of a very large pool of applicant and everyone is desperate for a foot in the door.  Are you willing to put your job on the line and b*!@$ and moan to your boss about being overworked?  No, so you suck it up and take up smoking and drinking and popping a couple of Prozac before going to work everyday.  It sucks for those who are unemployed, but those who are employed aren’t that much better off.  The employed, in this economy, are often way overworked and way under-compensated.

[Anonymous]

Now I understand, sociopaths and narcissists tend to gravitate toward landscape architecture. That explains everything. I was wondering what was wrong with me.

 

B.S. There are bad people who will take advantage of you in every profession. I’ve worked for scumbags before in LA offices before, but the majority of my bosses were pretty decent people. A couple I would even consider as friends now that I don’t work for them.

 

I don’t think this is the time to make a fair judgment about this profession or any other one for that matter. There are a lot of businesses that are just getting by right now. When we start building again then you’ll have a different perspective.

 

Yes there are LA firms that have a lot of turn over. But the best ones know that it is not smart business to hire someone, train them and have them quit just when they’re up to speed. Office casualties are costly. Happy employees that enjoy their work tend to be more productive and less likely to try to sabotage things.

 

Not all LA firm owners want people who are willing to be doormats. A good portion of them are looking for people who are players. Players are smart, creative, entrepreneurial minded, confident, assertive, have backbone and add to the company’s bottom line. These are the kind of people who are not going to allow themselves to get screwed over for very long.

 

As a professional you have to understand your value. Prior to 2008 if you were a good experienced LA, you didn’t have to take a whole lot of crap because someone else would hire you. But for now things are a little different, we’re in survival mode.

[Thomas J. Johnson]

Laguna Beach, CA. With the amount of work I was doing, it might as well have been Nebraska. I didn’t see the light of day… don’t let exotic locales and big names lure you into sacrificing everything for a job. It’s not worth leaving friends, family, a great town and spending every penny you have. Yeah, it was expensive.

[Theodore Tegen]

I would agree.  Or maybe they just charge Russell $600 a sheet for review, to compensate for dealing with his flowery disposition.

[Thomas J. Johnson]

That sounds like a pretty chill schedule… It looks like you even squeaked out 40.5 billable hours… that’s a lot better than cracking-out on AutoCAD for 36 hours straight, getting 6 hours of sleep and then finishing the week with 12+ hour days…

[Anonymous]

Talk about needing a hug.

[Thomas J. Johnson]

I like cheeseburgers.

[Anonymous]

Like I said it all balances out. I might get tickets to the ball game, but the week before my boss would do something to tick me off. Also there would be the atypical week in which I’d eat lunch at my desk and go home everyday with “computer eyes” from looking at ACAD for hours.

[Theodore Tegen]

Why aren’t you passing that fee on to the client?  Whether it is itemized or rolled into your design fee, It is perfectly reasonable to pass that on to the client.

[Anonymous]

You’re probably a fine LA. Besides I consider myself a grunt/front line LA. I didn’t graduate from a fancy program. I don’t have any freakishly phenomenal skills or abilities and I’m from blue collar stock.

 

I can say I’ve had a better than average lifestyle for the last two decades as a regular old LA. Several LAs I know that have been around for a while feel the same way. We are a group of professionals that are usually as serious about are fun as we are about our work.

[Anonymous]

I’m actually starting to like you. J

[Theodore Tegen]

I’m sure you realize that AZ is just about the worst place to be working in any field related to development right now, yet you insist that your experiences in the AZ market is somehow representative of the “real world.”  I wouldn’t touch a $1500 job with a 10′ pole, it wouldn’t be worth it for a firm the size of mine, our overhead is too high.  For a smaller firm with lower costs, it makes more sense.  For a one man show, it’s good work.

[Thomas J. Johnson]

Just trying to lighten the mood a bit… it wasn’t a reference to your last name. Besides, it’s McDonalds (Irish) not MacDonalds (Scottish)… You’re probably just overly sensitive to cheeseburger jokes… no need to hit bellow the belt. Don’t worry, I don’t hold out much hope, if any, of a shiny new LA future… Most likely I’ll be working at McDonalds in the near future.

[Mandy]

Dude, take a chill pill.  No need for the hostility.

[Author]

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