One of the little perks of working in aerospace is that aerospace companies often pay overtime to salaried employees. Though they don't pay time and a half (which is a requirement by law for hourly employees), they do pay your hourly rate, which is still better than most companies who pay nothing. So if you work 50 hrs, you get paid for 50hrs rather than for 40hrs.
Nice right? Well, sort of. As most things at the Shitshow, they have to screw it up somehow - so they abuse the policy. Since we pay people for each hour they work, management has no problem mandating that everyone is expected to work 50-60hr work weeks. The reason for implementing such mandates is the claim that "we" are behind schedule. Of course, it's never the case that everyone is behind schedule; some people are, some people aren't. Nevertheless, managers often want everyone to work overtime. Because you see, there is also another reason for mandatory overtime: empire preservation.
As mentioned in previous posts, every manager's goal is to grow his empire ( i.e. the number of people working under him). Other managers are constantly trying to steal those people away to build their own empires. So mandatory overtime policies become an empire preservation strategy, a tactic to prevent other managers from snatching people from your team. When another manager comes looking for more heads, your manager can now say: "Sorry, I need every guy I got. As you can see, I got them all working overtime, so I really can't afford to lose anybody." Who can argue that?
Because my life is used as a pawn in management's chess game, I throw rocks.
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