Joining and Leaving the Rotation
How Do I Get Added to the Rotation?
When You Join a Team
Your manager will discuss on-call expectations with you if there is a need to add people to a rotation. All team members are not on a rotation. If we need additional team members or product coverage for a rotation, your manager will nominate team members for the rotation.
These are questions we consider when building out a Tier 2 On Call rotation:
- Do we have a minimum of 8 people in a rotation?
- Do we have 100% coverage for the product?
What happens:
- You and your manager agree you’re ready
- Your rotation leader adds you to Incident.io (our scheduling system)
- You’ll see your first shift appear in your calendar
- You go through the first shift preparation checklist
When You Switch Teams or Domains
If you’re moving to a different team or taking on a new service area, you may be added to a different rotation. This works similarly — your new manager/rotation leader handles the addition once you’re ready.
How Do I Get Removed from the Rotation?
Planned Removal
If you’re leaving a team or no longer supporting a service:
- Tell your manager and rotation leader
- They’ll start the offboarding process
- You’ll receive your final shifts and then be removed from the schedule
- Hand off any active responsibilities to your replacement
During Your Rotation
If you have a legitimate reason to step back temporarily (extended leave, major project, etc.), talk to your rotation leader. You might:
- Take a break between rotations
- Swap with a colleague
- Reduce your on-call frequency
Tracking On-Call Load
Your rotation leader keeps track of:
- How many times each engineer has been on-call
- How many alerts each person handled
- Who’s been carrying more than their fair share
Why? To ensure fairness and prevent burnout. If someone is getting paged constantly, that’s valuable data for the team to use in tuning alerts and distributing workload.
How Often Will I Be On-Call?
The frequency depends on your region and team size. Here’s what we’re targeting for the DevOps Rails rotation:
By Region (24x5 Weekday Coverage)
APAC (Asia-Pacific)
- One week every 6 weeks
- Approximately 43 days per year (16.7% of your time)
- Team size: 6-12 engineers
AMER (Americas)
- One week every 8 weeks
- Approximately 33 days per year (12.5% of your time)
- Team size: 6-12 engineers
EMEA (Europe/Middle East/Africa)
- One week every 12 weeks
- Approximately 22 days per year (8.3% of your time)
- Team size: 6-12 engineers
The differences exist because we’re staffing for 24/5 coverage, and regions have different team sizes. APAC has the most frequent rotation because it has the smallest team; EMEA has the least frequent because it has the largest team. Our goal is to increase the size of the Tier 2 On Call APAC team as new APAC team members join GitLab.
Maximum Rotation Frequency
We cap on-call duty to ensure sustainability. You should never be on-call more than once every 4 weeks. If you find yourself exceeding this, tell your manager immediately—it’s a signal that we need to adjust staffing or reduce alert volume.
Your rotation leader will tell you your specific frequency. This information should be published in Incident.io well in advance (at least a month out).
What’s the Minimum and Maximum Team Size?
Your rotation leader has calculated:
- Minimum number of people needed to provide coverage without burning anyone out
- Maximum number who can be added before the rotation becomes too frequent
If someone gets added or removed, these numbers might shift. Your rotation leader is responsible for keeping this balanced.
Understanding Your Rotation Frequency
Example: If you have 4 engineers on a team and you rotate weekly:
- Each engineer is on-call roughly 1 week per month
- Coverage is continuous with someone always available
- Burnout is minimized because no one is on-call too frequently
Example: If you have 2 engineers and you rotate weekly:
- Each engineer is on-call roughly 2 weeks per month
- Coverage is continuous but the load is higher
- This might lead to changes (adding people, reducing frequency, etc.)
Staffing Model and Fairness
Our Tier 2 rotation uses a structured staffing model designed to be fair and sustainable across all regions.
Target Team Sizes
Each region has a target number of engineers on the Tier 2 rotation:
- Minimum: 6 people (ensures coverage even with absences)
- Target: 8 people (balanced workload and flexibility)
- Maximum: 12 people (before we need to reassess)
If your region is understaffed (below 6), we work on hiring or redistributing. If overstaffed (above 12), we may adjust to ensure everyone gets a fair frequency.
Fairness Principles
Our staffing model is built on these principles:
- Everyone carries an equal share — Your workload percentage should match your teammates'
- Regional consideration — We account for timezone differences (APAC has more people on-call more often because coverage is split across more people)
- Predictability — Your rotation frequency won’t suddenly jump without notice
- Sustainability — No one is on-call more than once every 4 weeks
Monitoring Fairness
Every quarter, we review:
- How many times was each person on-call? — Is it even?
- Were shifts fairly distributed? — Did some people get lucky and miss busy weeks?
- Did anyone burn out? — Are people satisfied with their frequency?
- Did we meet our coverage goals? — Did we have the right number of people in each region?
If the distribution becomes unfair, we rebalance.
If You’re Concerned About Fairness
If you notice:
- You’re being on-call significantly more or less than teammates
- Your region seems understaffed or overstaffed
- The rotation frequency doesn’t match what you were told
Speak up. Talk to your rotation leader or manager. We actively monitor this, but human error happens. Your feedback helps us catch problems early.
Related Pages
- Coverage and Scheduling — Understand your rotation frequency
- Time Off and Holidays — Plan PTO within your rotation
- DevOps Rotation Leader — Contact your rotation leader for add/removal
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