Job Changes?

Not changing companies, but my job role will change...at least I think it will if I have a job after the changes kick in.

To make a long story short, within the next 3-6 months the work I do will be transitioned to an eastern European team to handle 24x7. It is a phased in approach with stage one having the team (which is not fully hired or trained yet, but things are progressing very quickly) take all the inbound high priority requests from the help desk (which we do now) and filter them (like the team lead at the help desk used to do) and assign them accordingly. We would still manage the issue once it is assigned to us.

The next phase would be for the eastern European team to take the calls as well as taking back anything that is still open after our business hours. We would then only take calls from the new team if they needed questions answered.

The last phase would be for the team to handle 100% of the calls and never to call us again for input. I know that last one is a pipe dream but after we handover our work to them, we are no longer on call.

Sounds scary...like I am about to lose my job, but I believe we will be okay, at least in the short term. The account I work with has more work than workers and my boss and his boss both told me so at different times. They both stated to the European team that he could not wait to get us 100% so he could get us working on things that need attention. I am excited and scared at the same time.

I have been supporting this customer, both as an employee of that company and as their supplier for 14 years. I have been blessed to avoid the layoffs that started 3 years after I started working for them and continues today. I have counted at least six times I have missed the axe that cuts people from their livelihood, aka "their job". I guess I will see if I make it past round seven! God has been good so far and he will remain to be good no matter what happens.

All this talk of job changes has caused me to think back to all the job roles I have had in the past 14 years supporting this customer:

1996 - hired as a L3 Equipment Tech
1997 - transferred to IT as a Help Desk agent
1998 - promoted to HD Team Lead
2000 - promoted to Customer Support Coordinator
2001 - promoted to Customer Support Supervisor
2003 - transferred to current my employer to support my former employer
2003 - title change to Technical Support Supervisor, began working in the NOC
2004 - "loaned out" to a Project Manager to assist with a huge project
2004 - transferred back to support as a Disk Encryption Specialist
2005 - transferred to the Unix team as a Sysadmin
2006 - transferred to Escalation Management
2007 - transferred to Incident Management

That is a lot of jumping, I will admit but many of those was to keep from getting laid off, especially the last 10 years. I was working in the NOC when I was loaned out to the PM for a year or so. When my time was up with him, the NOC had been migrated to Asia. The encryption tech was leaving so I jumped in his spot.

After the encryption team was migrated and the basic support automated, I was given an option of being laid off, taking a Windows admin position or a Unix admin position...neither of which I was qualified. Since I am run Linux as a hobby at home, I decided to take that route. When all the Unix support was migrated to Asia, I was officially on the layoff list until I agreed to take any job that was available. That lead to the Escalation Management role that was by far one of the worst jobs for me.

I lasted seven months in that role before I told my boss that I needed out. I am not a quitter but the stress was killing me. As tough as the economy was, I was ready to quit rather than stay in that job role. Oddly enough, I was not fired, laid off, nor did I have to quit. About 2 weeks later, I was told that an opening was available on the Incident Management team. And while I has not been a bed of roses, I have been there since. Now, it looks like that my job role is about to change again.