Five of my co-workers have left Carfax for another company. Three of those had their last day today.
While I'm happy for them, I'm pretty bummed out too. These people are without exception the developers that I aspire to be. I want to be as knowledgeable, as fluent, and as quick as them. Being around them pushes me to work harder and smarter. And now that's going to be more difficult because they are not there!
It's kind of unfortunate that Carfax can't hold on to great devs for longer. While Carfax does offer a pretty darn good work-life balance, some people want to invest more of their passion and energy into their work. And they, like any company, certainly welcome this attitude, but they are incredibly resistant to balancing the equation with appropriate incentives, relative to the rest of the tech industry.
An ambitious software engineer in 2019 has a lot of value, and naturally you want to find a place that values you as much as you value yourself.
Obviously I can't speak for all of them, but that's basically why they left from my perspective. Luckily I'm friends with them, and we'll stay in close touch. With a little luck, I'll follow them there in the near future. I already tried to get into that company a while back, but failed to make it that time. I'm not as experienced as the five, but what I lack in experience I make up for in hard work and persistence; I'll be trying again soon.
The PSG is in the mail. I'm going to take off a week of work to learn this instrument. I will be streaming all of it on twitch.
In other news, it's football season, and I'm excited for the challenge of being the best roller that I can be.
Here's my pizza slinging prayer for 2019:
May the lines be long and around the corner,
May the wait never exceed 30 minutes,
May the pizza skins round and even,
May the dough be soft as not to cause carpel tunnel,
And may the pizza tosses be inspiring,
hovering in mid-air like a spaceship as centripetal forces expand
the crust to the perfect size until slowing to a gentle stop
Amen.