<FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>My previous job was a web developer position that would be utilizing ASP.net 2.0, SharePoint 2007, and SQL server 2005. I thought it would be great to be working with the latest and greatest technologies. When I took this job, I thought I would be able to move on in a few years and make some really good money. Unfortunately, my plan didn’t happen.</FONT>
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<FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>I didn’t realize that I would waste the next 10 months of my career on the project from hell. The project was to upgrade a web site that was used by students and teachers. It was going to be upgraded to SharePoint 2007. The web site was contracted out to a local web development firm. I would be maintaining the site, once the vendor was done. I knew that I wouldn’t be doing the original work, but I realized that I would be adding any additional functionality to the site. </FONT>
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<FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>The boss wanted to switch to the new site, half way through the school year. This bad decision was made before I was hired. What made the decision even worse, is this site wouldn’t have half of the features of the old site. The rest of the features were scheduled to come out in 3 months. As you can imagine, students and teachers were not happy coming back after the Christmas break to find a completely reorganized site that didn’t have half the features of the hold site.</FONT>
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<FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>The 3 months to completing the site never happened. The deadline was really unrealistic. The web development firm took this job in hope that it would get other projects from the state. The firm was in such a rush to get the project, that they never completed function requirements. There were quite a bit of debates as to whether items were in or out of scope. My boss would also bring up changes and request additional features and this lead to a lot of scope creep. </FONT>
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<FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>I was pretty much playing PM. Playing PM wasn’t challenging, but I kept hoping that the site would get done and that I would get the chance to do web development work.</FONT>
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<FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>Besides the problem with project and not being challenged, I had problems with some of my coworkers.</FONT>
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<FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>I wanted to create a test environment of the web site. I mentioned this to the head of IT and his statement was I didn’t need a test environment. I kept bugging him about it and his solution was to give me old laptops to create a test environment. The machines that were offer would not be adequate for SharePoint 2007. My plan was to buy decent desktop machines and make them into the test environment. The head of IT never purchased these machines. I realized he wouldn’t buy them because he didn’t want to be bothered by purchasing them and didn’t want to bother setting them up. </FONT>
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<FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>I also had issues with his boss. My boss complained that content on the web site wasn’t up-to-date and wasn’t changing enough. Even though the job listing was for a technical position and my skill set was technical, according to her I was suppose to manage the content. Even though in the real world, most organizations usually have a person with a communications/media background maintain content on the site. </FONT>
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<FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>My boss was also best friends with a marketing consultant. This marketing consultant only had one other customer besides my boss. As you can assume, like most consultants she was overpaid and worthless. One her brilliant ideas, was to make our site into a wiki. </FONT>
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<FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>After 10 months, I realized if I stayed any longer I would not grow professionally and it was time to leave. In the first month at my current job, I did more work than I did in 10 months at the previous job. As for the site, it still isn't completed.</FONT>