Job Change

I should mention that I changed jobs in early November. I left GE Healthcare to go back to Tellabs in Naperville. My job at GE was pretty easy and not a lot of hours. But I couldn't take the bureacracy, apathy, chaos, throw-it-over-the-wall mentality, blame, and constant turnover (seemed like about 30% of the employees quit every year). Anyone over 3-4 years of experience was like a senior employee. I knew in less than one week that the place was a wreck. A typical conversation there went like this "How do you do XYZ?" - "I don't know, Bob used to do it and he doesn't work here any more". No one paid attention to anything unless it was on fire. Priorities changed on a weekly basis.

I was told during my interview that they were moving to another nearby facility, so I bought a house 25 minutes from that facility (but 1 hour from the current one). They never moved in the entire 32 months that I worked there. It didn't only affect me, a lot of people moved to be near the other facility; one friend closed on his new house a week before they cancelled the move. Of course, now that I have left, they have finally moved. The total lack of financial rewards didn't help - no bonus, no employee stock purchase plan, no stock options, nothing. Very minimal annual raises, and that's it. Many people think having GE on your resume is great, and they seemed to think that was your reward.

I never wanted to be one of those people that hates their job, but that's who I had become. I did manage to stick it out for 32 months, AND I turned down two (and a half) job offers while I was there. Neither offer would have given me a job that was a significant improvement over GE. What was the "half" job offer? Well, they were asking me to take a HUGE pay cut and I was very tempted to do it, because the job would've been fantastic and a short commute. But they didn't make an offer because there was just too much of a gap in salary.

I'm back at Tellabs, and at the same time have steered my career back in the direction I wanted to go - software quality assurance and process improvement. I had worked at Tellabs for 10 years when I was laid off in January 2003. The project that I'm working with is working around the clock on very short development cycles. They are working too hard and are burned out. Things need to change soon. I've also been putting in extra hours, but nothing like the developers. The company provides dinner every night and food on the weekends, plus free soda and coffee all the time. It's not a reward, just something they must do if they expect everyone to be at work all the time.

The amazing thing is the quality that they've been producing. Of course, there are some silly mistakes with such a compressed schedule, but it's unbelievable that the quality of the product is pretty high. This is due to the fact that the employees are so experienced and talented, 10-15 years experience on average, and totally dedicated to the project. Nothing like this could ever have been accomplished at my former employer.

With the current work environment, people are often asking me "So, you've been back for a few months, what do you think?", thinking it's a loaded question. I tell them that I'm thrilled to be back. And it's true. It's a lot easier to work harder when everyone around you is working harder; it's easier to be dedicated when everyone else is; and it's worth the effort to try to make a difference when you actually think you can.

So here's what I traded: easy, chaotic job with short commute for harder job, longer hours, and long commute. And I'd do it again every day of the week and twice on Sunday. This is the concensus among my other friends that have left GE, and there are a lot of them.

The only unfortunate thing is that I'd like to move back closer to Naperville. I regret not moving somewhere in the middle. But my oldest is only in kindergarten, so we will move this summer when he's done. We're looking at Batavia and Geneva. Naperville would be nice, but the prices are outrageous, and where the prices are decent, the traffic is phenomenally bad. I'll be trading a 2.5 hour daily commute for potentially a 30-60 minute commute. That's an extra 1.5 - 2 hours I can spend with my family every day, so it's worth the expense and pain of moving, not to mention the fact that the houses are more expensive. Our criteria are: good schools, short commute, and nice house at a somewhat reasonable price.

I'm going way off on a tangent here, but there was just an article in the newspaper about people moving way out in the suburbs for more affordable housing. They face a 2 hour or longer commute every day to get a nicer house for less money. You might have a big nice house then, but you'll never be there and you'll never see your family. A short commute is critical for me. I realize that things are different the closer you get to Chicago, where you pay a fortune for an old ranch in almost any town; we are lucky to be in the far west suburbs.

- schneid