It’s kinda official

I consulted the oracle last night and s/he told me (who knows what gender they are) that “your dreams lie elsewhere”.

I, of course, took this to mean that my current employer is officially going to loose an employee. Which given that I resigned on Monday was probably going to happen anyway.

They did however come back with an offer to keep me, the offer was substantial and I am very greatful that they think enough of me to make such an offer, but there are a couple of things that bother me… and given that this is my personal blog, it’s time to get personal.

The offer would have meant a pay increase of around $12,000, more responsibility (project management – team leading) but still also doing the work I do now.

Here’s the thing. The work I do now keeps me busy, how the heck am I going to fit in even more? Just cause they pay me more doesn’t mean more hours magically become available during the day.

Further to this, there is one developer at work in IT (I’m in Marketing) who I have written about on these pages before, I was a member of the team that interviewed him and my recommendation was NOT TO HIRE, but turned out that the was in some way affiliated with the IT manager (friends, fellow-countryman) and was given the job anyway.

This guy has been a pain since he started. He still (after 18 months) is asking questions about basic image manipulation, how to resize, how to crop, and what is the difference between a gif & jpg – WTF he was hired as a web developer!

Gets worse because in July he was made a team leader! Sure he’s a team leader of one person, perhaps it is that Dilbertism at work, that those who are useless are removed from the workflow by making them managers, who knows.

Either way, he’s now on a better wicket than I am but… three of his projects are falling behind. One is a major project that a whole division of the company will rely on. Should he miss deadline major shit should fall on his shoulders, and by all rights he should be finally managed out of the company…

Here’s the rub with me accepting the offer made by my current employer. That important project that is falling behind, that one that everyone else in IT says has no chance of making its deadline – that project is one of the ones they want to hand over to me!

So you see, in taking the job, I’d be starting on a backfoot, having to pickup and manage someone else’s slack and in the same time, removing that failure that is by all rights his from him. His arse is saved again.

This however is not the only reason I’m choosing not to accept their offer.

My new employer can offer me more of a future. It’s a young company, growing rapidly, if I get in now the company should grow beneath those of us that are there. Further to this I’ll have access to the knowledge (and potentially equipment) of some amazing sports photographers and anyone who knows me, knows that my heart lies in photography.

Sure I’m not super at it yet, but then I’ve not had the time nor the access to hands on information.

So my mind is made up… future employment is with a future employer. Wish me luck.

15 days to go.