Some thoughts on personal change.

I have called working in the business world bipolar, toxic, and an excuse for mental illness.  I still feel this way, but I have encountered numerous pockets of decency and professionalism along the way.  I have made plenty of friends along the way.  This week, I took a massive step in my professional career and resigned from my present organization.  I will be joining another firm on November 19th.

When I was growing up in the 1980s, my parents and teachers spoke about how a career was a pathway or process.  You would join a company and advance up the organization throughout your career.  Your loyalty to the organization comes with job security and a means to support a family.  I was instructed people succeeded and failed based on individual merit.   The recession of the early 1990s and over twenty years of being a technology professional have proven those ideas false.

I have spent plenty of time around the damaged, neurotic, and mean people who make up a significant minority of business professionals.  In my worst moments of vulnerability, I have choked back tremendous amounts of rage and bitterness.  In my better moments, I have forced myself to see the good in others.  I was disappointed from time to time, but often, my optimism was rewarded.  I leaned on colleagues to muddle through the long days and lack of support, and I relied on my fellow agile coaches, who saw something in me I did not.

It is easy to see the bad in the world and wallow in nihilism. Creating a reformation will be hard work. A modern shareholding company is the closest thing contemporary society has to medieval feudalism, and those in power will do anything to remain in charge.

Fortunately, others like me are agitating for change and have a serious business case for making those changes.  Developers, agile coaches, scrum masters, product owners, and random strangers want these changes.  Together, we will work to make the modern corporation a more sustainable, sane, and satisfying workplace.  I have spent five years learning to be a great scrum master and coach.  It is now time to put that experience to use in expanding the agile reformation. 

Until next time.