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During the quarantine, a particularly dumb political fight took place between my manager and her peer. As a result there are some cool projects I wouldn't be working on or learning the skills from any more. As I was sitting at home in my underwear staring at some dumb Excel tables once again I realized that this sucks and sucked for some time. I've been with this company for a long time, and now in my early, soon mid 30s I realized that I could've and should've been doing much better. There's some E/N aspect to this too, I've been feeling aimless and unmotivated and possibly depressed for a while now in general, but I think it's a two-way relationship with the job. I'll be seeing a therapist about it next but I want to get started on improving the career situation anyway. Sorry this is a bit long but I don't have anyone unbiased to talk to IRL so I'd appreciate any comments.
Buuut. Because I'm not a "people manager", I don't get a company car even though my manager claims she wants to give it to me. The money could've been better. But mainly I feel like this still isn't a "big-boy" position with real impact and responsibilities and I that I've dug a hole for myself and don't know how to get out of it. During all of this I've picked up SQL, R and some Spak python, as well as database ETL stuff and BI (our proprietary tech and MS SSAS). On the business side I'm well familiar with sales and marketing processes, business planning, performance management, GDPR, market and customer intelligence data and have done some unofficial project management in those areas.
mobby_6kl fucked around with this message at 09:01 on Aug 15, 2020 |
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Aug 15, 2020 08:59
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reasons. My former peer from here is at McKinsey now so that might be an in.
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| # ? Apr 24, 2024 21:14 |
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gently caress the car, who cares about a car. What do you want to do in your work? Both tech and client facing? Post up your resume and let us at it, and start interviewing and reaching out to friends who know your skillset. See what's out there.
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Aug 15, 2020 19:55
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Yeah the car doesn't really matter, I mean it's a significant perk here due to high costs and gas prices but I just get mad about it because if I stayed put I would've had by now  And it's probably the only way I'll ever have a respectable new car, otherwise I'll keep buying old sports cars and weird stuff. I think not knowing what exactly I want to do was part of the problem that got me here. But yeah something tech and client facing would probably make best use of my mix of skills. I'm tired of this operations nonsense, but I'm neither an MBA six-sigma dork nor a god-level programmer (should've mentioned I got into electronics and consequently programming in C and C++ as a hobby) so it'd have to be a niche that takes advantage of what I do know. I'd really want to try sales somehow, but this is B2B software stuff, that's where the big bucks are and the stakes are pretty high so that ship might've sailed. I talked to the friend in the Customer Success team, they don't have an FTE position now but I might do some job shadowing or something to strengthen my case. Hoping to speak with the McKinsey guy this coming week. I'm updating the resume now and will post it here. Thanks.
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Aug 16, 2020 07:25
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Apply for traineeships in area management for retail or something(not all companies offer this). You'd get the car and people to manage. Lots of people.
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Aug 19, 2020 02:07
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Why do you want to be a consultant
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Aug 19, 2020 03:25
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mobby_6kl posted:During the quarantine, a particularly dumb political fight took place between my manager and her peer. As a result there are some cool projects I wouldn't be working on or learning the skills from any more. also mobby_6kl posted:we have a great team and culture. Do you? I think the behind the scenes question you want to ask is what the point of working is for you. You mention the work is high prestige and low stress but you also mention that it feels like you are coasting. My dad’s feeling about work was that it was the thing he did to pay the bills that allowed him to do the things that were important to him (family, outdoors, travel, photography). I think he’d have been happy in a situation like yours. He was working to live. My feeling about work is that I want to care about what I’m doing. As a result, my career has been a lot more chaotic and my current job is very stressful, but it’s never not interesting. My work and life are more tightly integrated. Both approaches are reasonable, (and there’s lots of spectrum between) but it can be dangerous and demoralizing to confuse the one for the other. Do you want your work to be more engaging? Are you willing to take pay cuts or whatever do achieve that? Would you rather work be more lucrative to free you up for your life outside of work? What’s important?
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Aug 19, 2020 21:53
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alternatively, are you willing to work like a fuckin dog at a MBB?
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Aug 20, 2020 17:02
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mobby_6kl posted:But yeah something tech and client facing would probably make best use of my mix of skills. So a sales engineer/solutions architect? High level, the job is understanding your company's technology well enough to help the salesperson sell and the client implement.
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Aug 21, 2020 09:59
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KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:Why do you want to be a consultant KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:alternatively, are you willing to work like a fuckin dog at a MBB? doingitwrong posted:Do you? That was certainly not great but feels more like an exception rather than a rule. There are probably always some political power plays happening behind the scenes but in general people are supportive, willing to cooperate to achieve goals and work-life balance is taken reasonably seriously. doingitwrong posted:I think the behind the scenes question you want to ask is what the point of working is for you. You mention the work is high prestige and low stress but you also mention that it feels like you are coasting. I'd like it to be more engaging and a (temporary) pay cut could be ok to get me there, but I don't mean like becoming a freelance cat trainer or something. That could be fun but I'm ok with corporate life as long as it's reasonably meaningful and well compensated. I think your last highlighted point gets there - I'd like to live more outside of work. I'm of course grateful I don't have to worry about money on regular basis and can afford a lot of the things I like, but there's always a high opportunity cost. E.g. I can afford to get a private pilot license as I've wanted at the back of my mind for a while, but then every flight hour would be at the expense of other things I'd like to do too. I can only visit my friends & relatives in the US and Canada once a year in the best case, instead of just popping over whenever for a birthday or housewarming etc. And that's without children (which I should start thinking about soon too btw). I understand the importance of being happy with what you have, but OTOH, I don't want to keep making these difficult choices if it's totally within my power to improve my career and get more out of life. And as I said, there's probably also some E/N background like not wanting to feel like a failson and to try to make up for some poor choices in the past. Shrimpy posted:So a sales engineer/solutions architect?
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Aug 24, 2020 20:50
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Where are you? With your Data Warehousing/Analytics experience you could probably land a job at Amazon, Microsoft, or other cloud provider in a customer facing role as long as you aren't a complete people skills disaster. Technical Account Management is that "yell at the right support person to fix some poo poo" role you were helping a friend do. Solutions Architecture is "tell customer to do the right thing and give them some ideas on how to do that". The latter is also likely to have data/analytics specialist roles. I made the transition from "do IT ops" to "tell other people how to IT ops" 6 years ago and have not looked back and not only because I make four times as much money now.
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Aug 24, 2020 22:42
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I had an effort post I lost, but my recommendation is to get pen to paper and identify some real factors you want in a job. What you’ve written so far is juuussttt I focused enough to allow a bad move, in my opinion. One way to identify what may be driving your feelings is to write a timeline of your jobs from beginning to now, and write things you like and things you didn’t from each job. Then make a parallel line with big life events and write down where it may have overlapped with a job and had some influence (I.e. you took a big trip you absolutely loved and think about it a lot, and oh yeah you were able to do that because you felt you could take PTO, or you made $Xx salary, or whatever) Then try and pull all the things you like and don’t like together and find some themes, find the underlying reasons for what may be driving you away from this position and what you really want in the next!
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Aug 25, 2020 19:57
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I'm not trying to be a jerk, but I do have several blunt questions so apologies in advance... 1. "I want more money for more freetime outside work" - Granted, I'm paraphrasing your statements for the sake of length, but this is what I'm hearing from you. Overall, my first thought was, 'poo poo, well who doesn't?' You're like the main character from Office Space who doesn't want to do anything. I hate to spoil it for you, but unless you are either: A. independently wealthy. B. owner of your own company. or C. are incredibly lucky/connected/have a golden parachute...the reality is that typically money and time are opposites for most of your mid-range life. You can have one or the other in most cases but not both. It very much sounds like you're more contemplating a mid-age rut more than anything else. Is that the case? 2. If it's yes to #1 - then you need to decide if a career change is needed or is the current position sufficient? Do you see yourself moving up at the same company to a higher level (if yes, then figure out what you need to do to get there) and if no then looking for roles at another company would be the next step. Part of that would be taking a hard look at your skillsets and seeing what you need to polish up on to snag something more in line with what you are looking to be doing. But based on your responses so far, I don't think you've even considered what end goal you are shooting for in the first place, so maybe start there? 3. You do realize there's a recession going on right now as well? Unless you happen to be lucky enough to be in a field that is still expanding during a recession...you might want to consider the larger financial picture going on right now. It might not be the best time to switch jobs if you are currently stable right now. Again, based on what you've said so far...it sounds very 'woe is me' as opposed to having an actual goal/plan in mind. 4. I have a friend in the tech world who does DevOps and so I hear quite a bit about the tech world...often times you don't really see any major raises unless you switch companies. If money is solely your thing, perhaps looking for a role almost the exact same as yours, but with someone who will pay more for it? 5. It sounds like you want some of the trappings of management, but I'm not really seeing anything that indicates you actually want to DO a management role. Seeing things like you want more time outside of work etc etc is typically not a management mindset...so perhaps you have some conflicting ideas going on here? Overall, I think it would probably do you best to really consider what it is you are really looking to get out of a change and then working on a solid plan to make that happen. Getting more feedback from an internet forum probably isn't going to do you much more good until you decide that part for yourself.
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Aug 25, 2020 20:20
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There are a couple of approaches I would look at. Firstly you can feel like you are floating around without direction. I hit this point myself after I completed all the goals I set when I left high school. Thing is I never set more goals so I lost my direction and it was easy to focus on my work. Set goals of where you want to go in life and then create the smaller goals to lead you to that point. With respect to work many people get a promotion by changing companies. You should look around for other jobs to gauge what is out there. It's difficult to understand where you are at without something to compare it to. This is not necessarily for the purpose of changing jobs but just to make you informed.
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Aug 25, 2020 20:42
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if you become a consultant and you're sufficiently senior you can trade staring at a lovely excel spreadsheet for staring at a lovely deck! The hiring profile for consultants is insecure overachievers. To be successful as a (management/strat) consultant you have to:
mobby_6kl posted:This might be a "grass is greener" thing since I never worked as one before but you'll never now if you don't try it, right? At least my perception is that it could be more engaging, varied, create more opportunities for networking, and better apply my skills. So I think I'd be willing, at least for a time. I will say that I find consulting engaging and it's a good fit for me personally. There's always something new to be learned and the content doesn't really get too stale. However, the situations and the politics and the project based processes get stale really fast. Who cares that it's Topic X instead of Topic Y, the process is going to be basically the same to come up with a solution. You're going to have similar objections and overcome them in similar ways. You have to define what engaging means to you in a more concrete way. Networking is fine, you do have a lot of opportunities to network as a consultant, but if you don't network well now you will suck at consulting and you won't network better as a consultant. How's your networking skills? Consultants don't really apply skills unless you want to be a rental body, which just sucks.
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Aug 25, 2020 21:36
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Ok this was a lot digest so sorry this took a while. Really appreciate your feedback.Arzakon posted:Where are you? With your Data Warehousing/Analytics experience you could probably land a job at Amazon, Microsoft, or other cloud provider in a customer facing role as long as you aren't a complete people skills disaster. Technical Account Management is that "yell at the right support person to fix some poo poo" role you were helping a friend do. Solutions Architecture is "tell customer to do the right thing and give them some ideas on how to do that". The latter is also likely to have data/analytics specialist roles. I made the transition from "do IT ops" to "tell other people how to IT ops" 6 years ago and have not looked back and not only because I make four times as much money now. Crazyweasel posted:I had an effort post I lost, but my recommendation is to get pen to paper and identify some real factors you want in a job. What you’ve written so far is juuussttt I focused enough to allow a bad move, in my opinion. I'll be taking a couple of weeks off in September and October so I'll hopefully be able to tune out all the bullshit and think about it the way you suggest. Oxphocker posted:I'm not trying to be a jerk, but I do have several blunt questions so apologies in advance... 1. I get the time/money is a trade off, of course, but I think it's highly unlikely that I'm maximizing the income possible within 40-45 hour workweek. Even if it does take some more time, it might be worth it to put a bit more effort. I know my manager works more than I do, but it's physically not possible work that much more Ideally of course I'd be like that Office Space guy and just do two chicks at the same time, but that's not on the cards yet. Yeah could be an age thing too, the covid lockdown made it very clear that the clock is ticking and I need to get moving if I want to change something. 2. I really think I need a change, not just for money reasons but I also feel like it's become stale and I'm not learning or developing much. This is a huge company and it would be very arrogant to think there isn't anything good enough for me, so I'm not against moving up within this company. You're right I don't have a plan yet, I was hoping to see what sorts of options might exist in this area because I've been stuck in a pretty specific niche for a few years and might not see all the possibilities. 3. Tech don't give a gently caress, thankfully. While a friend of mine was laid off from a (lovely) company, he found something else within a month. I should've been thinking about this a year or two back of course, but alas. That said I'm not handing in my resignation right now, I just don't want to put off preparing. 4. Yep jumping companies would definitely help a lot more, and I'm sure I've lost quite a bit of money by sticking around. 5. I liked the team lead / manager role I've had before, despite being your goony dork, working with people was quite nice. Obviously being some middle-manager cog is probably an entirely different pain in the rear end which I don't have direct experiene with but can observe in my manager. I definitely need to figure some poo poo out for myself, but with literally no one to talk to IRL it's very helpful to at least get some general direction like this to get started. Devian666 posted:There are a couple of approaches I would look at. Firstly you can feel like you are floating around without direction. I hit this point myself after I completed all the goals I set when I left high school. Thing is I never set more goals so I lost my direction and it was easy to focus on my work. Set goals of where you want to go in life and then create the smaller goals to lead you to that point. Yeah I think changing the company might be necessary for optimal $$$ because there's a lot of baggage tied to my current job grade which all goes out of the window if I go elsewhere. KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:if you become a consultant and you're sufficiently senior you can trade staring at a lovely excel spreadsheet for staring at a lovely deck! I think I'm at like 3/3 of that list. Political games haven't always worked out in my favor and I'm still amazed at what bullshit some of my colleagues manage to sell like it's the greatest thing since sliced bread. As for what is engaging... I think it's having some variety and opportunities to learn things, as well as seeing the results and concluding the project. One thing that's getting on my nerves is that some areas here have been an issue for years, like it was a problem when I joined and it's still not solved, though thankfully it's not my problem any more. Yesterday I talked to my former team member who's now a consultant for one of the companies I mentioned above. Of course it's a tech consultant role but I think he got into this "rental body" situation because he complained that he goes to the customer and does all the work solving their problem, and then everyone else takes credit for the success of the project  That said some of the other aspects sounded much more interesting, like talking with the customer to understand the problem, researching solutions, learning whatever is needed, etc.
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Sep 6, 2020 22:12
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mobby_6kl posted:Ugh, central Europe. But we have Amazon, MS, Oracle, and other cloud vendors (including the one I work at) here. So moving to a competitor is definitely an option and might be necessary to get a good bump in the salary. How was the transition to telling others how to do IT ops? I guess I have premature impostor syndrome because I feel like I wouldn't have the depth of experience in a specific area to pull it off. Once you escape from the hell that is the real world of production environments you bring a lot of value if you can just reflect on everything you and your organization did poorly and warn others about it so they can make completely different mistakes instead. You eventually get a good eye for where folks are going to gently caress up and steer them away from that to get some high level architecture plans for them to move forward. Then you support a bunch of questions when they actually try moving from hdfs to an object store like you drew on a whiteboard one day. This could be anything from "how me a dog use this api" to "i have discovered a unique flaw in your service that is a hard blocker to me adopting please go +1 the feature request with engineering that will solve this". Then sometimes you find a good workaround for blocker and write some code snippets and publish a blog post and talk and some event about it to a bunch of other nerds because you solved a problem faster than waiting for a new feature. Long term you have three options. You can spend a lot of time staying up to speed in your space and be a valued SME and have a job until your chosen area becomes obsolete, get bored of not directly supporting a real thing and join a product team when you forget how much that sucks, or just get really good at telling other smarter people how to provide value to your company and join management. This counts for Solutions Architect at a place like AWS/MSFT. It's more technical than a useless pre-sales tech consultant and less demanding than the rental body doing the real work. The work/life balance and pay is great, but the fringe benefits like cars and sales dinners are minimal and no one is paying for you to sit in first class because you aren't billed by the hour.
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Sep 11, 2020 05:02
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I kinda wonder what the local B2B microsoft is in central europe (especially since there are only like 2 countries that I know of that like to think of themselves as distinct from EE, and can't claim Western).
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Sep 14, 2020 19:13
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| # ? Apr 24, 2024 21:14 |
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Nobody thinks of Logos Bible Study Software as their "local Microsoft."
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Sep 14, 2020 22:49
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