4 ms·

If you don't mind me asking, what is it like (going back to?) working for a large company after working for yourself.

nfriedly 10y ago
There was a little bit of culture-shock, but honestly, it wasn't too bad. I had a few years at a startup in-between being self-employed, so it wasn't an instant switch, and my role at IBM provides a fair level of autonomy. This is my first time at a big company (e.g. > 50 employees). IBM in particular is huge, almost inconceivably big. It still surprises me how frequently I'm be asked for help/advice/whatever from people within IBM who I've never met before and who aren't on my team, or even in the Watson division. (This may be in part due to the fact that I have a more visible role than most.) On the flip side of that, I frequently have no idea who to ask about a given issue. (Although this doesn't happen as often now as it used to.) Nice points are that I don't have to worry about keeping up a pipeline of clients or having to be mindful of what's billable and what isn't. It may be partially due to having more experience, but I find it a lot easier now to walk out of my office at the end of the day actually be done working. I might think about work a bit, but I rarely feel compelled to actually go and do work when I'm spending time with my family. When I was self-employed, there was always a nagging feeling that I should be working whenever I was doing anything else. As an extension of the last point, paid vacation is awesome. I also get to publish a lot more open source work now then I ever did before, although that obviously depends on your role. On the down side, I'm supposed to get written permission from my manager for each open source project I want to contribute to. She always replies "yes" and usually quickly, but it still wastes time and feels silly. (I generally send the email, begin working on my change, and then wait for the "yes" before publishing it and sending a PR. That usually works out well.) Spending company money is also tricky. Placing an order from Adafruit is a convoluted process that can take several weeks. (To be fair, there is an internal shopping site that makes ordering more common things like a monitor less painful.) Overall, though, I'm glad I did it. My time at IBM has been good and, assuming they'll keep me, I think I'll probably stick around for a while longer.

There was a little bit of culture-shock, but honestly, it wasn't too bad. I had a few years at a startup in-between being self-employed, so it wasn't an instant switch, and my role at IBM provides a fair level of autonomy. This is my first time at a big company (e.g. > 50 employees). IBM in particular is huge, almost inconceivably big. It still surprises me how frequently I'm be asked for help/advice/whatever from people within IBM who I've never met before and who aren't on my team, or even in the Watson division. (This may be in part due to the fact that I have a more visible role than most.) On the flip side of that, I frequently have no idea who to ask about a given issue. (Although this doesn't happen as often now as it used to.) Nice points are that I don't have to worry about keeping up a pipeline of clients or having to be mindful of what's billable and what isn't. It may be partially due to having more experience, but I find it a lot easier now to walk out of my office at the end of the day actually be done working. I might think about work a bit, but I rarely feel compelled to actually go and do work when I'm spending time with my family. When I was self-employed, there was always a nagging feeling that I should be working whenever I was doing anything else. As an extension of the last point, paid vacation is awesome. I also get to publish a lot more open source work now then I ever did before, although that obviously depends on your role. On the down side, I'm supposed to get written permission from my manager for each open source project I want to contribute to. She always replies "yes" and usually quickly, but it still wastes time and feels silly. (I generally send the email, begin working on my change, and then wait for the "yes" before publishing it and sending a PR. That usually works out well.) Spending company money is also tricky. Placing an order from Adafruit is a convoluted process that can take several weeks. (To be fair, there is an internal shopping site that makes ordering more common things like a monitor less painful.) Overall, though, I'm glad I did it. My time at IBM has been good and, assuming they'll keep me, I think I'll probably stick around for a while longer.