Why my job search is pushing me to an edge.
I know, job searches are always roller-coaster, no matter if you are seeking for a job out of need, from a state of unemployment, or because you want to develop further. My situation is special, though. Not especially tricky, or complicated. More the other way round. You could call it a first world problem, if you tend to be cynic. Read on.
I’ve recently been released from work. I live in Germany and work for an IT company. A great combination, for many reasons.
First, as an employee in Germany working on a non-temporary employment contract, you are widely protected from being laid off. Your employer can’t just decide to let you go. They need a reason. And “reason” is quite narrowly defined. If you steal, or do other unethical things, yes, you may get fired instantly. If business doesn’t require you anymore, no, that’s not a good reason, if the company is as big as mine, and when they have open positions in other areas. In Germany, you could sue your employer for laying you off in such situations. You could even sue them, if they don’t offer you things to work on. As an employer, you have a right to work, even if your employer pays you your full compensation. That’s the way it is by law. Sounds strange? Yes, it does.
Second, there are not too many people with the same set of skills. And I really loved my job, I passionately did what I did for a living. Then my department strategically decided to discontinue the field of business I where in. And I don’t have a job anymore. I will not start to whim or fingerpoint on my company’s decision and the consequences this will have for business. It’s their free decision. And it puts me in the luxurious position of being employed, released from work, fully paid, and free to seek a new role, inside and outside the company. Which I do. And that’s the moment when things get complicated.
I’m in DevRel, which stands for Developer Relations. It’s marketing, but on a technical level. When you market your product it’s not only about sales. You want to increase usage, perception and preferability, even for unpaid product derivates or services, increase the number of early adopters of new versions, beta services and make rookies have an easy start, stuff like that. In a sophisticated specificity, we even create ecosystems of ambassadors for products. We influence influencers to make our product more widely known and used. Sounds strange? Yes, it does.
Back to the topic of my job search. You may imagine that this is not a job role that’s common in every mid-sized company. Not in a few, it’s an enterprise thing. And while many enterprise-sized companies do have technical evangelists nowadays, although they may not call them evangelists, only a few have a team of technical people whose only business is to evangelize, and this team needs audience evangelists or evangelism managers to do the non-technical stuff. Not talk on conferences. Not demo every little piece of your platform. But work with and relate to developer communities. Or academics. Or start-ups. Like I did. I’ve been a technical person, a coder, once. Though I wouldn’t have called myself an engineer. And that was quite some time ago. So — it seems I can’t just continue to do what I did. As there are only a few companies hiring those people and I’m not willing to move away from the place I live for family reasons.
I now try to listen to that inner voice that could tell me what else I could do for a living. It says I should probably stay in IT, or Tech at least. My knowledge on the audience is capital. And the Tech Industry is just the most important industry of the century. Whatever comes next, as a trend, a paradigm, a revolution, it will be based on Tech. And they pay well, too. There’s still skills shortage everywhere. Some very good reasons to stay here, my inner voice says.
But the Tech Industry has some serious problems, too. There’s a gigantic gender gap, but that’s only one of the downsides. Privileged white men dominate the whole industry and there’s little awareness for the need of a social mindset, equality and solidarity. There’s a reason why you recently hear numerous complaints on and by marginalized groups and the problems that arise when you ignore a significant part of human population. This is going to backfire soon. If we don’t start to change things now. Imagine how the next revolution leaves behind 75% of the earth’s population, how big is the chance that you and me are part of that 75%? Easy maths.
And that was also part of my business, or at least my job, and how I defined it. Back then when I had a job. My colleagues often called me Diversity Representative, Mr. D&I (for Diversity & Inclusion) or Inclusion Commissioner. And I enjoyed having that image. I was serious on that. And I could move things forward. The company is currently evaluating among other inclusive measures to install a tactile guiding system for visually impaired people in the Munich office. Despite there’s no blind employee. Yet.
We have to start somewhere.
I started somewhere. And now I should stop? The jobs for people willing to take care of diversity & inclusion are even more scarce. Should I really need to leave that behind, take any a role, where I may be able some years in the future, to restart on the approach to promote D&I? Or should I switch away from Tech Industry, hope that the problem will fix itself over time, and spend my time with something more fulfilling, maybe in the social sector? (I’d also need to cut down on my own life standard, as the wages are pretty low there.)
My current approach is to look for a company with a strong D&I profile (like Lyft, BTW — Hey Lyft, if you read this, you still have a job application from me in your inbox. Three, to be exact.). And do something -anything- for them where they can profit from my skills and knowledge. And make them more aware and actionable on the potential harm that exclusion and uniformity has on Tech Industry. And our community.
Only time will tell. Let me know if you think that decisions like that are important to humankind. Or companies. Or products.
