Job

Back to the Mothership!

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My last blog post was from February 2024. That was over a year ago (at the time of this blog post, which you are currently reading). Far too long! And now I’m writing a new blog post titled “Back to the Mothership.” What does that mean?

I’m glad you asked.

What happened?

Towards the end of March, I lost my job. I was laid off. It was quite a surprise and also a bitter disappointment. Especially when there had been no prior warnings or any discussions with the boss or anything like that. And especially when the Outlook invitation was “Personnel / Goal Setting” (that sounds promising, right?). And when someone from HR is also in the meeting room, you can put two and two together.

But that’s in the past now. I’m over it. Done and forgotten (but not forgiven). I will miss the team I was privileged to lead there. Including me, half the team has resigned or was resigned within three weeks.

Wow, bummer, what now?

I have spent a lot of time with my family in the last two months since I was laid off, spending a lot of time with my son and my wife. And I’ve also been able to get a lot of things in and around the house in order. So I cleaned all the windows (finally, once again after a few years), repaired the robotic lawnmower and gave it a new garage, and did a lot of those little things that take time and that I’ve been putting off until now.

But I also took time to figure out what I really wanted professionally. I enjoyed some good discussions with my wife (she is an emergency doctor, so she knows urgent and special situations), and also with good friends about my situation. What are my strengths? What skills do I have? What is my expertise? Is computer science (well, I mean the big IT), especially the field of virtualization and technology, still my passion? And the answer to this last question is clearly “YES”.

And what’s that with the Mothership now?

Now I can let the cat out of the bag, since the contracts are signed. I’ll be starting a new position as a Senior System Engineer in the VCF stream at the company “soulTec” on June 2nd. I will work a lot with everything related to vSphere, datacenter, a lot of customer projects, both onsite and remote, and I will learn a lot! I’m so excited and anxious, I can’t wait to show up at the office for the first time on Monday.

Technology with passion!

Welcome and Goodbye – New Job!

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The last few weeks, and probably months, it was very quiet on my blog. I hadn’t much time to investigate, test, try, and write things down. I had a more important focus over the past few months. And I usually don’t bring up personal things on my blog. But beginning with the 1st of December 2023, I’ll explore new horizons. No, I’m not going on a world tour, or a long holiday voyage. I’m switching my job.

The past

I worked for nearly six years for a company in the high-tech area, started there as an ICT systems specialist, and made it up to ICT systems engineering through the years, with lots of learning, certification, and dedication. My last employer was a company in the high-tech area, with surface treatments, coatings, filaments, etc. The last few months I’ve spent with different projects, documentation work, teaching our internal service and support people, and also handing over things to my team properly. I’m feeling confident that everything is fine and my former coworkers can get over “the loss”. Now it’s time for me to explore new horizons.

The future

The company which hired me is located in the healthcare branch. During the past few months, this company grew to the largest rehabilitation provider in Switzerland: they operate more than 800 beds and employ around 2,100 people. I’ll be working in the IT team (who would have thought) and will take over the responsibility for their VMware Horizon VDI infrastructure. What a great new challenge!

It’s not easy to quit a job and start something new. Everyone who did that probably knows what I’m talking about. And the fact that my last employer and I had a good relationship didn’t make it any easier.

Thank you

The last nearly six years have been very interesting, instructive, and challenging. I’ve met so many great people with in-depth knowledge and a sense for the business. I have to thank my boss for the many years and the trust he gave me. Also many thanks to my team and coworkers for all the support I received when I needed it. You did a great job folks!