Growing and thriving plants get repotted.
While watering a plant (that needs repotting) in my office today, I thought about how we as employees can get limited by our environments. Sometimes change is necessary.
Many years back I was told that I was being transitioned out of the company I was at. While that hurt so much and triggered unmeasurable anxiety, it resulted in our family moving to the Bay Area where we had incredible success, both personally and professionally. Then later we relocated back to Utah for another tremendous job change.
It is interesting that there is an inverse correlation to (overall) employee tenure and innovative results. Companies with the highest employee retention, such as ConocoPhillips (10.6 years), Union Pacific (9.3 years), and Wells Fargo (6.6 years) are not known for their cutting-edge innovations, whereas Apple (1.7 years), Amazon (1.8 years), and Nvidia (3.2 years) have a lot of change going on.
So whether you are feeling the itch to leave your tech company after a few years of service, or you were forced to leave before your desired timing, please try your best to view the opportunity as a positive one where you can grow both your roots and branches. And the benefits are often from the environment itself — even with a “lateral” move when it comes to salary or title, finding a place where you can learn new things and be happy is the most valuable part of any new opportunity. And it helps when you join a great company with fantastic business growth. (Canopy is hiring ;) )