[Discuss] OT: Computer Professionals Update Act

[me at mattgillen.net (Matthew Gillen)]

On 01/13/2012 12:37 PM, Jerry Feldman wrote:
> In any case, IMHO, employees who work extra
> hours because the work cannot be accomplished during the scheduled work
> day. should be compensated. In contrast a programmer who works some
> overtime to meet a schedule should not be compensated in the general case.

What justification do you have for that?  If I'm a programmer and a
deadline is forcing me to work off hours, how is that fundamentally
different from the server upgrade that has to be done over the weekend?

Unless you're implicitly /blaming/ the software dev for needing to work
overtime (i.e., the deadline crunch was his fault).  I think that is a
gross simplification of what generally happens in software development,
and more to the point, the manager usually shares (at least) equal
responsibility for the schedule crunches (whether it's keeping the
requirements in flux, not being realistic about the initial schedule, etc).

Regardless, personally (as a software developer) I'm currently perhaps
lucky that I get compensated (usually with comp. time) if I put in more
hours.

Matt