Overall
I’m likely done with my career. I’m approaching 65, have recently walked away from a job, and am enjoying my unscheduled time.
I have worked in a tech role for nine companies — the first two companies not being ‘true’ tech companies (defense contractor, airline) but the last seven being tech. It’s interesting to document my departure from all these companies — because most of my departures were my decisions, but some were not.
MY Decision
Companies that were my decision to walk away from were: FMC Corporation, United Airlines, Octel Communications, Lucent Technologies, Charles Schwab, and Salesforce. Some of those departures were interesting:
- I left Schwab because — I was the best and most experienced project manager, but rather than promoting me to manage the project management group, they hired in someone else. A nice guy, but not as good a choice as me.
- I left Salesforce because it was an odd ‘tech’ company, and I was supporting a troublesome group. (Details here.)
The other companies — I just left because I had been there long enough, and it was time to move on.
THEIR Decision
Three companies that booted me out were: Cisco Systems, Marketlive, and Autodesk. In all cases, I ended up with a better job shortly afterward — and looking back, regretted not leaving these companies sooner. Here is the story of each of these companies.
- Cisco Systems – Cisco moved me and my family up from the south bay to the north bay. Big financial contribution from them. They had purchased an optical networking startup in Petaluma (at they time, the biggest tech purchase to date) and this company drove the overall tech progression to a faster data flow (optical is much faster than copper wires). Petaluma is a great town, and the schools were good – so it was great to have relocated me and my family. I worked as a project manager there for about 3 years. Eventually Cisco embraced the technology, but no longer needed the north bay location – so they started laying people off and shutting the location down. I was one of the first layoffs – but again, it was all good, and I ended up in a better place afterwards.
- Marketlive – A few years later (one company in between) I was working for a tech startup in Petaluma – one that was focused on e-commerce (web-based retail). I reported directly into the VP of engineering, as did the director of engineering. The director and I didn’t get along well. I did what she wanted (maybe not as fast as she hoped) but I also did other key project management things, plus I fulfilled requests from the engineers that reported into her (that she wasn’t doing). They would come directly to me to move things in the right direction. The director eventually complained to the VP about what I was/wasn’t doing— and he laid me off. Not a big deal, because I ended up with a better job at a better company.
- Autodesk – I was at Autodesk far too long (8+ years). It was good at the beginning, but got weird at the end. I ended up as part of a project management group that was being managed by someone who didn’t understand project management. I would meet with him weekly, and tell him that we weren’t meeting the needs of our stakeholders (and I would explain why) — and he would say ‘thanks Tom’, but wouldn’t make process changes. He would subsequently meet with a coworker of mine (who previously managed a writing team) and they would laugh and have a great time in a conference room. We eventually all got laid off — including the manager — so we clearly weren’t meeting the needs of our stakeholders. 🫤
Looking back, I’ve concluded that most times when the departure from a company wasn’t my decision — it was because I am a doofus and, though I was aware of the situation that led to my departure, I was too much of a dork to take the needed action to prevent it from happening — or at least make the departure happen when I wanted it to. In concept, informing the problem person’s manager about the situation could have moved things in the right direction.
Summary
As mentioned above, I stayed at some companies longer that I should have — but it all turned out well, and I always found a better job soon afterwards — even when the choice to leave wasn’t mine.
