Boxed in part 2

If you felt trapped in a job you didn’t enjoy – how do you find a way out?

Imagine doing the same thing every day. You haven’t been able to change groups. You don’t have much luck finding a job outside because your skills are obsolete. You are able to provide value to your current employer for now. You are comfortable but there’s an uneasy feeling.

The one thing you can only change is yourself. You’ve probably heard that many times in movies, comic books, and from your friends. If you cannot rely on your manager, your team, or anyone else… you will need to grow in the direction you want. You do the work yourself.

You have two choices:

1. Stay in the org
2. Leave

Let’s talk about what you can do in either situation.

Grow your skills within the org

Let’s say you’ve been fixing test scripts for a few years. You want a change. Consider the following questions.

• Why are these tests needed?
• Who wrote those tests and do they need help?
• Can you speed up those tests?
• What can you automate?

Question if your work need to be performed this way forever. You don’t need to walk up to your manager and say, “Wow is this even worth my time?”

Wrong attitude.

Try asking, “Do you know what systems are affected by these tests?”

If your manager doesn’t know then ask, “Who else could I talk to?”

Extend past the boundaries you think your manager placed on you. Chances are those boundaries were self-imagined. You need to be able to see how everything fits together at a higher level. If you are so unfortunate to have a manager that restricts you in every way, then see #1. You are not in a good place. Use your free time at work to acquire more skills and keep looking.

Prepare for a new career

You have concluded you have to leave your environment.

Here’s how I did it. Around 2008, I wanted to work on image processing. I took a job in high-definition security cameras and discovered my daily responsibilities were powering on and off a camera to check if there were issues with the hardware. Not what I was expecting and I knew I wasn’t going to be around for long.

I spent hours reading papers on wide dynamic range and video analytics. I kept looking for jobs in image processing, but I wasn’t having much luck and the pay at the time for entry-level positions was very low. I was going to be okay learning image processing on my own.

I noticed that all the jobs were focused on the web.

Every day I reviewed algorithms. Python was (and is) a popular language so I would work on exercises on Project Euler. I would also read solutions on TopCoder and painstakingly go through them. I took courses like Linux kernels on the side. I read books on management, self-help, and companies every weekend in the library. I went through several years worth of Harvard Business Review. I talked to everyone I could on career advice to help filter my decision process.

If you don’t have anyone to talk to, feel free to send me an email with your situation.

With all my time spent in Python, ironically my next job would be writing Ruby. My next job was at a tiny startup and the skills I picked up there were invaluable. From management to scaling systems to helping sell a company, I would never have imagined I had an opportunity like that.

The first step was recognizing I didn’t belong. The second step was re-educating myself.

Before you do all that, assess your situation. Do you see yourself in your current position in a year? What will you accomplish in that time?

Best of luck.