lotsa luck!!

A new city, a new job...

The new job almost destroyed me – personally and professionally. The last 3-4 months had been really tough. I learned on the joining day that my job content had been totally changed. The analytics project/process for which I was initially recruited hadn’t come to the company. As the department head who conducted my telephonic interview when I was in Delhi put it, “The project was in the pipeline.” But neither he nor the HR manager had bothered to inform me about that when I was in Delhi.

I was asked to manage a team of 15 people – 13 survey programmers and 2 Team Leaders - in another process. And everything was wrong with that process - the transition hadn’t been done properly; the client had taken full advantage as there was no one with the relevant Market Research knowledge when the SOP/SLA was put in place, the whole team, and especially the programmers were being exploited, and almost everyone was playing dirty politics to save their own asses.

After the first few weeks, I learned that I don’t agree at all with the department head on so many things and our management styles were poles apart. Nor did I like the client who was very unreasonable and inhumanely demanding. They even expected us to work on weekdays and their national holidays. As far as they were concerned, we were dirt cheap Indians who had been bought with their dollars.

I started fighting for everyone in my team, I fought with the clients, I fought with the senior management but soon realized there was nobody behind me. The programmers and the team leaders were just too scared of losing their jobs and I understood. I submitted my papers the day I completed my probation period of 3 months.

I know I’m taking a huge risk. I currently don’t have any job offers in hand and 3 months at a company’s not going to look good on my resume. But I’ve this gut feeling that I did the right thing and I know that everything’s gonna be all right, very soon.

The sun’s always mellowed, almost always. The weather’s heavenly in this city that had remained elusive for as long as I remembered. Now it’s with me, breathing and living with me in perfect harmony. And sometimes, totally out of sync.

I can hear the quiet of this city in the midst of the traffic jams. I can see the subdued colors in the neon signs at the over-crowded malls.

The last 2 weeks have been just amazing, and so very peaceful. I’m now enjoying everything in my life, like the old days – I can now smell the coffee, I can now sleep, I can go out and feel refreshed and happy, I can read my books without thinking of anything else, I can play the guitar and get lost…I can do anything I like.

Am talking with a few companies right now, 2 of them’s showing INTEREST. Wish me luck folks. Lotsa, lotsa luck :-)