A balanced professional life
I recently quit my job without a predetermined plan. That might sound foolish to a lot of you reading and the opposite of what you’ve been advised to do right? Over the several months, before I quit, I thought a lot about why I quit and what was next for me. Another job? Start something of my own? Focus on writing? Take a break. As some of you know I write to gain clarity and today’s piece is exactly that. Writing to gain clarity. To know where I am going (or want to go), I must know where I’ve been and why I quit.
Why I quit
I can come up with many reasons (haha, can’t we all?) but the fact of the matter is that no company is perfect. I can point to the company’s changed direction which was very different from what I initially joined for. Or that the reality did not match my expectations. I tried my best to stay afloat and I had been considering leaving for a while, but out of caution, I stayed. I stayed in the hope that I’d be able to drive change but I was not able to, not at least as much as I had intended. I just felt like as a group we were never aligned on a direction.
I recently saw this video on Spotify’s engineering culture and the video describes a 2x2 matrix with Alignment on one axis and autonomy on the other axis
It instantly struck me that the key reason I left was the lack of alignment. Low Alignment, High Autonomy. When I realized things are not going to change I decided it makes sense for me to part ways. I could have stayed for another 12 months just to address the infamous interview question “Why did you leave after a little over a year?” In most cases, neither is the employee at fault nor is the company. This isn’t personal and this isn’t an indication that either party is bad or mal-intentioned. It just becomes like a bad relationship where both the company and the employee might be amazing on their own but not a good fit when combined. Furthermore, lots of companies rescind offers themselves (which as I’ve written is short-sighted) so who are they to judge, right? Do candidates ask their interviewers why they rescinded offers? No, they don't. In speaking to several people in my network there exists this stigma that an employee who has only worked for a short tenure at a company is likely at fault. Grossly incorrect; Think of it this way: What if there was a law that forced a company to not be able to terminate you until you complete 5 years?
What’s next?
In considering the question of what was next, I think the answer lies in what I (or you) consider balanced.
You might have seen something similar to the below for a balanced life.
This got me thinking about a balanced professional life. I used to be the kind of guy who’d spend all my work hours on work-work and only much later did I realize that it was not an optimal way to think about work. Now, the yellow work part of the pie chart above further gets divided into work-work and work-hobbies which I like to pursue. This does not mean that I spend less time on work. It means that I extend what I consider my work hours to incorporate my work-hobbies. For me, this is writing, seed-investing, reading about tech, volunteering with animals to expand my understanding of the world, and my raw knowledge, and being exposed to a variety of people. Calling them purely hobbies would be incorrect. This is, I guess, my way of being a lifelong learner (which is one of the defining leadership principles at Berkeley-Haas)
These work-hobbies are not only good for me but also ultimately good for the company.
There are of course other ways to solve for a balanced professional life. One of the ways is to work for yourself (small biz, individual creator, startup), advice startups (paid or free), run a consulting business on the side and do your own startup on the side. While I think all these are great options one must be careful not to conflate freedom with free time. Being your boss can be hard but also very fulfilling and while having a job can earn you a lot more it might not be as satisfying in and of itself. This does not mean that the job is bad or not a good fit, it just means that you as a professional have varied interests and some of them need to be fulfilled outside of work. The more I think about it, to be happy at work it's necessary to have work-hobbies that I am passionate about.
Bargaining power
I can truly say I have never directly worked for money (and that is usually my answer when a recruiter asks for salary expectations) and it's true. The one thing I realize is that I have a unique set of skills and I know my worth. I don’t think I’ll ever settle for a less than ideal role (and this is a mix of comp, work, culture, team, company, and ability to continue with my professional hobbies as long as they are not at the cost of my job)
A lot of people do not have this flexibility but in my case, because I am divorced, have no kids, and have a low burn I don't need to optimize for a paycheck. This freedom might not last and at some point “earn a paycheck” might become the primary need. And that's OK.
Starting my own company
In considering starting my own company, the key questions on my mind are:
What’s the worst that could happen? Will I ever become unhireable? I think not. I hope not. Will I ever want to work for someone else after that? Um, that's the hard part :) Of course, I haven’t even covered the complex thought process that one goes through while thinking about starting a company.
I know that some of the above thoughts might sound like I want it all and that I am a douche? That is far from the truth. My career has very humble roots and one rife with lots of challenges and lots of valuable lessons learned along the way but it has not made me arrogant; just more conscious of my career choices and how I want to earn my paycheck. It's also important to know that these needs can change as time passes and at different stages of your career!
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