Hi,
You're being inflicted with this because you've written me in response to my layoff info, or asked me about it, or for no good reason at all...
Some of you have seen part of this. Most questions (except one) are answered herein.
I was laid off by HP in July, on my 26th hire date anniversary. In my case, the severance package is excellent, so this isn't a financial hardship. (Quite the contrary.)
My new job is with Network Appliance (www.netapp.com, NTAP), located at a light-rail stop in Sunnyvale. I start there September 9th. The job is basically the enjoyable parts of what I was doing at HP recently. Netapp has about 2000 employees and had some $800 million in sales its last fiscal year.
I'm thanking God because he dropped what looks like the perfect job into my lap after a month of not really trying very hard. This puzzles me because there are many people who have tried a lot harder for a lot longer and still not found anything even close to what they'd like to do.
GORY DETAILS follow.
Busy people will not miss anything important, but for the curious...
I started looking, and sent my resume to many web-sites. The only thing I got for my trouble was a phone interview, which I flunked. Actually, there was an immediate opening at a wireless startup, but I wanted the severance package -- which is given only to those laid off. If I'd quit before that, I'd lose tens of thousands of dollars.
I also talked with a former manager, now at Xilinx. He'd love to hire me, but I have the wrong skillset and things are tight there.
Nothing to do but wait for my notice. I really wanted that severance package!
A former manager, now at Cisco, wrote back, saying "WHAT??" and saying "we'd love to talk to you if you're interested." That was encouraging, but as Cisco is now in a hiring freeze, nothing ultimately came of that.
I also emailed Shyam, a former colleague, who I had run into at a trade show in February. He had co-founded a startup and was apparently eager to sell me on joining. We made a date - August 6th - for me to meet the team.
Meanwhile, I took the "accelerated career transition" class offered by the HP-provided outplacement service, July 22-23. There I got some help on my resume, in preparing for interviews, etc. I also heard there would be a job fair Thursday July 25.
Well, I dropped my resume at the Brocade booth, and basically nothing happened.
For Netapp, I wrote a cover letter, saying that if a position opened up that could use my skills, I'd love to be considered. The letter also said I've long admired their products, that I tried to build an HP product to compete with them, that I read their whitepapers, and corresponded with one of their engineers about a Netapp test program. Oh, and that I worked for (their CEO) when he was at HP.
The Netapp recruiter started to read the letter. When she saw the part about "anything in this area" she consoled me, "That's pretty much what you have to do these days." But when she got to the CEO's name, she got pretty excited. "Do you think he remembers you?" she asked, adding, "I haven't met him myself." I wasn't sure if he would, but she urged me to call him.
We had a great time in Yosemite, and there was email from Netapp waiting for me when we got back. I set up a time to talk with them on the phone -- Wednesday at 3.
This job sounded fun and challenging. The business case sounds compelling to me, and the post-dot-bomb era VCs seem to think so too. I met with most of the people in the company, including their interim CEO, and the message I got was to please take my time and decide whether I want to work there.
It was certainly flattering to be invited to work with these very accomplished folks, and it's fun to think about doing something like that, but I'm just not clear God is calling me there. And I'd have to give up a lot. The other day at church, I heard about an opportunity for older couples to mentor younger couples. Now how could any high-tech product be more important than helping young couples with their marriages, volunteering in the community, and all those other things I wouldn't be able to do?
I eventually told them no, but maybe when they get to a less stressful mode of operation, and if I get laid off or something, I'd be interested in talking with them again.
He called within ten minutes, apologizing for being late. "It's been one of those days," he said.
"Has it?" I asked, sympathetically. I could tell right away we were going to get along, so when he replied, I said, "That's why they pay you the big bucks!"
Anyway, it was worth waiting for - one of the best possible phone interviews I could've imagined. My interlocutor was humorous and bright and forthright. He joked about the stock price, what he does for a living, and so on. Then he asked me what in a job would "turn me on" - what my ideal job would look like.
Since I still don't know how to answer this question, I just told him the truth - I talked about writing code, about helping others grow, maximizing my contribution to the organization. I also mentioned a surprising result of an exercise from What Color Is Your Parachute? - viz., that communication is very important to me.
In turn, he told me that they were looking for someone to be a sort of mentor/lead - someone with strong technical skills ("Uh-huh," I said) who could also do a lot of communication with the more junior engineers.
Now that position was certainly not on Netapp's list at the job fair! In effect, he'd just told me, "We're looking for someone to do exactly what you want to do." This sounded great to me, but what I said (in mock consternation) was, "Whoa, you want strong technical and communication skills??"
He didn't miss a beat: "You see why I'm still recruiting." He went on, "So does that make you want to run screaming from the room? Since you didn't just hang up right away I guess that's a good sign..."
I told him it was great, so long as I got to write code now and then. This, as it turns out, will not be a problem.
He then asked me about something on my resume, the part about hacking a filesystem. I mentioned a whitepaper on their website, describing how they did what I needed. It was really cool, and I was going to use their technique. But then I realized they put enough there to show how smart they were, but not nearly enough for me to "steal" their ideas. He confirmed it: "That was the idea."
"It really pissed me off," I said. That got a laugh. Then I told him what I finally did end up doing, and he seemed satisfied with that.
He asked me if I had any questions about NetApp, and I said I had a ton, but I'd save them for later. Then I paused and tried: "I hope there, uh, will be a 'later'" ...?
"Definitely," he said. Well, that was good.
Yahoo maps and the VTA website told me that the Netapp office was very close to a light-rail stop. That was a nice surprise - I'll be able to take public transit! It was my first time on the light rail system, and while I was fiddling with the ticket machine, the first train took off. They run every 15 minutes, though, so no problem; I still got there half an hour early.
I talked with five people. Each asked me what my ideal job would be like, or something like that. And everyone struck me as sharp and as someone I could enjoy working with.
I spoke with the project manager (PM), who said that the feedback so far had been positive, and he asked me about -gulp- my salary at hp! Gee, what was I supposed to do?? Well, I ended up just telling him the truth, and asking if I was in the range. He can pay me within 5% of my hp salary. This is good (I've heard of one 15% pay cut, HP->Netapp).
"IF," he said, "If we were to be interested, we might want you to start in August. Would there be any problem with that?" I tried to hide my excitement as I told him I wanted to be off 'til the kids got back to school. No problem, as it turns out. And I told him "I'm very interested" (in joining your team, in working here, something like that).
Anyway, the last guy I talked to said he had worked at HP before, as a contractor, in New Jersey. He had been with AT&T in USL, which was sold to Novell and to SCO... well, hp got it, then killed it off last year. Anyway, he said of all the companies he worked at, he liked Netapp the best. I must have said something he liked, because he told me, "You'd be a good fit here" and "We need someone like you."
Well, that sounded pretty good. The next night, Thursday, 8:15pm, the phone rang. "Grant, do you have some good news for me?"
Silence for a full second, then "Nnno, I don't." Oops! No answer from the financial people. This is different from "the answer is NO." He apologized for leading me on, but I reassured him that since he'd told me the contingencies, that he shouldn't feel bad about raising my expectations too high. I told him that although I wanted to work there, I also wanted what was good for the company. "In my view, what's good for the company is to hire Collin Park," he said. Well, that felt good!
And since he put it that way, I wondered if the CEO could help. "Grant, I wonder how much you know about how my resume got to your group?" I tried.
"We talked to the CTO, and he forwarded us the message you sent to Dan," he replied. "I don't know what kind of relationship you have with Dan, but I have absolutely no issue if you want to try contacting him again." So I did that. I also prayed.
The next morning, Friday August 16, the offer was approved. The CEO contact didn't have anything to do with it, as it turns out.
I signed the offer letter Monday August 19, one month after my last day in the office at HP.
In a small way, I wonder the same thing. I ask this out loud sometimes, even though I know there's no answer this side of the grave.
Well, that's the story, with a lot more detail than you probably wanted to know. Thanks for your endurance!
-collin