Matthew Botos

I’ve been in my new job for 6 months now, which is long enough to take a look at the bigger picture of that change:

The transition was tougher than I expected; changing companies is a much bigger shakeup than changing projects. I had gotten comfortable with the latter; even though there was an adjustment period, the corporate culture was the same and I had grown a large network there. It probably took a good three months to assimilate, and I’m still putting together the bigger picture of this new company and new industry.

The proverbial grass is greener in spots, though interviewers conveniently don’t mention the brown patches, or the occasional dog turd. The project was in worse technological shape than advertised, though I’ve learned a lot about good & bad architecture, reverse engineering, and refactoring in the process. There’s also a lot of opportunity in the turnaround; I got to be scrum master and lead the implementation of test-driven development and other modern practices.

When it comes to people, the experience has been very diverse, with remote coworkers in Ireland, London, India, and Tennessee. Our team also has several guys from India on site who are in the US for the first time, which has made for some interesting lunches. The staffing strategy is something I’m still trying to figure out; the company still relies heavily on contractors and outsourcing while also building an internal development team.

One thing that has been a definite improvement is the compensation. The most honest statement I heard from one former VP was that “we don’t pay inflation; we pay the market rate”. Taking my head out of the sand showed me that I could earn much more than that in the broader market. Given my history of pay raises, this jumped me ahead 3-6 years versus staying put. And it’s not just the cash, either - with many companies scaling back or dramatically restructuring their health care, this move actually improved my coverage.

There are noticeable smaller differences as well. The company is still small enough to provide little extras like holiday treats and monthly birthday cupcakes. Some things happen quickly - it took all of ten minutes to get a keyboard tray my second day, while others took some bureaucratic wrangling - it took some coaxing to get dual monitors for our development team. Things are very much at a tipping point where a growing company risks becoming stuck on policy and process instead of results.

Overall, change is good, and this one felt like it was overdue. It was a tough one to make, and I’d be hard pressed to say whether it has truly increased my overall happiness. Instead, it’s more of a satisfaction that I woke up to certain realities, took control of my professional life, and started taking action.