Wow, what a week. Let’s start with two weeks ago. Neutron has been looking for a while to hire a good Python/Django developer. Dal, the Proton project manager has started looking at Github profiles and asking us developers what we thought of their open source work. One name that got sent out was Greg Doermann.

I recruited Greg to work on Snirk with me. I eventually left Snirk because I didn’t like the business plan (mainly of just trying to get venture capital money before anything else). I gave up my ownership and left all the work to Greg. Things didn’t work out there for that and we all ended up going our separate ways. But, I was really impressed with the work Greg did.

I reached out to him and leaned he was now VP of tech at Perfect Pitch technology. He was earning a six figure salary with lots of great perks. 

This story will become relevant to this journal entry later.

Thursday night Cade invited me to play softball with him. It has been over a year so I was excited to go play. I went 4 for 5 and had a lot of fun. Cade told me to keep the jersey he gave me so I suspect I’ll get a few more calls.

On the way home I got a call from Dave Parkinson. He was asking how things were going working with Joel. I said fine.

There is a bit of a back story with Joel. Ever since I started working at Neutron I haven’t heard anything good said about Joel. The worst story I heard that no one has denied is that he slept with another employee and the other employee was later let go while Joel stayed around. A couple of our senior developers left and basically said they would not come back until Joel and Felicia were gone. I often heard Nicole, my former boss complain about Joel – very often.

So when I had a lunch meeting with Dan, our CEO, I asked him about this. Why, when everyone complains about Joel and we’ve had some top developers leave and say they won’t come back until certain other employees are gone, does Dan continue to employ them and promote them?

As I remember the conversation, Dan seemed more upset that people talk about them like that in the office. He asked who was saying this stuff. I said pretty much everyone. He asked if Nicole would join in on the criticism or if she stopped it as inappropriate. I felt the need to be completely honest and say she joined in. But, I felt bad because I really liked Nicole and I didn’t want to see her get fired so I added how much I felt she was a great boss and how smart she was.

A couple days later it was announced that Nicole was being let go. I felt terrible like it was my fault. For some time the plan was to move me off of proton and get me started working on a new project which was a web based tool to help job seekers track the progress of finding a new job.

The job sounded fun and exciting because it was an external app – an app for the world to see rather than just an internal tool for employees to use.

After Nicole left our team was broken up and Joel and I were basically made a two man team. We found ourselves a bit stuck because we needed a good front-end designer and we were having a hard time finding someone.

While we were looking and doing interviews we were asked to fix our company stats systems. I spend a week or two learning what was out there and working with existing code before eventually deciding to start a new Django project to  build out all the new stat tools.

We hired a good front-end developer and he as been busy working on the designs and layouts. I have spent the past 3 months working on the new stats system. I’ll admit this project has grown to be much more than I anticipated and therefore taken a lot more time than I thought it would.

So, back to my phone call Thursday night with Dave Parkinson.

Well, not quite. Let me give a bit more background. Joel was very recently given a new title: “VP of Operations”. I’m not sure how much changed with his responsibilities, but not much changed with out team of 3.

Tony, a co-worker I have become friends with and went to Twiliocon with last year, was very upset about Joel’s new title. He has made it very clear to me in the mast that he can’t stand Joel and think’s Joel is a liar and a generally bad guy. He was so upset about this change that he gave his two weeks notice. When he did, Joel and Dan decided it was better to just pay him for his last two weeks and send him out the door.

In the process of Tony being let go, 4 other people were fired, which as I understand was a result of Joel’s newfound authority.

Now, back to the phone call with Dave.

Dave said when Joel was promoted he was the only one on the executive team that supported Dan’s decision on the promotion.

Like Dave, I hadn’t personally witnessed anything wrong with Joel. He seemed smart and competent enough to me and we got along well.

Dave’s opinion quickly changed though as he said Joel try to throw him under the bus. I can’t remember what he did exactly to make Dave so upset, but he was definitely upset. He said his new goal was to take Joel’s job. He said in six months, either Joel will be here, or I will be here.

He then warned me that I need to watch my back. He said Joel was telling Dan that I am too slow and he needs an “A” player on his team. Dave said Dan was now raving about Anant being a superstar because he fixed some javascript that it took me a week to write and did it in 30 lines of code.

That may or may not be true, but it was clear that I have fallen from grace. Before I was put on a team with Joel, I was the superstar. Now, I was just a lackluster performer.

It hurt. I love Neutron. It has been my favorite place to work and for some reason I saw myself being there for a really long time – perhaps even moving to the executive team as VP of tech or CTO or something.

But now it seems things had changed in an instant. Nicole warned me about this when I was going to be put on a team with Joel. Others warned me as well. Up until this point I thought things were going well.

I spent Thursday night sending out a few resume’s for different jobs. One was to Perfect Pitch technology where Greg is not the VP of tech. One was Needle where I have had recruiters contact me in the past. And the third was for a company named OveractDev which has offices in Orem, St. George and San Francisco. I was applying for a position in St. George.

Friday morning was awkward, but in our team meeting I told Joel I wanted to start managing everything through YouTrack. I wanted to document everything I was working on going forward so I could prove how much I was working. I had a productive day. Or so I thought…

Just as I was driving into Alpine I got a call from Joel. He told me that he had just gotten yelled at by Dan. He said our revenue stat number was way off. He said Dan wasn’t happy and He wasn’t happy and it had to be fixed by Monday. I was shocked because I’ve never received a call like this. I spent all night friday working on it. I spent more time Saturday morning, and in the process I wrote an email to Dan and Joel defending myself explaining what I have built and the challenges I have overcome. I explained that having that revenue number fixed by Monday morning was an impossible task and why.

I didn’t hear back from that email until late Saturday night. Joel the message he was trying to convey was not one of being upset with me or questioning my integrity but rather the work I do is urgent and critical to the success of Neutron. He gave some encouraging words but I couldn’t help but feel the email felt very condescending. It frustrated me more than helping me feel better. I shared the response with Rachel and she said the same thing – it felt very condescending.

The only resume I got a response back from so far was a phone call from Greg. He said he would love to have me on his team, but they couldn’t afford me until maybe mid-summer or fall. I thought it was funny how quickly the tables turned on that conversation.

I’ve told this story to Ken, my father in law, yesterday. He said, it sounds like you’re a good candidate for a blessing. We later took the kids on a 3.5 mile hike to Stewart Falls. We had some good chats in the car on the way there and the way back.

Tonight he came over and chatted with Rachel and I some more and gave me a blessing. I wished I would have recored it because it was long and powerful. Here are a few points that stood out to me.

The Lord is pleased with my progress thus far in life as a father and member of the church.

I promised the Lord I would fulfill an important work while in the pre-existence. I need to study to find what that is and work to fulfill my covenants

Find where the Lord would have me place our family.

Lord will take care of my needs.

I need to cleanse my desires so that only the most righteous desires remain.

I will have good health to fulfill my life’s mission.

I felt the Spirit very strongly after that blessing. I feel the Spirit now. I also felt an urge to talk with my Dad. He tried calling just before I got my blessing. I called him afterwords told him everything that was going on. He gave me encouragement and gave me confidence that I would make the right decisions. He also asked that I take at least a week to calm down before making any major decisions, which I think was good advice.

So It now Midnight. I will be in the office in the morning and I won’t have accomplished what I was told I needed to have done by this time. I’ll continue working on it throughout the week. Hopefully I will get it all solved. In either case I’m going to be gone all next week to celebrate our anniversary and to go on Trek.

But in the meantime, I think I’ll also be sending out more resumes to get more options to see where my family might end up. I didn’t mention this yet, but Rachel and I have been thinking about selling out house that we thought we would be in forever. We are tired of the large mortgage. We are tired of doing so much cleaning and yard work every week. We have had a sense to move and have been looking at St. George a lot. But the one thing that has been the greatest reason to stay is that I have a great job that I love. Now my job doesn’t feel to have the same pull it did even a week ago. Now I have in an instance become open to new opportunities.

I’ve said this to Ken, my Dad and Rachel have jokingly. “I’ll go where you want me to go dear Lord, just tell me WHERE you want me to go!” I know it is not that easy. If it were I hope I would really have the faith to do so. But I’ve found having the faith to go where the Lord wants you to go, is first having the faith to trust the inspiration and feelings you are having and coming from God. Then having the faith to go and do is the easier part of that. 

For example, if I were called to be a mission president, I would have not problem going wherever I was called to serve. Rachel would likewise be fully supportive and go where the call was issued.

But because the call is not coming from a church leader, but is coming from what we think is whispering of the spirit, it’s not so crystal clear. Are they whisperings of the Spirit, or is it a desire to downsize so I am not so stressed out about mortgage payments, or a desire for Rachel to get away from the business she has gotten involved in with her mom and sister? Are we looking to run away from problems? Are we making selfish decisions by taking the kids away from their school and friends or are we doing what is best for our family?

As we were walking home from Stake conference today Rachel was a bit frustrated with me because I didn’t have answers to these type of questions. She said (or rather I heard), “you’re the head of this home, make a decision so I can support you in it!” I thought she was joking at first, but she was definitely serious and it make me think.

I asked her earlier if she was willing to go anywhere I might feel inspired to go – even it if were out of state. Without hesitation she said no.

Tonight one of our trek girls dropped out. As Rachel was talking to her mother about it, in the course of the conversation it led to something interesting. The family is moving to Maryland – back east where they are originally from. I have talked to Brother Bracie in the past. He doesn’t seem happy here so I can understand why he wasn’t to move back there. He once told me its just not the same here. For example, after a stake conference, you walk outside and after 10 minutes the parking lot is empty. Back east, it would be different. Everyone hangs around for an hour or more afterwards just talking and enjoying one another’s company.

I know the church is different that way outside of Utah. It was different in South Africa on my mission. Sometimes I envy that.

So in the course of talking with Sister Bracie, Rachel said she became more brave. Sister Bracie said she has lived close to family and far from family. She said being physically close does not lead to being a close family. Instead she has felt closer to family when she lives far away. For example, when her mother visits she stays for a week and they spend a lot of time together having fun.

I’ve often felt this way. Absence makes the heart grow fonder. Things are very casual with Rachel’s family because we see them everyday. There is no point in getting together for Sunday dinners or holidays anymore. When we visit my parents it is different. We make the most of our time together.

So I can’t help but think that a new start in a new area would be a bad thing. Yes, it would be a hard thing, but we can do hard things. I envision us being closer as a family – especially initially as we won’t know the area or the people and we will only have each other. Yes, in time we will make friends and get more comfortable in the new area, but it will definitely be hard at first. 

That hard thing feels like an adventure to me.

In stake conference last night they mentioned that the stats on our endowed and recommend holding adults in this stake are some the highest in the world – almost unheard of. Yes we live in a good area, but at the same time I think that limits opportunities for many members. There are only so many callings to go around. That is why so many from this area are called to be in bishoprics, stake presidencies and high counselors in BYU wards.

I know I shouldn’t covet callings. That said, being an elders quorum president in Taylorsville was probably the most rewarding calling I have held since being married. I made some close friend and visited a lot of people. It is hard to replicated the service and visits you do without such a calling. Yes it’s certainly possible to get out and visit people without the calling, but why. It just doesn’t happen.

So that has been another reason which I haven’t felt confident enough to voice because I don’t know it is an appropriate thought or feeling. 

It is now 12:30 AM. I should be going to bed now. It has certainly been helpful getting my feelings written out. I will continue to look around and a ponder and follow the pattern the Lord has set by making a decision, then praying about that decision to know if it is right. But I realize I can’t make a decision to move jobs if I don’t have any job offers, so if I am serious about this I need to start applying for jobs. That is whee the first step of faith will come in. Oddly, I don’t feel like I know myself well enough to know what the next entry will be like. Will I calm down and resolve the problems at work and stay where I am at, or is there a big change just around the corner? Time will tell.