Category: Kyle

After working at Symantec for six years, it felt really strange to say my final goodbyes. I’m not one for sentiment at work, so when I got choked up and had issues responding to people, hopefully they didn’t take offense and think that I was trying to brush them off.

I spent my last day at work trying to catch up on all the cases I had, trying to get through the final points of them so I could feel I did my best before handing them off. I think part of me was also in denial about leaving. When word started getting around that I was leaving, and people started coming over to say goodbye, I accepted that I was really going to leave that day and started packing. I surprised myself with how much I had collected over the years of being there, and had to make a couple trips out to the car with everything. I think a good sign of being trusted at the company was that my manager and his manager both left before I did, so I was practically on my own to leave the building my final time. After I triple-checked I cleaned out as much as possible, I left my badge with a former manager, and left for the last time.

When I got home, Rebecca had a large fruit basket waiting for me. She informed me about it earlier, but didn’t check the card. It turns out Venafi was so excited to have me come on board, they sent this out in welcome. It was a nice distraction from my absentminded thoughts about leaving Symantec.

So, before we left for North Carolina, I got a job offer over the phone for a new company, with the understanding that I would get an official offer by email the next day. I didn’t want to mention anything to my manager about it, until that offer came. Of course, I left work early to get to the airport, before the email ever arrived. I didn’t get the offer until we got to the airport, and I didn’t want to deal with it during the chaos of travel. That night, I emailed my manager and told him I got another job offer, and asked if Symantec would try countering this soon after my last offer. He replied back and confirmed that they wouldn’t try to counter again, asking me to let him know my decision. I emailed the manager of the other company and explained I was out of state, with limited internet access, and asked for his patience until I returned. He agreed.

I noticed that for the last job offers, I felt more apt to leave when I was away from the office, and more reluctant to leave once I got into the normal routine in the office. Having a week away to think about things helped me be more objective, even though it was still a difficult decision. When we returned home and I got back to Symantec, I slipped back into feeling scared of a change. However, one of the managers was best friends with the new position’s manager, and told me a lot about him. With this positive endorsement in mind, I started considering what it would be like to leave.

When the HR rep from the new company called me around lunch time, I told her I accepted the position. Now it’s just a matter of waiting for the last day, hoping I can endure.

Back when I passed my resume along for the my previous “Opportunities” post, I had also sent it to another former coworker who went to a small company called Venafi. He explained that they had a support team and were looking to fill some positions, so I figured it wouldn’t hurt to have a talk with them and see if they would be interested. A few months had passed with my hearing nothing, and I figured they weren’t interested. Then this coworker sent me a message one day, asking if I ever heard from the manager, and I told him I hadn’t, and the next thing I knew was they were contacting me for an interview.

This afternoon I went into their office in Sandy, near the South Towne Mall, and had quite an interesting interview with a few members of their management. They were impressed with the experience I had on my current product, as their software offers management of security certificates, and I was one of the only candidates that had actually set up a server environment to create these, so I understood much of the terminology they used, and felt comfortable with the environment and people I spoke to. It was different, or maybe I’m just feeling more confident?

Anyway, this evening I got a call back from the manager, offering me a job. During the interview, when he asked how much I was making, I decided to include my additional perks, like company stock I was going to get this year, so when he made the offer, it was actually comparable with the number I gave him. He said to think it over and he would send me an official offer by email tomorrow.

Why do I let myself get into these situations?

I’ve always been of the opinion that it doesn’t hurt to pass my resume around, to see what the current market is like and test the water and see what I’m worth. I figure, what’s the worst that can happen? You get a job offer and have to make a decision?

Last year, a former manager at my company was looking for some support people to fill positions in the company he went to, and I passed my resume along to him wondering if I could stand a chance at getting an offer. Actually, with some arguments in my favour, I got a really decent offer at much higher than I make, but Symantec countered with something less than the offer. Considering the options, I felt like I should stay, even though the money was less, as the new position didn’t feel as stable and required more travel, plus the benefits wouldn’t be as good. Hey, money isn’t everything, right? I spent some time regretting losing out on that extra money, but also this decision allowed me to move into a new family of products to support, and that has been really fun to be part of, even though it was annoying at times.

Well, in the last few weeks, a similar thing happened. A former manager contacted me and I passed my resume along, and one thing lead to another and I got called in for an interview last week, spending a decent amount of time talking to him about how things are going at work, and also talking to some of his team for a technical interview. Upon leaving the interview, I met another former Symantec person, whom also really enjoyed working at this new place and hoped I would get a position there. Then today I had a phone call with his manager, just as a “get to know you” type of thing. I typically feel like I don’t gauge interviews well, but I felt like these went well and I impressed him.

Now comes the problem – what if the worst thing happens?

…well, cub scout leader. Kyle has been involved in scouts since the beginning of the year. As soon as Ethan became a bear, Kyle was going to cub scouts every week, due to the fact that every single week, one or both of Ethan’s official bear leaders wouldn’t be there. So when Kyle was asked to meet with a member of the Bishopric, back in April, we knew it was going to be a scout calling. We weren’t expecting it to be Webelos though, considering Kyle had been going to bears every week for months.  So he started going to Webelos, (Ethan was NOT happy about that) but we had to wait for his background check to clear before they could make it official over the pulpit. They finally made the calling official, and after awhile they found someone to be his companion, but that didn’t last long. The other leader’s wife ended up being put on bed rest due to complications with her pregnancy, and so he stopped coming and eventually he was released. So they are still working on finding Kyle a companion. The only reason I haven’t blogged about Kyle being cub scouts before now, is because I was waiting for him to get his uniform so I could get a picture of him wearing it. 🙂