Time Management for System Administrators 144
genehack writes "System administrators have a stereotypical reputation for grumpiness and irritability. Sometimes this misanthropy is a cultivated pose, designed to deter casual or trivial requests that would take time away from more important activities like playing nethack and reading netnews. More often, however, sysadmins are disgruntled simply because they can't seem to make any headway on the dozens of items clogging up their todo lists. If you're an example of the latter case, you may find some help in Time Management for System Administrators, the new book from Thomas Limoncelli (who you may recognize as one of the co-authors of the classic The Practice of System and Network Administration). Read the rest of genehack's review.
| Time Management for System Administrators | |
| author | Thomas A. Limoncelli |
| pages | 226 |
| publisher | ORA |
| rating | 8/10 |
| reviewer | genehack |
| ISBN | 0-596-00783-3 |
| summary | Time management tips for sysdadmins |
This slim book (only 226pp) packs a large amount of helpful information about making better use of your time at work, so that you can make some headway on at least some of those tasks that have piled up around you, while still managing to have a life outside of work. One of Limoncelli's main points is that sysadmins have to develop some way of effectively dealing with the constant stream of interruptions in their life if they're going to accomplish anything. The other point is that they also need a good tracking system to make sure they don't lose track of new, incoming requests in the process of dealing with existing ones. The book continually reinforces these two points, and presents several alternative, complementary ways to accomplish them.
The first three chapters deal with high-level, generic issues: principles of time management, managing interruptions, and developing checklists and routines to help deal with the chaos of day-to-day system administration. The middle third of the book details how to use "the cycle system", Limoncelli's task management plan for sysadmins. Basically, it's a hybrid between Franklin-Covey A-B-C prioritization and day planning and David Allen GTD-style todo lists, with a few sysadmin-specific tweaks thrown in. The final chapters of the book address a grab-bag of issues: task prioritization, stress management, dealing with the flood of email that all admins seem to get, identifying and eliminating the time sinks in your environment, and documenting and automating your work-flow.
In general, I think this is a great book for sysadmins that are looking to begin addressing time management problems. People that have already done some investigation of time management techniques (like the aforementioned Franklin-Covey and GTD systems) may find less value here -- but I still think the book will be interesting, especially the chapters detailing the workings of "the cycle system". Personally, after reading this book, I don't see any reason to move away from my modified GTD system, but I have gone back to using some daily checklists, which are helping me keep on top of my repeating tasks a lot better. I suspect that any working sysadmin will take away at least two or three productivity-enhancing tips from this book."
You can purchase Time management tips for sysdadmins from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
Some tips (Score:5, Interesting)
Honestly, I think a lot of places do this now. At the time, it seemed new and it worked and continues to work well. It will even work when you have 2 sysadmins, probably the optimum is to have about 4 because if you have any more than that, you lose your rhythm with what is going on with the company a bit.
One task at a time... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Some tips (Score:2, Interesting)
- Use your ticketing system instead of filing requests via email
- Use your ticketing system instead of walking up to your cube and bothering you
- Not walk up to your cube at all
- Not mail specific/favourite admins specifically for specific requests
*sigh* If only HR wouldn't throw a fit if I replaced the plastic battleaxe on my cube wall with real one...
Works for me! (Score:3, Interesting)
As the reviewer said it may be less valuable for those of you that are already doing something like this. And I'm not taking everything it says as gospel. But you could do a hell of a lot worse than to pick up this book, inhale it several times over a weekend (it's short), and start using what it teaches.
And hey, he co-wrote The Practice of System and Network Administration, another excellent book. I'll take a look at anything he's got to show.
Consider the source... (Score:2, Interesting)
Your boss's job is to keep you busy. In an ideal world, your boss's job would just be to make sure x amount of work gets done and then their responsibility ends. In the real world, your boss gets fired if you're effective enough to have 25% of your time free and you look like you're slacking off. Various ploys about acting busy only get you so far, if you finish all the assigned tasks way ahead of time, and the other stuff isn't on the "hot" list, then they assume you can fit way more on that list.
So it comes down to this, if you're stressed and overworked, your (my) boss gets praised as long as they can keep the "hot" list hot. They call it pipelining here, as in "bend over for the pipelining". If you're not stressed, they find more to do or stop investing in timesaving admin tools, since you obviously don't need them.
Yes, my job sucks. Yes, I'm looking. No, I don't buy that lots of people don't have this problem, they just don't recognize it.
My Review (Score:3, Interesting)
Instead I've done the next best thing, which is to write a Rails app for this, which is, of course, accessible from the Treo and just about any other place. http://www.shokk.com/Todo/ [shokk.com]
All in all, there are some very good nuggets of info concentrated into the fewer pages of this book from the whole of the previous book, which did not wholly deal with time management and had those ideas spread throughout the book.
For an idea of what the book talks about, see the video here [google.com].
Think in terms of computer science (Score:5, Interesting)
-matthew
Love the cover art (Score:2, Interesting)
When is it time to get *YOUR* work done? (Score:3, Interesting)
Unfortunately, for me, it seems that each person who I've helped in the past, knows that I can help them now. Regardless of how many times I say, "So and so is on-call", I get the response, "I know this will only take you a second." and if I say "Take it to the on-call" again, they go right up the food chain, claiming how "uncooperative" I am.
Anyway, I digress.
How many sys admins, sys analysts, sys engineers (whatever title your company decides to throw at you this week), get to the point, that they just want to scream, "When do I get to work on my assigned work, instead of doing your work for you?".
People will walk up all the time and lay the famous "Quick question" line, at which point I have to suppress the desire to pick up that spare Netra lying under my desk and beat them over the head with it. Sometimes, I surpise myself, and leave it there. Most of the time, I end up with it almost over the top of the desk, before they back off and leave. But seriously, I usually do end up answering their questions, and then try to get back into what I'm doing before the next interruption hits.
The problem with this methodology, is that when the end of the week hits, and your boss asks you for a status update on the one project you were assigned to, and you give them this pole-axed look, claiming to have been inundated with walk-up traffic, your boss just says, "But I thought you weren't on call this week". To which, I really don't have a good reply - other than, "It was either help them, or have them go crying to you claiming I wasn't being helpfull".
We have a help desk center, where everyone with an issue is supposed to call. For some reason, the S&D (no, this doesn't mean software and development, it's supposed to mean Support and Development) group seems to think they are above this work rule. No matter how many times we casually remind them, no matter how many carefully worded e-mails are sent out reminding them of this rule, it never stops the walk up traffic. It also doesn't seem to matter who's on call as long as the person asking the question knows that you can provide them with the answer, regardless of how many times you've given them the same answer. It's easier to ask again, than to strain your brain and remember it on your own.
For those co-workers who actually do remember to follow the rules most of the time, and do remember the answers given for longer than a day or two, I am very courteous and helpfull. For the rest of the SOBs, I'm not as forgiving, and I usually end up reminding them, quite vocally, that I've answered their question (the exact same one) multiple times in the past, and why can't they get it through their duranium alloy skulls?
Oh well - not sure where I'm going with this anymore, maybe I just felt the need to vent.
If anyone has found a chuckle here, then great. If I've offended anyone, then f-off. =D
Blah. Can't throw one book at "sysadmin" ... (Score:2, Interesting)
xx hours in each day
xx tasks take up xx hours
xx interruptions take away from xx tasks.
This varies greatly. You may have a nice cush univeristy job where you can get away with BOFH tactics and generally get paid to do little to nothing.
Or you could work for a web hosting company with 300 servers and one Admin. You know, the kinds of companies that give you an army of "rhce's" from india and call it help? In that case you don't need time management skills you need hard drugs, and liquor and lots of it.
My priority scale changes much like a dynamic cluster would.. whatever is prone to get me screamed at the most if it doesn't get taken care of is what gets attention. Thats either the servers or the wife, whichever talks through the earpiece when I pick up the phone.
If someone could write "The complete idiots guide to quieting a noisy pesky end user who wont STFU about their database"
The point is most of us have unrealistic demands put on us daily. You just need to accept that you are not going to get things done, and most people aren't going to like you much less appreciate what you do (or even understand why those pesky interruptions can set you back a whole day
So put this somewhere on your wall or on your cube / door / whatever. It works for me.
***
If you see me editing stuff that looks like code, stand there for 10 seconds. If I don't look your way, go away - leave your number or email on my door I will call you back.
***
Companies should educate staff more on AST (Admin sensitivity training.)
As the median income for a 20 year seasoned unix veteran is now around 40k, we just don't make enough money to put up with end user crap
A few things that helped me a lot (Score:2, Interesting)
delay any future requests from people that waste your time.
I.E. panic requests "drop everything, I need this done now."
When the truth is " I don't need it for a week & it isn't on the plan until either,
but I want to go into the meeting today & report it done"
Avoid meetings, any meeting over 30 minutes & 5 people to usually low value.
Make sure your customer knows what they can do to make your life easier.
I.E. like budget time & money for installs/testing.
not waiting until 11:15 to report a problem, so you can work thru lunch.
learn Perl (& Python)
watch the problems and look for the root cause.
a couple of scripts & simple documentation go a long way.
Try to always put your stuff in a very easy to find location.
i.e. If it doesn't almost jump in front of the user/help desk it is in the wrong place.
Document the top 10 things that go wrong with an app/process & have a solution.
A simple trouble shooting guide for the help line/web site is a good thing.
have a to-do list for your own use.
Go on vacation and be unavailable for a least a week.
You will find out how far ahead of the chaos you are.
And your boss & users will get a that too.
This has lead me to budget for tools/training, extra manpower, & a new job(once).
Getting fired was ok, I found out later they go thru SA's very quickly.
I learned a lot of things to avoid & how to spot them in the interview process.
Always read the new BOFH !!!
Ya can't live it, but an idle fantasy is alway fun too.