The Art of Working Remotely by Scott Dawson

Author:Scott Dawson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: remote work, working remotely, digital nomad, distributed work, telecommuting, work life balance
Publisher: Scott Dawson
Published: 2019-07-25T00:00:00+00:00

Breaking Up and Moving Out (2013)

I was no longer being promoted despite receiving excellent written evaluations. I was also unsatisfied with my position in middle management. I enjoyed managing people but I wasn’t producing anything on my own. I wasn’t designing. I wasn’t coding. I wasn’t getting any recognition for my work. I was tired. It was time to break up and move out. It wasn’t an easy decision. I’d been there 17 years but it was definitely time.

I didn’t know where to start looking. I hadn’t “looked for a job” since graduate school. I tapped my network. I was looking for a web design job where I could continue to work remotely. I was also looking for a salary commensurate with my experience. I had several interviews with headhunters who laughed at my salary requirements. They weren’t outlandish — but they were higher than the sweet spot of the industry’s salary bell curve. I kept at it, searching job listings and networking.

I met with local web design and development companies. I felt that a modest commute of 25 minutes wouldn’t be too bad. It might even be positive to be in an office environment again! One company wasn’t hiring but offered to send me freelance work. Another got cagey when they found out how long I’d been working at one company. I also had a video interview with a university, but that’s where that lead stopped. I think many companies were scared off by my tenure. They wanted younger college graduates they could more easily mold into their cultures.

I came very close to working for a startup in California. One of the founders was someone I met during my first days in the associate program. The job sounded perfect and they were willing to let me work remotely. We were sorting out salary vs. equity when I received terrible news. The board wasn't comfortable with a remote employee. They asked if I could work in San Jose. It was like a sucker punch to the gut. I knew this would be incompatible with my life. My kids were 9 and 12. The salary was not enough for my family to live on if we moved to the area. I’d miss so much of the next few years and spend a ton of time and money traveling back to see them. I passed on the opportunity.

My search came to a close with one of my former managers. He was a senior manager at a financial services company on Wall Street. The company was operated by two private equity firms. My former manager knew I had the chops to work remotely. He could guarantee remote work as a condition of the web design job. During an initial phone interview, the development manager introduced a potential hitch. The team was small and they couldn’t take on a full-time designer. They needed someone who could design part-time and also write code. Was I that person? I have subscribed to Lynda.com for a long time.

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