Fair point. The "task diversity" of systems administration is a different world, particularly in non-tech industries (most sysadmins are working in companies that do things other than technology). Low-voltage cabling, basic plumbing (yes, really -- got to get the condensing water out from the air mover somehow...), finding the fault lines between hardware and software. I also really love hiring sysadmins, because it really is entirely about finding people who are good at isolating and solving problems, and surprisingly little specific platform knowledge is needed going in (my first sysadmin job way back in 1999 involved managing a 24-node sendmail cluster sending cough cough totally legitimate email to large numbers of people. My supervisor handed me the Bat Book and said "you'll probably need this. Have fun.").

Ah yes, 1999, when to paraphrase Jason Calahanis in that one documentary "You'd get hired as an engineer for owning a keyboard and knowing how to type".

That's a pretty helpful process though. Otherwise you have customers and account managers screaming at you to fix things through email/voice. I've gotten a few of those and the sense of urgency was a nice break, but I'd die from stress if I couldn't firewall that communication with a ticket system.

But they don't let you work on new features? That sucks :(