When It's Time to Move On

I am starting a new adventure. For the last two years I have been learning manufacturing HR from the school of hard knocks at a Lumber Mill in Dillard Oregon. The experiences and development I have recieved from the many great people I have worked with are too many to count. The reasoning for my leaving is relatively simple:

1. I have an inherent love for the HR functional area and wish to specialize in this area (Currently I cover safety and environmental compliance which for development purposes has been good, however is becoming more and more of a distraction to where I want to be).

2. I looked at my goals for the upcoming year and realized that I wasn't invested in any of them (Namely all safety and environmental goals and no HR goals)

3. The culture of my organization is based on "putting in your time". This permeates everything from compensation and benefits to how you are treated on a personal level. I have worked hard over the last couple of years to become an expert on this organizations HR processes and feel that those skills really are not valued because of my short tenure.

4. About a year ago I started getting a sneaky suspicion that I could get paid more to do less work. Now, if you are a 12 hour a day guy you can't just become an 8 hour guy, but my wife and I have made the decision that she would stay home with our two small children and focus on my career. If I am going to be missing that much time with my family there is a compensation number that needs to be reached for me to be comfortable.

Having said all that I really do like my current organization. If I was the type of guy who wanted to wait around for my shot and "put my time in" this would certainly be the place to do it. Good people both in the managerial and hourly ranks. However, I also chose this company because I felt that I could make an immediate impact that would better my organization. Lately, due to economic conditions and managerial changes I have felt less and less like I have the ability to impact my organization for the good. I probably could have kept the plates spinning for another couple of years, but in the end, I want to be fully engaged in what I am doing. I am proud of the achievements and projects that I have worked on here, but it is time to move on.

A note to people in the same boat, you would be amazed what opportunities are out there at this time. I was in the fortunate position of being pursued by three different organizations. I believe the key to this is that I truly love my chosen profession of HR. Good people always have choices. I chose to move on.

I also hope to be restarting blogging regularly. stay tuned.