How (and why) to celebrate Sysadmin Day

jeremy · 07-26-2013, 12:11 PM

Quote:

It's only been since 1999 that Sysadmin Day has been celebrated. It's always set for the last day in July. Like Administrative Professionals Day, its intent is to recognize a lot of tireless work that nearly always goes unnoticed. And, for a lot of systems administrators, the day is still far too low profile for the users they support to think of coming around to say thanks, never mind baking them cakes, crafting trophies for them or taking them to lunch.

Some may argue that sysadmins don't warrant a day to acknowledge their efforts. They might argue "Does every type of professional deserve a special day of recognition? Should we have a janitors' day, a bus drivers' day, an accountants' day, an attorneys' day?". Well, maybe we should, but most professionals don't spend most of the year doing wildly complicated things that almost no one notices or understands while sysadmins:

get noticed least when they do the best work (e.g., people notice when systems crash or run slowly, but not when they're fast and reliable)
are generally taken for granted
usually struggle with woefully inadequate budgets
have to deal with constantly increasing complexity
find that pretty much no one else understands what they do and, thus, often have no one to talk to
work long hours and often get stuck with tasks that can only be done after normal working hours or on weekends
...

View the complete list at IT World

How are you celebrating Sysadmin Day?

--jeremy