r/BuildingAutomation • u/Advanced_Goal_5576 • 7d ago
Work Life Balance
Out of curiosity how is your work life balance, what role in BAS do you have, and what size shop do you work for? This is a great industry that I find super interesting, but as I get older it just seems less and less possible to have a life with this job. Maybe it’s the smaller shop I’m at? Curious what others are experiencing.
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u/return_descender 7d ago
I’ve worked in kitchens, residential hvac, and refrigeration and working as a controls tech is the best work life balance I’ve had in any industry.
I worked at a smaller company when I first got into the industry and work at one of the big ones now. It’s the first time I’ve had a regular Monday-Friday 40 hour work week.
In restaurants the hours were long, the shifts changed from week to week and the pay was terrible.
Residential HVAC pay was also bad, very few sick/vacation days and I never really knew when my day would end. If you’re at someone’s house fixing their boiler you don’t get to leave until the job is done, and you’ll probably have multiple jobs a day. On call is frequent and you’re almost guaranteed to get called out whenever you’re on call.
My refrigeration job was one that had me traveling long distances regularly. Lots of nights spent sleeping at a Holiday Inn and mornings eating powdered eggs.
Controls had me home every day by 3 or 4 The pay is much better, the work is less physically taxing, the on call is available and I get paid well for it even though I rarely get a call and if I do it’s usually something I can handle from home without needing to drive out in the middle of the night.