On the other hand I'm saving good money and I don't have to deliver to a particularly high level, but even this level of output is an emotional grind.
Feeling stupid because I should be feeling grateful to have a job. Had coworkers furloughed, furloughs at other companies across London, etc. Yet here I am looking to quit?
Facts:
- almost 2 years out of uni, 'Senior' Engineer doing Scala
- London based, under lockdown saving 50-60% of my paycheck
- cheap rent (£650), no dependents, no mortgage, subscriptions: contact lenses, spotify and PAYG phone
- good physical health
- by the time I'll have served out my notice period, I'll have:
- 8 months runway @ £25 a day for groceries and discretionaries,
- 10 months runway @ £15 a day
- got a good amount of social stimulation at my place of residence. Not reliant on virtual happy hours for getting my fix.
- got a software project I'm enthusiastic about. Would be keen to put more time into it.
At first I thought I was going to do freelance work, but the longer I didn't start doing that the more I didn't want to do it. So after a year or so of playing with new tech and starting several personal projects which didn't turn into viable businesses, I began making some money with a website.
Because that profitable website and others I built afterwards weren't actually that profitable, 2 years after I quit, I had to do some freelance work to not run out of money. I had to do 3 years of small freelance gigs while growing an online business. So for me it was 5 years before I could pay myself without having to sell my services.
Not knowing from the beginning what I really wanted to do cost me 5 years of, let's say, austerity. Never really had any financial problems during this time, but I also wasn't comfortable applying for loan to buy a house.
I don't want to offer any advice, just share a personal story which might be relevant.
Let me give you some advice, having worked (and still working) 22+ years. I've had my share of stupid code, trust me.
I do understand your emotional state of mind, been there a few times. This is no time to quit.
What you have, if I've done my math, is roughly 11K pounds. That is, to put it mildly, very very little. Things may not work out as you expect, and you may find out that what you think is 8-10 months, will end up being 6 months or less. Will you have the emotional power to resume yourself to only those expenses? Then what? You'd end up needing a job in pretty much really bad times.
Things will be bad (probably even get worse), and my take is you'll need a lot of leeway to be able to get a decent job and restart.
My advice is to work at least 3-6 more months, and save up all you can. Then, you can certainly get on that project you're enthusiastic about. Hope this helps.
Have you considered another angle, which is that you may have a health condition that is impacting you?
I had a similar experience, I changed job/country but I was still feeling drained. It turned out I was suffering from a health condition which was draining my energy and I was fatigued all time.
Some of this may include but not limited to:
- Iron deficiency - Diabetes - Blood Pressure - hypothyroidism
Whatever you decide to do, if you feel like you just want to sleep and don't want to do anything for a while, check with your GP first and do blood tests.
For example:
- If you wish to continue working in Scala and living in London, check the local job market for that skillset. Is demand growing or shrinking?
- Are London's Scala-friendly employers likely to be hiring in 6 months considering factors like covid-19's impact on the economy?
- Suppose that in 6 months, it turns out that no attractive Scala-in-London jobs are available. Can you easily move to another region where they're more abundant? Is there another language / stack in which you are (or can be) proficient and lets you get an attractive job in London?
I had a contractor working for me who came and openly talked about this with me. After digging into the problem more, we found it is about the chemistry of the team and he was not getting along with their manager. He changed the job, got a lower pay and life continued fine for him. The point here is to identify the trigger than eliminate it.
1.) The grass is not necessarily greener on the other side of the fence. Have you got an idea of what you want to do? What you will accept? Even if you just want to leave, you need a plan. Otherwise you'll take something worse out of desparation down the line.
2.) Even if you find a "dream job" or even just a better job things always change. Especially in London. This might also be the case for the job you are in. Is it a temporary rut you are in? Like another commenter said, do you like the company but not the current position? If so the company might do a lot to retain you rather than see you walk.
3.) Exploit your network to explore options before leaving. Use the current situation as a chance to seriously look and to build a plan. Its easier to find a job when you already have one that to find one when you are desparate. I am sure you have but... If you have friends or connections at other places tap them up. You never know...
4.) This lockdown is doing funny things with all our heads. Take a deep breath, work out if its just the insanity of the situation that is clouding your vision. If you commute into London normally and now you are stuck at home, you might be suprised how much energy that city imparts when you are in there.
I have experienced this first hand. I mean... Its nice to have flexible working, to be at home and in the city because the opposite is also true, London can really bite you! But... London in the summer, especially after work in the City... One of the best places in the world.
If after all those questions your mind is still set on leaving, then you are making the right choice! Hell there is no wrong choice. We only live once!
Best of luck mate!
It's not necessarily my career choice but rather the current working environment (scrums, daily standups etc.) and the underlying desire to make everyone as replaceable as possible although I can understand the business argument. Possibly a start up environment with some substantial upside would be better.
Our direct management layers are at best semi technical with limited coal face experience as a result I find it difficult to believe in their ability to deliver.
I won't be going anyplace for the next few months due to the virus.
i.e. a sideways move into a different team in the company or asking for a mentor (e.g. 10 years ahead) outside your team might make a big difference to your job satisfaction.
Some money is better than no money, and free money is free money.
Everybody probably goes through that and to be honest: the first 5+ or so years out of Uni may be really non-inspirational...
8 months at 25 GBP isn’t the world.
The stress, anxiety and frustration searching for jobs (Brexit, anyone? CoVid anyone?) is magnitudes bigger...
In the first couple of years, learn what you are good at, what you hate and what people pay good money for. But that implies you will have many “not very inspirational moments”...
Keep things in perspective but keep a job that pays your bills: if you work 40h per week you can still work 40-60h on stuff you love. If you are good you can squeeze 80-120h/week of actual value add out of it (assuming you get things done more effectively than other entrepreneurs that surf tech crunch a lot).
Don’t limit yourself to the notion that you can’t build great things on the side.
Worked for me many years and paid off nicely.
I was in a situation similar to yours some years ago. The writing was on the wall for the project, but I was so sick of the job and wanted to travel so I gave my notice and left. If I had just waited two more months I would have been let go anyway with two months' severance, which would have given me a lot more travel runway/options.
I would try to get furlough and I would approach it by changing how you work within your org. By changing how you work within the team to suit you you will either get fired/replaced/furloughed or you will make the workplace suit you.
Don't like standups? Don't go. Tell your boss you are working hours outside of normal hours and re-discover slack free coding.
My 2 cents,
If you are still contemplating, think about how you might feel, say after a week or a month. Because the state of mind then would be different. The relief of leaving a job one does not like is temporary and then the anxiety of future takes over, generally. Now with the current situation, it can add to the stress. Side projects enthusiasm is good but again anxiety about future can bring it down.
If it is possible to push taking the decision, talking to your manager, having clear work timings / notifications might help. Also since you have decided to move on anyway, maybe it is an opportunity to be assertive in asking for some changes you might want.
Look for what else you would want to do, take a look at other openings, talk to friends all these can add some objectivity to the decision and their consequence.
While the immediate pain has to be addressed, looking for a long term solution helps one make better decisions.
Good luck and stay safe.
Yet perhaps it was unavoidable that one must go through self -discovery. Maybe you can do it more efficiently that I did.
One perspective I gained was that you aren't short in time to change your life even in your job. You lose even more time later, as work and family become more demanding. If I knew what I know now I could have just kept my job and worked on something on the side. I just didn't know what to work on back then.
I also didn't spend on myself. It would have been cheaper in the end to do so, in retrospect.
Anyway, you don't want to be jobless during a potential downturn. At least see it through the virus period.
When times are good, it's hard to take yourself out of a job market where you can waltz into offers and get big raises every year by job hopping. The opportunity cost is high.
When times are bad, you don't have the fear of missing out of a big opportunity. Honestly, I've been trying to take a gap year for a while and I could never pull the trigger because it felt silly. Now it feels much more palatable to do so.
This does depend on your timeline and runway of course. If you're only looking for a couple months off as a hard cap, maybe not a great time. If you're looking for (or fine with) a year or so and have the financial flexibility to do so, then it seems like a perfect opportunity.
That's why they call it work.
It's a tough job market out there right now. Even if you're working on your own thing I'd hold out a little bit longer and try to use your day job to fund your side project.
It's tough for everyone right now, stay in a safe financial place at least 12 to 18 months till this pandemic passes.
Check out StartupsForTheRestOfUs.com podcast, start from episode 1 in the archives. I think it will resonate with you.
Compartmentalize your day job as just work.
Focus on your software/side project to keep things interesting.
Right now, though, with the current situation, it's not as clear-cut. Personally I'd be really nervous to have to navigate the job market within the next 6 months, or to be relying on my savings to eat when I could end up needing them for a big medical bill (though maybe the latter isn't a problem where you live).
I would say: definitely quit. The question is whether or not to hold out for another few months. That's something I don't have an answer for.
FWIW I did something very similar a few years ago. Quit my first job out of college, after a year and a half, because I hated it. My plan was to "freelance" which I didn't have much of a clear plan for. But I had savings, and I found a few odd jobs over the next 9 months, and while I ended up having to find a new "real" job, overall I was very glad to have gotten out of that first one.
I had the idea of creating a service to optimise poorly-running software because I did a bit of that at IBM. So I took 2 weeks vacation, cold-called and got 2-3 appts and quit. Didn't understand business or anything really. Only got one paid gig for $600.
Went into consulting for a few years while building software to sell. My girlfriend at the time got me into real estate and I developed a neat little package which netted me $90,000 first year (not bad back then) plus yearly upgrades. Then somehow got into telecommunications when the deregulation happened. Never really had a typical 'employee' job. Had countless failures, one medium success, and one big success.
Moral: Never wait until things are 'ready' before quitting. It's like deciding to have a kid; there is no good time. It's amazing what hard work and the threat of failure will do to one's motivation.
That said, I have done the same twice. The first time I really just needed a break. I was classic burn out which is what yours sounds like. I recommend trying for a break, like 2 months non pay. You can work on your pet project, and after 2 months if you still want to quit, do so.
This is a hard reality to adjust to and navigate. A lot of it has to do with figuring out what you really want and need. Many on HN then dream of having a side project take off. Others maybe want a high status job. Later, some decide family is more important and want work/life balance.
It's not just the job but designing the lifestyle you want and how to get there. The lack of that idea is what's really causing the anxiety at work.
I quit a job that I was miserable at after 3 years out of uni. I traveled and I enjoyed life on my own for a few months. And when the time came, I ended up taking a job that paid even less than the job I quit (it’s not all about the money) — it set me up for real success later down the line, and I regret nothing.
Granted, now is not an appropriate time to be traveling, so that isn’t really an upside ... but if you have other interests such as your side project, that can be just as gratifying.
1. Maybe I’m a bit burned out and need a break.
2. Or maybe I’ve got a health condition that I should check out. Talking this over with a doctor or therapist could help.
3. Everyone is stressed and fatigued now. It’s the only new normal.
4. Covid-19 will likely flare up again this winter. And a vaccine, if one is developed next year, will take most of the rest of 2021 to roll out. Or longer.
5. More companies will go out of business and more employees will be shed during that period. Some of both may be potential customers of your “project.”
6. Try to search for another job before you bail. Thinking about how you can sell yourself is a good exercise.
7. Interview for a few positions, carefully.
8. If you can’t find any good jobs, stay where you are.
9. Start working on your project now and see if it’s got real business potential or is just a pipe dream.
10. If you really have no project, and it’s a pipe dream, stay where you are.
11. Talk your situation over with a mentor or an older friend. If you have neither, stay where you are and find a mentor.
12. Face the reality that two years out of uni is nothing. In the sense of a career.
13. Face the reality that soon you will appreciate your job more when you see how many people don’t have what you have. Don’t feel guilty about not feeling that way now.
14. Your runway metrics are insufficient in the Covid-19 era. I’m not sure you’re paying enough attention to the economic consequences of the pandemic.
15. Be more discreet on public forums; you are over-sharing at least 3 key facts.
16. Be wary of taking advice from strangers, including me.
17. “Do it” Is not advice, it’s a remark.
Good luck, take care, and remember your country voted years ago to leave the EU, and your PM who is supposed to lead your county through that maze was hours away from being put on a ventilator a week ago.
It never hurts to take advice from Ferris Bueller, though.[1]
Gives you way more runtime (less taxes to pay too), the option to ramp back up and time to find something new.
I also quit without a new job though. I knew that my position would be in demand and had already gotten and declined 1-2 offers.
I moved to a new city and ended up doing another 2 month part-time remotely while interviewing on the side. I managed to get a free month between jobs and found something much better (way more interesting, more pay (luckily enough for two, needed right now), and also sweet colleagues).
With that said, any other time I’d say go for it if you’re comfortable spending full time job searching, but during a pandemic... it’s going to be harder to find places hiring.
I have wanted to do this at several points in the past few years (3 years out of school now, first real job). Although I can't say for certain what life would have been like had I done it, I'm currently glad I didn't. I have learned a lot about myself and about perseverance, and the experience I have gained has unlocked more interesting opportunities for both the present and the future.
Consider taking this assessment. It's helped a lot of people get their thoughts straight and make better decisions about their future.
Do you intend to make a serious attempt at running your own business? Do you want to take a few months as unpaid vacation? When do you plan on interviewing for a better job, if ever?
My experience is that quitting without a job offer makes life difficult, but I'm not sure it's applicable to your plans.
Some of the other comments have advice like trying to get furloughed, and all those seem worth a shot, but yeah.... just walk!
I just got a job at a bank (cloud architecture) and some companies are still hiring.
The job market is going to be weird for a while. Accepting that, you could still see if landing the next job is possible first, and take a little time between gigs to sort yourself out.
If what you are doing is not making you happy, delaying the decision will only make you more unhappy.
The longer you stay at this job the longer you do damage to your future self and prevent yourself from doing great things and living the happiest life you can.
Do you know when the economy will be back to normal?
The scala job market is good and only getting better. If you’re good at the functional aspects you’ll be considered for clojure/Haskell jobs too.
Do you hate your job, coworkers, or employer? If it's your job, do a LOT of research on what you'd rather do. If it's your coworkers, get a better job. If it's your employer, get a different job.
Consider maybe going back to school in a new field. I'm currently doing it now going into CS. I've learned I'm a tasked based person, not a people type person. I was in business but hated it because relationships arent as measurable in terms of achievement as an actual skill is. You may have to do some soul searching here to try and figure it out. Good luck!