Why I Left My Well-Paying Reputable Corporate Job

This is an overdue update—I quit my corporate job 3 months ago.

My decision to leave came as a surprise to many. After all, my work was well-appreciated and valued. Someone asked me what I would miss most about leaving my job at one of the farewell parties. I said, the people and connections of course. But also I will surely miss the continuous waves of exciting new initiatives or challenges, sometimes nascent or vague, sometimes super messy, always at mega scale, and never only the technical dimension.

For years I was like a kid in a candy store, excited about the wide range of things of all shapes, sizes, and flavors in front of me. At some point however, I felt like I’d worked on all major patterns, solutions, strategies, and lessons learned, even for what might be yet to come at this job. So, while figuring out what was next for myself, I quietly doubled my efforts in coaching and enabling others at work to succeed on their own, and took time to introspect my life to-date, my values, passions, and limits.

I had chosen safe paths to pursue “success” (which boiled down to a good family and a good career). These paths were by no means easy but well-explored and well-proven—I was amongst the 90% of the working population taking these paths. Though it may not be as adventurous, I feel good about what I have accomplished. Even better, it was these steady years of cumulative growth that gave me the tools, resources, and courage to explore and live out the next phase of my life differently.

So, for the first time in over 30 years, I’m not working for someone else. I am now self-employed, partnering with my husband developing indie apps. If you use a Mac or iPad for productivity work, check out TimeStory! We’re also actively evolving our app portfolio with intentions.

My priorities, as I look at how I want to live out the second half of my life, are very different from the first half. Being self-employed gives me the maximum autonomy to explore and pursue what’s truly important to me at this stage of my life.

The last 3 months have been wonderfully rejuvenating. I’m loving the excitement of working independently, at the opposite end of working in or with large corporations. I’m loving the mixed déjà-vu and stark contrast moments as I tackle similar problems but in a completely different world. I’m loving that I’m having to deal with everything from the right backup/restore solution, product design and delivery, balancing between desirable release goals and limited capacity, to marketing and AI strategies, on a much smaller scale of course.

I’m also experimenting with a new lifestyle, taking advantage of the total freedom I have on my own schedule. I might work on a weekend when there’s a good momentum going, or take a weekday off to enjoy the good weather outdoors. I’m looking forward to my upcoming 2 months of travel in Asia, integrating sightseeing and “remote” work (as in away from home), plus traveling with my mom to see one of her bucket list destinations.

More to come as I take one step at a time in my new journey. I’m not sure how/what the next thing might unfold, but I will share from time to time what I’m up to and my learnings and reflections. In the meantime, I’m taking these words of advice from The Book of Charlie:

Take a chance.

Enjoy wonder.

Savor special moments.

Practice patience.

Observe miracles.

Make them happen.

Cry when you need to.

Make some mistakes.

Learn from them.

Spread joy.

I wish to express my sincere gratitude to all who have coached, mentored, supported, helped, cheered, sweated with me in my first half journey—you know who you are, I feel privileged and lucky to have crossed paths with you.