J.C.’s Money Blog

Today a colleague retired after working at my company over 40 years. It was very unceremonius. The management didn’t make any kind of announcement, and they seemed pleased to have his head count out off their books. He hadn’t been planning to retire, but they offered an early retirement package, which he accepted.

He never really smiled, on a day that should be one of the happiest, I would imagine. I left the office with him to help carry his belongings to his car, and he simply told me that it goes by much faster than I can imagine.

Two years ago, I accepted what I thought was my dream job, and now I am ready to quit. My experience today shores up my confidence that I am making the right decision. This colleague spent the majority of his life, and actually the entirety of his career working for this corporation, and he still feels like just a number to a cold corporation. I don’t want that to happen to me. As he said, life is too short.

So why do I want to quit my job, well lets see:

Scheduling freedom

Even as a white collar guy with some flexibility in my schedule, I still have to be at work doing work during core hours. Whether or not these are the best hours of productivity is irrelevant.

I want to work when I am feeling productive.

Ability to concentrate

Working at my big corporation makes concentrating on a task impossible. One problem is the endless meetings to attend, which means you have to get started on a task, then put it away for a meeting, then get back to the task, only to be interrupted by the next meeting. Often I won’t even start a task because I know I will be interrupted.

Worse than that is my desk crammed into a very loud, very annoying office. In my office there are about 30 people working around me, and concentrating on a task while hearing 10 different conversation simultaneously is impossible.

My own IT

My IT department destroys my productivity. They limit my email account to < 50 MB, so that I have to start archiving everything locally every few days or I cannot send or receive emails. My PC has just enough memory to load the operating system, so that I am constantly bogged down by lack of resources, by the time I load one single office program. If I tried to buy a weaker computer at Wal-Mart, they would laugh at me. And this is our corporate standard in 2007.

Salary
My profession is generally a salaried job. Which means I am expected to stick around until I get the “job” done. Of course there is no measurable quantity that defines when the job is done, so I am supposed to get lot done. Well, since my corporation limits my ability to be productive, the only way to get lots done is to spend lots of time at work. But spending lots of time at work doesn’t earn you anything extra, unless your corporation decides you deserve it, and hopefully rewards you in the future.

Well, I’ve worked hard and personally sacrificed for my corporation and haven’t received the rewards.

Limited upside income potential
I can do great things for my company, finding ways to save millions. However, I don’t have the chance to directly benefit from my actions. My company will simply use the market price for my position to determine my compensation. I have to bear the full downside potential, they could close down my branch and get rid of me.

If choosing a job were like a stock, noone would pick it, since it has very limited upside potential and 100% downside potential.

Choose my colleagues
I have a few colleagues that are really good. I have tons of colleagues that are average at best, and plenty of complete loser colleagues. I spend the majority of my time at work. I want to be able to choose who I spend the majority of my time with.

Choose my bennies
I got Lasik eye surgery, so I don’t need the vision insurance offered to me. I don’t have a family, so I don’t need the life insurance. I don’t need a family health plan. Why are all my investment options in my 401k so terrible?

Benefits are great, but hey, they’re really just part of your compensation. If you don’t take advantage of them, then they are lost compensation. Forget company benefits! Give me the cash, and let me choose how I want to spend my money. Let me decide how to insure myself.

I don’t want my company telling me what my health and retirement priorities are. I know what’s best for me.

Less than two working weeks left, till I get to turn in my notice. I can’t wait.