Time to Leave Nokia
After a long three and a half years at Nokia I’m ready to leave. I’ve been through several re-orgs and my team has been dissolved. I’m hoping you can help me.
What I do
Finding a new position is challenging. I don’t really have a name for what I do. I don’t fit neatly in the engineering, design, or architecture boxes. My skill set is both wide and narrow. I’m always explaining to friends parents that yes I’m in technology, but no I can’t fix your computer or write you an app. I suppose that’s not strictly true. In many cases I probably could fix your computer and I’ve written many mobile apps, but that’s not what I do.
How do you summarize rapid prototyping + app development + developer evangelism + futurism + UI design + love of wearables and weird nerdy things? This is gonna be tricky.
What I want
So what do I want? I want a success. I’ve got a bad track record of picking companies and projects. My last two projects at Sun (where I spent 5 years) were JavaFX Script and the JavaStore. Both were canned when Oracle took over. Next I went to Palm, who was acquired by HP two months later. I helped launch the TouchPad, which was the #2 tablet in the US for 8 weeks, then everything was canceled. Then I went to Nokia where every project I worked on failed to become a product, sometimes only by a week or two. Nokia then sold half of itself, did two re-orgs, and is now buying Alcatel Lucent.
While I have completed many projects, they have all failed due to circumstances beyond my control. I want to work on something that will succeed or fail based on what my team and I actually, do, not on the whims of upper management. I would have been fine if webOS failed in the marketplace, but it was killed by our own CEO. Finding a good project will be a challenge.
What I need
The other challenge is working remote. I live in Eugene Oregon because that’s where my 4yr old son’s grandmother lives. No amount of bonus or salary will make me move. I’m happy to travel. I’ve worked remote very effectively for close to ten years now. I’ve pushed great projects forward while working remote. But some companies still don’t allow remote working. Some would love to hire me but only if I move to Mountain View or Seattle (thanks but no thanks Googazon.) So if you are willing to hire remote, you can have access to awesome talent that the big guys can’t get!
Soo… I’m ready for something different. I want to work on something that will be both meaningful and successful. A good salary is important (I’ve got a kid and a mortgage after all) but it’s not the only thing. My LinkedIn profile lists my full skill set. It’s a mixture of Node, JS, Java and other languages, but the technology is never the important thing. One can always learn a new language. What I specialize in is building prototypes quickly to prove if an idea will work, then getting other developers excited about it. I had previous employers say, he’s smart and gets stuff done. I want future employers to say that too.
Now my ask: If you know of a company working on something genuinely meaningful who is willing to have remote workers, then please email me. joshua@marinacci.org