After 11 weeks off, I was due back to the office on December 3rd. The thoughts of what I would do when I returned to the office ramped up in the weeks prior. Meet my directs one last time. Meet my manager and see if anything has changed. Take care of any managerial tasks. Give my official two weeks notice.
I slept well the night prior and people said I looked refreshed. I guess that’s what they would say to someone who had so much time off. The next night I could hardly sleep. The same for the rest of the week and by Friday I was back to my ragged work self of recent years as evidenced by this send-off photo.
I’m not sure what caused my lack of sleep for the week. Leaving Microsoft after 18 years and likely leaving a formal workplace after 35 years might be it. But, what was “it” exactly. I wasn’t feeling overly emotional. I wasn’t feeling overly wronged. But there were emotions under the surface, I’m sure. And I was wronged, I’m sure.
As far as my actual work, I have 3000 emails in the inbox. I thought there would be more. I read the ones from my directs and bosses and skimmed the subjects of the rest. I did the bi-annual feedback write-up we do, something called “connects”. I analyzed the employee survey for my team.
A funny thing happens when you are leaving a company. The people who know you are leaving tend to be more open. You learn their truths about the projects, the company, their peers, their career. It’s happened to me with every company I’ve left, and Microsoft was not an exception. It seems to me that these are the real conversations we should be having with each other. At least from time to time without the need for someone to be leaving.
People asked me if I had considered staying. And I had but it wasn’t practical. I’d want to dial back my hours and/or the commute and I’d need to get out of my current organization. I poked around a tiny, tiny bit and it didn’t seem likely. As I squeezed into the subway Friday after work, I decided I’d send my manager my official two week’s notice.
Then I decided to wait until Saturday morning. One hail mary check of email. Then sent.