Consulting v. FTE

After a 3.5 long years at z*, I left to take some time off. After 6 months, I was wooed back to work at a company that a friend was at.  I lasted seven months there, and quit this past May. For a multitude of reasons, the company wasn't a good fit, mostly because they billed themselves as a tech company, but they weren't.

Fast forward to today. I've recently been engaged as a consultant for a client who wants some software built. It's an interesting and new gig. I spend most of my time doing the actual work that I loved doing as Product Manager, but without any of the politics.  I got a little taste of what those politics were yesterday, when I met with the existing tech team, who are definitely miffed that I've been brought onboard to build something that they either can't see the need for, or don't know how to build.  It's refreshing to realize that I can totally play nicely with this level of politics.

Working from home on a regular basis is really interesting. I've had to get a lot more disciplined about taking breaks. The first two weeks were terrible. There's always something to clean, or something more interesting to do. 30m TV breaks turn into hours, and there goes my day. Although much ado has been made about the maker's schedule for engineers, interrupts for anyone working intently on something, engineer or not, are just as disruptive.

My cat is a whole other ball of wax. He sleeps for most of the day, but wakes up around 3p and demands attention. He is generally successful. He does this in five ways, usually in the same order: 1. Scratch ipad. 2. push ipad off desk 3. Sit on keyboard 4. Bite laptop screen 5. Climb on my shoulder. Wash, rinse, repeat.

There are definite drawbacks to consulting - I'd say that the constant BizDev mode really sucks, especially when you're as inherently anti-social as I am.  The solitude of the work sometimes sucks.  And I've been especially spoiled w/ 4+ years of working in places that cater lunch for you. When I have to cook lunch for myself, there's a high likelihood that I skip lunch, or push off mealtime way too long. Paying for my own health insurance sucks. No PTO *REALLY* sucks.

All in all, I think I'm happy with my current situation - and my clients are really, really great. They've been open to a variety of different employment options - including full-time employment w/ 90% work from home. It's an interesting, new dynamic, and I find that I'm learning a lot about this different style of work, and I can get back to actually envisioning product, rather than just pontificating about it.