On-call is a concrete experience that connects engineers to the systems they own. When on-call is healthy, it builds confidence, resilience, and pride; when unhealthy, it corrodes engineering effectiveness. Poorly managed on-call increases stress, burnout, and attrition, and it can also harm company brand and finances during outages. A 2025 Catchpoint report found nearly 70% of SREs said on-call stress contributed to burnout and increased likelihood of leaving. On-call also signals how much a company values engineers through factors like unstable systems, unclear ownership, noisy alerts, missing documentation, and insufficient training. The industry links attrition to on-call rotations, with the idea that engineers often leave because of on-call conditions.
"On-call is one of the most direct touchpoints engineers have with the reality of the systems they own. When it's healthy, it builds confidence, resilience, and pride. When it's unhealthy, it quietly corrodes everything that makes engineering teams effective. And while most companies drastically underestimate this effect, a recent survey found that on-call is the least-liked aspect of software engineering, often leading to burnout and attrition. Poorly managed on-call isn't only a mental health issue; it can also impact a company's brand and finances, as recent significant outages from AWS, Azure, and Cloudflare have shown."
"For engineers, on-call is not an abstract concept: it's a very concrete experience. When you're paged for systems you didn't build, code you barely understand, or brittle architectures you struggle to stabilize, the stress is immediate. A 2025 Catchpoint report found that nearly 70% of SREs said on-call stress contributed to burnout and made them more likely to leave their job."
"In fact, on-call is one of the strongest signals engineers receive about how much their company values them. Unstable systems, unclear ownership, noisy alerts, missing documentation, or insufficient training all communicate an unintended but unmistakable message: "Here is a critical system. Please keep the lights on. Good luck." The link to burnout and attrition is well-documented and folklore in the industry: "Engineers don't quit jobs, they quit their on-call rotations.""
"By contrast, clear ownership, well-tuned alerting, and reliable runbooks can turn on-call into a learning loop rather than a constant emergency. When engineers know what they own, understand the systems they’re supporting, and can respond with confidence, on-call becomes less about fear and more about problem-solving. That shift improves psychological safety and helps teams sustain performance over time."
#on-call-management #sre-and-incident-response #burnout-and-retention #alerting-and-observability #engineering-culture
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