Moving Experiences III

There's a song that sums up my feelings on transitioning from one job to another. Another slice of my life, hence the line break. Go read the poetry or the beer reviews.

This is not for the faint hearted. However, it is self-serving. Enter at your peril.

Going to be a Head of Department the first time was marred by many things. I came as a new broom, employed to shake things up and lead the change I had identified as being needed when I went to interview. I started doing everything all at once. But there was resistance from a member of staff that needed work, and I failed to carry her. I had to work against her after she decided that I was the enemy. My ex-colleagues forgot that. Both my subsequent bosses forgot, or didn't believe it, but I am implacable and I do not make an easy enemy. Even when I am beaten I will come back and fight on. And on. And on. Even in leaving I won.

Two years of hard fight and there were more in the offing. I had a child. I could not fight as I used to. No longer could I ride at the head of the charge, I was being pulled by a higher calling. Not without regrets at the job unfinished, the promise undelivered, the battle still fought, I left and returned to a safer environment. But I was different. I had helped a colleague leave the profession. I had fought a battle and I had emerged victorious but at the cost of any friendship. I threatened my old and future Head by my very presence. I had removed a non-hacker. He had become that non-hacker and knew it. I did not.

He struck first. But I struck back, in a way that he did not expect. Because I am implacable. I outlasted but I did not win. Nor did he. Then came a new contender. I opened, when I should have shut, and I paid the price. But lack of experience failed to destroy me. But I left and they outlasted. I do not regret this in the final analysis. I regret my desire to stay on good terms. I regret my lack of courage. I regret the shortness of my leaving speech and the equivocal nature of it. But I do not regret leaving. The job had changed. No longer about our charges but about numbers. And I can make stats march and dance to my bidding. When people challenge my stats something is wrong. And it's not my stats.

So I am happy. Because I have won. It is not perfect. There are issues, there is low level shiz that I am not used to having to deal with, but there is personality and there is compassion. There is understanding. There is quality. And I am not misunderstood. I am understood. I am understood. I am understood. So I am not afraid.