The MM Network

[JPolen01]

Either way you should probably leave this company if they're hitting you with timesheet bullshit.  Management that nitpicks on time like that is incompetent in my opinion.  Or trying to goad people into quitting, which is shitty in another way.

Agreed. Why does it matter if you complete your assigned duties in 40, 45 or 38 hours? If the job is complete, the job is complete. Tracking every minute of every day is bullshit. I get that different time can be charged to different projects but they need to factor in breaks, restroom, general bullshitting time. 

Get on your horse and get the fuck out of there.

[Senor_Taylor]

Why do you have to ask your manager if you can apply? Seems kinda counterproductive to give managers power over what internal positions are applied for. It means that some (or even many) managers will just say no because they want to keep productive people on their team.

Either way you should probably leave this company if they're hitting you with timesheet bullshit. Management that nitpicks on time like that is incompetent in my opinion. Or trying to goad people into quitting, which is shitty in another way.

Yeah, it's in our company policy that your manager needs to approve of you applying internally for other positions. They already told me that can't afford to lose me until Q1 2020 and I've tried to imply it's best to let me move internally before I leave outright, but the external job search has been tough without PM experience. Trying to play both games at once and if I can move to a PM role internally, that'll let me get experience to find a PM role externally.

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[G.Irish]

Do you have a PMP, Scrum Cert, ITIL cert. or equivalent?  If not, start working on those as they'll help you get a PM position.  Don't stay in a holding pattern in your career because it would be more convenient for someone who didn't see fit to give you the raise you deserve.  It's good that you're working both angles though.

[Senor_Taylor]

Do you have a PMP, Scrum Cert, ITIL cert. or equivalent?  If not, start working on those as they'll help you get a PM position.  Don't stay in a holding pattern in your career because it would be more convenient for someone who didn't see fit to give you the raise you deserve.  It's good that you're working both angles though.

Oddly enough, I keep getting very healthy raises (10% every year) so I have a little bit of golden hand cuffs happening. I'll look into those certs, but I haven't seen any PRODUCT manager roles ever mention those as preferred. I see it a lot for Project Management, which I don't want to get into currently.

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[Ken]

Not sure if I mentioned this, but I've been getting hounded about my timesheet lately and it's been stressing me out. Required to log 45 hours a week "productive hours" so no lunch breaks, no rest room breaks, nothing is counted that isn't backed up by time logged in Jira or Salesforce. The only exception is my "admin" code that I need to try to squeeze all of my restroom breaks, email checking, slack messaging, walking to and from meetings, etc into. 

This is my nightmare. 

Respect for even doing that for a day. Fuck outta here with that noise.

[G.Irish]

Do you have a PMP, Scrum Cert, ITIL cert. or equivalent?  If not, start working on those as they'll help you get a PM position.  Don't stay in a holding pattern in your career because it would be more convenient for someone who didn't see fit to give you the raise you deserve.  It's good that you're working both angles though.

Oddly enough, I keep getting very healthy raises (10% every year) so I have a little bit of golden hand cuffs happening.

Just make sure your raises match your market value.  With experience you might be able to make 20-30% (or higher) jumps by switching jobs.  

 I'll look into those certs, but I haven't seen any PRODUCT manager roles ever mention those as preferred. I see it a lot for Project Management, which I don't want to get into currently. 

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My mistake, I thought you were saying you wanted to be a project manager.

[Senor_Taylor]

Do you have a PMP, Scrum Cert, ITIL cert. or equivalent?  If not, start working on those as they'll help you get a PM position.  Don't stay in a holding pattern in your career because it would be more convenient for someone who didn't see fit to give you the raise you deserve.  It's good that you're working both angles though.

Oddly enough, I keep getting very healthy raises (10% every year) so I have a little bit of golden hand cuffs happening.

Just make sure your raises match your market value.  With experience you might be able to make 20-30% (or higher) jumps by switching jobs.  

 I'll look into those certs, but I haven't seen any PRODUCT manager roles ever mention those as preferred. I see it a lot for Project Management, which I don't want to get into currently. 

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My mistake, I thought you were saying you wanted to be a project manager.

I make 74,000 base currently with 5-7 in bonuses. I'd say that's fairly good for my experience? That doesn't really sound reasonable for an entry level PM. Or does it?

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[Apoc]

FWIW, PM doesn't really mean Product Manager for any company I've been with. It's always meant Program Manager.

Just want to make sure you're not hampering your job search with terminology issues.

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I make 74,000 base currently with 5-7 in bonuses. I'd say that's fairly good for my experience? That doesn't really sound reasonable for an entry level PM. Or does it?

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https://www.glassdoor.com/Salaries/junio...KO0,22.htm

It's probably going to be hard to find a Product Manager role without moving into that role with a current company first.

[Senor_Taylor]

My job search is on "associate product manager", "junior product manager", "product analyst", "business analyst".

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[.RJ]

A lot of BA roles really are very disconnected from product management work so be careful there. If its not a 'product company' then steer clear.

[Jake]

I would take a bit of a pay cut to get the fuck out of there. I refuse to log my time beyond "yes I worked for this client today" - we're all adults here.

[V1GiLaNtE]

I would take a bit of a pay cut to get the fuck out of there. I refuse to log my time beyond "yes I worked for this client today" - we're all adults here.

That is some Grade A Fuckery right there. Jesus christ you have to log your bathroom time...? 

@Taylor - What happened with CapTech?

[Apoc]

I would take a bit of a pay cut to get the fuck out of there. I refuse to log my time beyond "yes I worked for this client today" - we're all adults here.

That is some Grade A Fuckery right there. Jesus christ you have to log your bathroom time...? 

@Taylor - What happened with CapTech?

When I was living in this world, we had to bill 9 hours per day in 15 minutes increments, so the client billing was "accurate." We couldn't bill lunch, so a lot of people ate at their desk, but no one was backing up their colon because they couldn't go the bathroom.

[Senor_Taylor]

I would take a bit of a pay cut to get the fuck out of there. I refuse to log my time beyond "yes I worked for this client today" - we're all adults here.

That is some Grade A Fuckery right there. Jesus christ you have to log your bathroom time...? 

@Taylor - What happened with CapTech?

Got a "no", I think? I can't remember who has said "no" and who I haven't heard from yet.

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[Senor_Taylor]

Got approved to apply for the Analyst position and talked to someone on that team that said his pay is exactly the same as mine. Very excited. I've been told by a PM already he would expect me to come in as a senior analyst so maybe it'd be a raise. I'll keep my expectations low.

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[Senor_Taylor]

Does anyone have any experience with Ntrepid in Ashburn? Have an interview there for a Junior Technical Product Manager role.

[Senor_Taylor]

^^^ First phone call went well. Have a call with their product team and an on-site left. Salary expectation seems to be more than I make now, 40 hour work week (but they seem to not allow you to ever log less), 21 days pto + holidays, 7% contribution to 401k that vests immediately. No structured WFH. If I hadn't read reviews online, it would seem 100% perfect.

Currently caught in between this potential job and my internal move at my current company. On one hand, it's an opportunity for a raise, a sponsored clearance, less hours (maybe) and a change of scenario, but on the other hand, the enemy you know is better than the one you don't?

[V1GiLaNtE]

A sponsored clearance

My .02 be careful what you wish for here. Once you get down the cleared path it gets harder to get out. I thought that was the type of work I wanted to do, but when I began to realize I had to report ALL of my travel abroad, potentially lock myself out of opportunities (social,financial, etc.) that may be a "gray area" of the feds = jeopardize clearance, and a lot of push on projects to be holed up in a secure facility (which usually means suit and tie 24/7) I stepped away from it. 

Also, shocker, but a lot of cleared work is super mundane and not at all interesting. It's just cleared due to the sensitivity of the agencies operations. 

I know plenty of MMers here work in the cleared sector, but in the end I found it to be a pain in the ass without much reward other than job security.

[.RJ]

Cleared doesnt always mean top secret/work in a scif, either. I used to have a clearance and left the job and let it lapse, although I'm pretty boring and it didnt cramp my lifestyle at all. Plenty of uncleared work available around here. That said, I dont have any desire to go back to that work but mostly because its boring like you said.

[Senor_Taylor]

Let me clarify. This role doesn't need or use a clearance. They have other stuff that does and it's possible I could get one.