Office politics and careerism are pretty inescapable wherever you go. If anything, they might be worse in the private sector because a lot of people there (more

Office politics and careerism are pretty inescapable wherever you go. If anything, they might be worse in the private sector because a lot of people there (more often that not the MBA types) are primarily motivated by money and power. They will be cut throat if it gets them what they want. You might be better off making a list of causes you care about and reaching out to some charities/NGOs/non-profits/community organisations and seeing if they have any positions available that match your skillset. Alternatively attend some conferences or otherwise reach out to C-Level suite and see if you can identify some problems they have that you might be able to code a solution for. I imagine they would probably jump at the chance to get a tenured computer science professor as part of their tech team. Alternatively, try setting some boundaries. Send an email saying you will only be replying to emails within two hourly windows each day (have a read of Deep Work by Cal Newport for more on this). Find an off-site work space, work from coffee shops or work from home to avoid unexpected visitors. Attend meetings remotely: if most of it is irrelevant you can work on other tasks simultaneously in a way you can't socially get away with in in-person meetings. Take a few hours or even days before responding to any instant messages - a lot of the time people will end up finding another way to solve their problems. Delegate any tasks you can to an assistant if you've got one.