The first day was pretty amazing. It was one thing to be there for a one hour interview, but quite another to spend the whole day there. I got there a little after nine o’clock and I thought that I was supposed to head over to the classroom for new hire orientation, but I got pulled aside and told to wait for the HR person to meet a group of us contractors. So, the HR person showed us how to use the timecard system that Yahoo uses to submit to the payroll server, and then we got our badges. And then that was it. No more orientation or further discussion. I was told to head over to the NOC and I shocked my new boss when I walked in and said hi.

So, most of my morning was spent learning their network architecture and all I can say is that it’s pretty much unlike most anything I’ve worked with in my years in operations. Very complicated and challenging; I’m looking forward to really sinking my teeth into it. For the most part, I spent a good deal of time sitting with my co-workers and shadowing them. I have to learn a whole new set of procedures and that’s nothing new, except that the way they utilize the tiering system is somewhat like how eBay uses their lead-supervisor system in their NOC. The interesting part of this new gig is that my boss is incredibly flexible with time, which is pretty unusual for a NOC job, but I guess the reasoning is that if the engineers remain accountable to one another for coverage and coverage is maintained, that it doesn’t matter much who’s there and who’s not. I’m used to a way more rigid system or governing shift work. I’m wondering how this is going to work with the other grave person, whenever they hire him or her.

By the way, any NOC people on my flist are welcome to send me their resume so I can refer them.

Yahoo’s campus is absolutely beautiful. And I think Building C is my new vice, because anyplace with awesome and cheap food and free iced chocolate frapps is eventually going to kill me. I had lunch in the cafeteria today and their grilled chicken sandwich is to die for, and the fries taste like heaven. I think tomorrow I’ll have something else, and I’m sure I will enjoy that, too. The one thing I realy like about the cafeteria is that you can ‘charge’ your employee badge with money and use it like a dorm food chit at college. Except that I’m not dependant on parents for food money… I guess I’m actually dependant on my wife to give me food money, these days. Okay, so not much difference there, eh? 🙂

Like I said before, sometimes a negative like a firing turns into a real positive. I’m looking forward to tomorrow.