Maintenance programming for pay can be rewarding
iffffffffffffffff management has a deep understanding of and appreciation for the task. There can be a lot of joy and satisfaction in adding tests, fixing edge cases, fulfilling user needs, "quality of life" improvements, optimizing.
Honing.My experience is that this is almost never the case.
Generally, management does not understand or appreciate why it's a slog, why you might want to refactor this or that, etc.
Obviously a lot of this falls upon the engineer. It's your job to communicate and demonstrate. Helps if you have other engineers backing you up and presenting a unified message. Also helps if management is technical enough to understand what you're saying instead of simply believing -- or not believing -- you.
But maaaan. Uphill battle! I'm burnt out on it. I've decided I need to seek greenfield stuff. Maybe forever. But definitely for now.
My experience is that this is almost never the case.
Generally, management does not understand or appreciate why it's a slog, why you might want to refactor this or that, etc.
Obviously a lot of this falls upon the engineer. It's your job to communicate and demonstrate. Helps if you have other engineers backing you up and presenting a unified message. Also helps if management is technical enough to understand what you're saying instead of simply believing -- or not believing -- you.
But maaaan. Uphill battle! I'm burnt out on it. I've decided I need to seek greenfield stuff. Maybe forever. But definitely for now.