國立清華大學_服務創新與分析研究中心

1. Good school environment, with discounts and benefits for faculty and staff

2. The unit is well-funded, and basic equipment and supplies are provided

3. The system architecture is large in scale, so there is a lot to learn, with guidance from experienced senior colleagues

I. Job Responsibilities

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1. The division of responsibilities is unclear. Developers are expected to make or participate in decisions—in other words, developers are asked to endorse decisions made by the leadership, so that if responsibility is pursued later, there is someone to shift the blame onto.

2. There is no specification document to provide backing, but meetings are recorded. When supervisors or senior management require architectural changes, they must be made, without considering the future impact or whether the current situation is suitable for implementation. This increases project difficulty and delays progress, while developers are left to bear responsibility for failing to meet the schedule.

3. Laws and rules are chaotic. The system and programs are constrained by educational staff procedures and regulations. Overall, the SOP is more like adding whatever comes to mind and filling in whatever is missing, making it difficult for users to understand how to operate the system and making development challenging. Agile development has not been adopted.

II. Culture and Atmosphere

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1. Because this is a project office under the K-12 Education Administration, there are many considerations and pressures from senior management. Since information is conveyed through a single point of contact, neither side understands the other's position or the current situation, and cooperation does not seem to be built on a foundation of trust. The same is true within the team.

2. The team's decision-making and leadership style are characterized by high-pressure coercion. In short, the organization leans toward authoritarian rule: rule by individuals takes precedence over rule of law, the team's established rules are applied inconsistently, and treating people differently based on who they are rather than what they do is commonplace.

3. The team is not large, but office politics are serious, with clear divisions and everyone acting independently. It is highly questionable whether this is really the same unit.

4. Violations of the Labor Standards Act. In my opinion, the Labor Standards Act protects employees' minimum basic rights; it should not be treated as a hiring threshold. Many companies offer benefits and conditions better than those required by the Labor Standards Act, but overtime has become routine in this unit due to understaffing and a heavy workload. Employees frequently have to handle and respond to work-related matters after hours, and most people have been in this unhealthy state for a long time. Supervisors and senior management also tolerate this situation, believing that dedication requires this level of effort, while overtime pay or compensatory leave varies from person to person or is decided on a case-by-case basis.

Conclusion

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The above is purely a statement of my personal position and impressions. This unit does not allocate sufficient human resources and lacks adequate information about the current education system and processes. Communication between the Administration and the unit is also not transparent. Under these circumstances, digitizing a large-scale national project is extremely difficult. From a practical engineering perspective, this is by no means an easy task. Behavioral economics tells us that people tend to be overly optimistic and overestimate their own ideas. I hope the unit will execute this project with the utmost caution and not let down the expectations of taxpayers and the country.

1. As project staff at National Tsing Hua University, you can enjoy the university’s related benefits and use its facilities.

2. Like most civil servants, you receive your salary at the beginning of the month. If you take leave or have other deductions, these are handled afterward. The payday is fixed, except in cases involving project-year transitions, administrative procedures, and similar issues.

3. Senior colleagues will help you become familiar with the existing systems and code, after which work will be assigned for development. You will not be left on your own. There are standardized development guidelines and internal/external testing machines. Testing is handled by dedicated personnel, and there is a bug-reporting system.

4. There are many opportunities to communicate and discuss matters with system analysts, testers, and even customer service staff, which helps develop communication skills.

1. This is a project position with a one-year contract. If the review and approval of funding for the new project year is delayed, the first month’s salary will be paid late. When you are hired for the first time, you may also receive your salary later because of administrative procedures. The probation period is approximately two months, and during probation your salary is based on your academic qualifications, which is noticeably lower than the official salary listed on recruitment websites.

2. Since this is a position in a university project office, this work experience is usually discounted when looking for jobs in the private sector, and your ability to handle pressure and manage schedules is often questioned.

3. In terms of team operations, engineers are expected not only to develop software but also to participate in some planning and specification discussions. A certain level of communication ability is therefore required, so this job may not be suitable for people who want to focus exclusively on development. In addition, because this is a government project, many issues involving considerations from senior management will arise.

4. Because of the nature of the project, confirmed development schedules are difficult to adjust. However, it is common to discover during the discussion stage that the planning was inadequate, or for users’ responses after launch to differ from the actual situation. Correcting these issues requires additional working hours and is usually urgent. There is no clear process for reporting overtime, nor any definite method for paying overtime compensation or granting compensatory leave.

5. This point reflects my personal experience and concerns the work atmosphere. Please consider it in light of your own circumstances, as everyone may have a different impression.

First, the team atmosphere is acceptable outside peak periods. However, once a peak period arrives, customer-service requests and bug reports pour in like a tidal wave. The testing and customer service teams work overtime intensely to handle these matters. At such times, engineers are very likely to be blamed for being unwilling to cooperate with overtime, not fixing bugs, or failing to think things through when writing code, making it incompatible with users’ operations and real-world needs. Engineers, however, often feel that the specifications were not detailed or accurate enough. These complaints tend to continue, which can make people feel as though they are being held accountable after the peak period has passed.

What dissatisfied me personally more was that, based on what I observed, departing employees were often criticized behind their backs. For example, they might be accused of slacking off and doing nothing after announcing their resignation, or of failing to make sufficiently detailed plans or handovers before leaving, causing considerable difficulties for those currently carrying out the work and making it hard to continue, or even affecting the launch schedule. However, after verifying these claims with the departing employees themselves or with third parties, the answers were often completely opposite. This inevitably gives the impression of a Rashomon-like situation or of deliberately spreading rumors.

Furthermore, if someone bears important responsibilities, even when they announce their resignation early, every possible effort may be made to delay their departure. This ultimately leads to an unpleasant separation, with both sides complaining repeatedly, and the behaviors described above recurring.

Of course, this is purely my personal impression. Some people do part on good terms; it is just that unpleasant separations do not seem uncommon. The unit also has a relatively high turnover rate, with most employees staying no more than a year.

Overall, I believe this job does have an important mission, but the work atmosphere is not particularly healthy. Specifications are also prone to repeated revisions, so this is not a job well suited for long-term employment. It is emotionally exhausting.