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Priorities, side projects and switching companies

·3 mins

Following is what I am thinking today over a few Guinness pints:

  • Keep in mind what’s important to you:
    • When you interact with people on a daily basis (for e.g., at work or while browsing online communities), they will indirectly influence you. The key is to regularly remind yourself on your own priorities.
    • For me, one of the highest ones is to spend sufficient time with Vihaan. (I guess there is no upper limit on how much time is enough.)
    • The other probably is to find a better job. More on this next.
  • I should probably give up on the D2L book for now.
    • I’ve been thinking about restarting that book for a few weeks now. And while I haven’t been able to, the thought keeps nagging me all the time.
    • Maybe it is just too hard to learn something as complex as Deep Learning in parallel with a demanding job and first-time parenthood. (When I wrote that down, it seems abundantly obvious.)
    • The other probable issue why I am unable to maintain my flow is that everything I do, i.e. office work and this book, is related to technology. That’s monotonous.
    • While Deep Learning seems an interesting branch, the technologies and problems I deal with at work are as complex and interesting. I am sure these look magical to a vast number of people in the world.
    • I’ve been thinking for awhile to stop picking up long-term learning projects. When I picked up that D2L book, I told myself that this will be my last such project. However, why wait?
    • Because of all these reasons, I am thinking of setting aside the book until I have more time on my hands. For e.g., my next parental leave, notice period at Amazon or long travel.
  • It is high time I change companies.
    • At the minimum, I’d have spent eight years at Amazon by the time I leave. That’s a lot of time with one company.
    • I don’t foresee sufficient career growth in my current org in Amazon and I may be able to get higher compensation elsewhere. So, what’s keeping me here?
    • One reason I’ve given myself to not leave the company is that there a lot of smart folks in AWS. However, the truth is I don’t get to work with such folks on a personal level - the best I get is to listen to their discussions in ops meetings or tech talks - and smart folks will be present in other companies too.

I can think of the following next steps:

  • Start preparing for interviews:
    • Tech talks.
    • Relevant technical documentation. However, I won’t attempt anything large, just things that I could finish within one afternoon.
  • Is it (finally) time to learn Spanish on the side? Or scuba diving.