This post is mostly to gather my thoughts and ideas as sort of a public forum to just get some shit off my chest. I'm posting here because I know several members in real life and several virtually, and I feel pretty confident that I can get relatively detached feedback without too much judgment. (i may also ask to have this thread deleted after a bit of time)
1) I recently had a somewhat life-changing epiphany. I tried helping my dad last year with some emotional stuff he was going through, but he didn't like the advice and decided he didn't want to talk to me anymore. So I didn't talk to him for the last year, then finally called him on his birthday about two weeks ago. I came to the conclusion that I want to bear no resemblance to him whatsoever, and if I ever have kids, none of the characteristics are passed down. For the past 15-20 years I've thought about changing my last name. I really hate it, but now it's just another reason to get rid of it. As an additional piece of information, about 5 years ago, my dad found out his father (my grandfather), very likely isn't his dad at all. When my grandpa went off to the Korean War, it's possible my grandma got knocked up by some other dude and never told grandpa it wasn't his. Well, whatever, I've never really cared about that, my dad did though even though he hated his "father" for being somewhat of a loser. But I guess it's just another degree of separation. So I've spent the last two weeks consciously thinking about everything I say, do, or act that resembles my father. I've been attempting to completely change my attitude because I realized he's never done anything right with his relationships and interpersonal skills. And I emulated to the detriment of my career. So at 38 years old, I have to break this. Which leads me to #2.
2) I have to make a job change. My experience at Big-G has been fucked since the day I stepped foot on campus. Literally since my first day here it's been a shit-show. On my first day here, the product I was going to own was reassigned and I had nothing to do for basically 3 months. Fast forward a year at the company and it's my team and product have completely fallen apart. My manager and I just don't get mesh. Our personalities and work styles simply don't match. I just want to work and be goal oriented and he just waves his hands around promising grandios ideas to leadership with no substance behind it. Stuff we'll never be able to deliver on. Well it came to a head last week when on Friday afternoon he suggested I find a new team, and possibly completely new job role if I want to stay at the company. Which is fine, because I didn't really have the strongest desire to work here before coming in. I just saw it as a career and skillset validation that conveniently paid me a lot of money. For perspective on how hard it is to get hired in product management here, I've recommended 22 people for my job in the last year, zero have been hired. So I feel like I know my shit and can present it well. But there isn't actually any products I want to work on here. The products are actually really fucking boring. Imagine owning a piece of a piece of the strategy for data center storage or CPU. So fucking boring! lol
3) Which brings me to my options.
But my whole perspective has changed. I used to be so amped up and just push push push. There was a total sense of urgency every day I went to work. And I've just flipped a switch. I've had two weeks now to think about the rat race of corporate life, the fact that I've accomplished the hardest of goals (getting into product management at Big-G), and financially stable. I don't need to wake up every morning with a big chip on my shoulder. Or maybe I do and I'm just lying to myself to make myself feel better. Idk. I guess we'll see what happens.
1) I recently had a somewhat life-changing epiphany. I tried helping my dad last year with some emotional stuff he was going through, but he didn't like the advice and decided he didn't want to talk to me anymore. So I didn't talk to him for the last year, then finally called him on his birthday about two weeks ago. I came to the conclusion that I want to bear no resemblance to him whatsoever, and if I ever have kids, none of the characteristics are passed down. For the past 15-20 years I've thought about changing my last name. I really hate it, but now it's just another reason to get rid of it. As an additional piece of information, about 5 years ago, my dad found out his father (my grandfather), very likely isn't his dad at all. When my grandpa went off to the Korean War, it's possible my grandma got knocked up by some other dude and never told grandpa it wasn't his. Well, whatever, I've never really cared about that, my dad did though even though he hated his "father" for being somewhat of a loser. But I guess it's just another degree of separation. So I've spent the last two weeks consciously thinking about everything I say, do, or act that resembles my father. I've been attempting to completely change my attitude because I realized he's never done anything right with his relationships and interpersonal skills. And I emulated to the detriment of my career. So at 38 years old, I have to break this. Which leads me to #2.
2) I have to make a job change. My experience at Big-G has been fucked since the day I stepped foot on campus. Literally since my first day here it's been a shit-show. On my first day here, the product I was going to own was reassigned and I had nothing to do for basically 3 months. Fast forward a year at the company and it's my team and product have completely fallen apart. My manager and I just don't get mesh. Our personalities and work styles simply don't match. I just want to work and be goal oriented and he just waves his hands around promising grandios ideas to leadership with no substance behind it. Stuff we'll never be able to deliver on. Well it came to a head last week when on Friday afternoon he suggested I find a new team, and possibly completely new job role if I want to stay at the company. Which is fine, because I didn't really have the strongest desire to work here before coming in. I just saw it as a career and skillset validation that conveniently paid me a lot of money. For perspective on how hard it is to get hired in product management here, I've recommended 22 people for my job in the last year, zero have been hired. So I feel like I know my shit and can present it well. But there isn't actually any products I want to work on here. The products are actually really fucking boring. Imagine owning a piece of a piece of the strategy for data center storage or CPU. So fucking boring! lol
3) Which brings me to my options.
- I can try to find a new role/product to own here. Basically stay for the money and the prestige of working here.
- Find something I'm passionate about working on outside the company. I found something I would LOVE doing, but it's highly likely it could be a 50% pay cut. I could be wrong, but it would possibly bring me back to where I was before I came to Big-G. Which is fine. I live within my means and it wouldn't impact much. I have a call with this company tomorrow morning.
- I've already got interviews lined up at AWS and Facebook (Oculus). I give zero fucks about either company or product. It would be a 1 year money grab. And after a year, I wouldn't have to pay back a signing bonus and I'd find another job/company.
- Go back to my old company. They've offered me jobs as recently as last week. There's an interesting role at F5 that would be doing the strategy stuff I really like. And I'd be able to go back to being around people I really enjoyed working with. I'd probably get total comp around 75% of where I'm at now, which is ok. But I don't really care about the technology as much. But it would be a great learning experience.
- Try to find a unicorn startup. but most of the products starting up in seattle are lame. It's either food delivery or dating apps. lol
But my whole perspective has changed. I used to be so amped up and just push push push. There was a total sense of urgency every day I went to work. And I've just flipped a switch. I've had two weeks now to think about the rat race of corporate life, the fact that I've accomplished the hardest of goals (getting into product management at Big-G), and financially stable. I don't need to wake up every morning with a big chip on my shoulder. Or maybe I do and I'm just lying to myself to make myself feel better. Idk. I guess we'll see what happens.
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