Shift+Delete Software Engineer

Its been quite sometime since I last blogged. It was a long transition period for me, with my brother's marraige and then the much awaited resignation drama from my last software company. In fact, when many of my friends were resigning and moving out of the company, I used to think how I have to go about this job. I have had long "teetee-hours" thinking of how to present my resignation to my project manager/HR without spoiling anything, if and when that time comes.

And the time did come. It was May 23, 2006. And with all the build-up, its natural to expect a gem of a presentation, so much so that my project manager would have personally taken care to see me off till the main gate. Nope. It was a major screw-up. Infact, you can use this as a good sample for "how NOT to give a resignation speech".

On the D-day, I come to office a little early (by around 9 itself). A swarm of butterflies were making a visit to my stomach. I still couldnt figure out why they came at that time. Poor guys, so many of them, so little space (hey, seriously, the crowd was big). In fact, they were not going to fire me, I am quitting. It really takes a skill to make a mountain of a mole and I was having a high percentage of success right at that time. I dont know if others go through a similar routine, but since this technically was my first proper resignation, it was kind of eerie to go through that process. (the other resignation needs another blog).

I didnt want to give it as the first news of the day to my project manager, and so, waited it out till 1030 AM. And did it seem like a long time. I've heard people say that, when waiting for your lover, every minute will seem like 1 hour. Now, in this case, I was waiting for 1030 to come. So...????????

At exactly O-1-3-0 hours, I took my notepad, my visa which had come (now, here I need to tell that some people before told that they were going to some other job when actually they entered some of the competitor companies. So, I took my visa as proof of my honesty and validity ). It went something like this;


Me : Dear San (named changed on purpose - ha.. how i wanted to use this phrase), I ... well... because of some personal reasons, and.. you know.. health reasons.. I .. I ... have decided to .. move out of SCM.

San : I expected this for quite sometime now. I could see this from your performance in the last few months. (to be honest, in my 4 years of work, to my personal observation, I was actually performing better in terms of delivery schedule only during the last few months. man, now I am getting the creeps on the definition of "On-time" delivery).

Me : I otherwise have no problem in the working environment or the company.

San : I cannot accept the "health reason" as a reason for you for quitting.

Me : I am not making things up here, and I have the visa to show that I am really going to the gulf.

San : You should have told about this earlier (like how, San, I may or may not go to the gulf in about a month or two or whatever time the visa comes, so, I may or may not resign from the company, so please plan accordingly. That would sound like the weather report, isnt it. I still am trying to understand what prompted him to ask THAT question to me. )

Me : Since the visa validity is only till end june, I need to go before that. Please relieve me by that time.

San : Let me see. Send a mail to me and HR.

Me : Thanks San.

Let me be honest here. I had to edit the above dialogue so much so that the whole conversation is twisted to the extent of the appearance of a better conversation. When I came out of the cubicle, I started breathing better. It was like thriller movie to me.

Then, things went from one to another and it was the last day of my life as a software engineer. So many tatas, so many "keep in touch" words, mails; although I was and am not that good/effective in keeping in touch with my collegues at SCM. It all was sentimental. I must say this company was more like my second home where I was so comfortable working, what with a whole cubicle to myself and 8 computers (including two Mac systems) to work with, you cudnt ask for a better work life. But, life had planned something else for me. I take this opportunity to thank all my friends and collegues for being there for me at all times. It was wonderful working with you people.

I am copy-pasting my byebye mail I sent to all my collegues.


I wanted to write a totally different "Bye bye" mail to you all, but the moment I started thinking (oops.. not thinking... its just... ..mmmm.. a.a.a...... ahem..). well anyway, when I started doing that, my eyes darkened, my heart pulse rate started increasing, the adrenalin started rushing, my brain started sending all the alarm signals.... and it ended just like what I am writing now.

I wanted to write about all the good times I had in SCM, about all the wonderful people I met and worked with here, about all those "thrilling" TTP sessions, those "heart rendering" driver releases and the immediate "congratulatory" bugs, which luckily ended up on the better side of me.. (or is it the only side SCM has??? mmm...), but didnt know how to put it down properly. Then there were the weekly meetings, the monthly salary deposit mails, those quarterly bonus payments, the yearly appraisals, those project reviews, the CFO/CEO/COO announcement sessions, the daily pantry sessions, the war against food poisoning (yup... its food court food alright ), those traffic diversions, the friends' meet.... etc...etc... so much to be happy about, not that much talent to put it in words.

So, then I decided to apologize for any or all of the actions that had hurt anyone during my life in SCM. But then, people in SCM are "choooo chuweeet" they would have forgiven me that very moment. I dint want to hurt anybody's feeling by sending an apology mail. So, I trashed that mail also.

OK,

What do I write now?

mmmm.......

Here's a try:

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Dear All,

Today is my last day with SCM professionally. I am moving to the middle east to take up business with bin laden, dawood ibrahim, ... well u name it, i have it (he he cudnt resist the nag). On a funnier note, I am taking up business as my career. I want to thank you all for helping, guiding and supporting me to throughout my life in SCM. My apologies if I had hurt
anyone by my actions or words.

Thank you very much.

I shall be mailing you from ajosephantony at yahoo.co.in or gmail.com,

Now that needs your mail IDs... so, please do drop them in.

Thanks and Regards,
Joseph Antony, A
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How was it? Good? OK? However it was, thats me ;-)

To all my friends (aka collegues)

Thanks a lot for everything.

Wishing you the best in life.

Joseph Antony A.