2010 Reflections p1 : Switching Jobs

Switching jobs in this hectic economy was one of the harder things for me to do this year, but ultimately was a huge win. This is just one of the many events this year that I'll be reflecting upon over the next few weeks that helped write this chapter of my story. I had been working at AOL since 2006 and survived a lot of restructuring and layoffs with the company. For much of that period, I worked on a single project that I greatly enjoyed, Propeller.com, a "social news" network. I also had some really wonderful coworkers that I respected and admired. Late last year however, it was announced that AOL would be splitting away from Time Warner and that another wave of layoffs were coming. It was also announced that active development on Propeller.com was being discontinued. In the mean time, my project boss Tom was moved to lead a new project. Ryan, one of his staff was promoted to the new project boss. Meanwhile, my engineering boss and a few of my co-workers were moved to help on other projects within AOL. When the dust settled, my project boss and team were assimilated by another group. Ryan, the project boss was laid off. Meanwhile, me and the other remaining developer, Rich, discovered we were in limbo once we realized we had no boss. Out of self preservation, we found someone to give us work within AOL, but it didn't match our skill set and we were unexcited about the project overall. While on this new project, both Rich and I interviewed at an Iowa based company called Webfilings that one of our AOL co-workers Mike helped to get started. Mike had been harassing us to join his team for nearly a year. However, previously, the idea of leaving the security and pay of AOL for a start up seemed foolish. With the new project at AOL making our lives miserable, we decided to finally check it out. After an intense eight hour interview gauntlet and a few follow up calls weeks later, we were both hired. Since my May start, I have been quite happy at a job for the first time in since the height of Propeller.com. By taking the job at Webfilings, I was able to get better pay, better benefits, have coworkers I could relate to, and felt like I was working on project that had a future. Additionally, while still telecommuting, I am able to actually meet my co-workers and work with them in person every few months. I work with some really great people, but most of all I feel fortunate to be able to continue to work with Rich. He is one of the best developers I have ever worked with and a great guy. Ultimately, switching jobs in this economy was one of the hardest decisions I could make. However, it paid off for me in the end and I have no regrets. Propeller.com is now officially closed and both Ryan and Tom moved on to bigger and better things. This three year chapter of my life has ended and the stories and adventures with the Propeller.com team in LA, SXSW, etc get to live on in infamy. As an aside, you can view Webfilings and their rise on CrunchBase. Next up - Part 2 in the series: A new lease on life - car crashes to cleanse the soul.