It is Thanksgiving Day and I am sitting in the dining room of Pam’s sister’s and her husband’s dining room in Wooster, Ohio typing on a little MacBook.
I am thankful for so many things in my life including my job. In December of 2021 I was an Oracle database developer but I was forced out of that department due to a timing error. (I had expressed an interest in another department, my APL moved my name to that team and when they said they had no room I could not be moved back to my old team because there was no room – they had combined two teams together.)
I had no team and I thought I was going to lose my job but a new team was forming and they took me in. In order to develop their software I needed to simultaneously learn JavaScript, React.js, Next.js, CSS, and MUI all at the same time. I was learning new things every day. My APL said that all training needed to happen during company time so I was trying to work on classes around an hour a day but I was really struggling. Then around June my team said that training should be on our own time – pretend you are attending night school to keep your job. So I was taking classes every weekend, holiday, and vacation. Every night I was working late trying to make progress on my work assignments. It seemed that for every single software module I created I needed to Google to learn what in the world I was doing, trying to muddle through using trial and error.
Then in August they said it just was not working out and I was going be terminated at the end of August if I didn’t find a new team. I had been there for nearly 16 years so I contacted former co-workers and asked for help. Soon there were two departments fighting over me. I have a reputation for being a hard worker who always does a great job….but that is based on my past performance in production support, not as a developer struggling to learn new technology.
After Thanksgiving my APL is going to contact my new department to see how I am working out. Right now I am still on probation, they don’t know if they want to keep me on. This entire experience has been a real nightmare but right now I am very thankful that I am still employed. 😀 😀 😀