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Serious questions on career direction. I'm asking, so you have the right to beat me up, use this against me, etc. WARNING: this is going to be a whiny baby post.

I'm seriously considering whether I want to stay. A lot of things swirling around in my mind about it.

On the one hand, I haven't been here that long, and I told myself when I came that this should be at least a 5-year gig. But on the other hand, getting another degree is usually seen as a natural time to make career moves and people are more forgiving. It's a concern, but I'm not too worried about having to explain that part.

Job satisfaction and knowing I'm making an impact are really the issues for me. I can tolerate the fact that Arbitron is effectively a monopoly and, therefore, has a greater propensity to lose its competitive edge and become fat, dumb, and lazy. But some days I see real opportunity to accomplish minor miracles mostly because Arbitron is in a position to make changes with wide ramifications. The other positive is that job security doesn't get any better (but that has the drawback of having to work with a lot of people who have exploited that fact).

You know that I want to make a bigger impact than I currently am. I keep asking myself whether I really have career growth here (responsibility and authority), or whether the only way up is out. My gut tells me that I'm not on the fast-track, mostly because I've never sold radio before and that gains an element of suspicion from a lot of people. Nothing I can do about that; it is what it is. I perceive my strength to be living in that area between software development and the customer, helping get the right things built and deployed. Some days that pulls me farther to the development side, but I really don't think going further in that direction is an option for me at Arbitron (they do too many things wrong and I wouldn't be popular for pointing them out). Other days it puts me squarely in the job I think I have, but that lacks authority throughout the rest of the company. I know that's not uncommon many places and in many positions, and furthermore that the onus is on me educate them and, ideally, win people over to why I'm adding value so that they want me involved, but if the rest of the organization doesn't regard that in any way formally, it is hard to make stick. And frankly, I'm not sure that's getting better with Scott, despite early hopes that having "higher" representation in the company would make a difference.

I'm seriously considering whether I want to stay. A lot of things swirling around in my mind about it.

On the one hand, I haven't been here that long, and I told myself when I came that this should be at least a 5-year gig. But on the other hand, getting another degree is usually seen as a natural time to make career moves and people are more forgiving. It's a concern, but I'm not too worried about having to explain that part.

Job satisfaction and knowing I'm making an impact are really the issues for me. I can tolerate the fact that Arbitron is effectively a monopoly and, therefore, has a greater propensity to lose its competitive edge and become fat, dumb, and lazy. But some days I see real opportunity to accomplish minor miracles mostly because Arbitron is in a position to make changes with wide ramifications. The other positive is that job security doesn't get any better (but that has the drawback of having to work with a lot of people who have exploited that fact).

You know that I want to make a bigger impact than I currently am. I keep asking myself whether I really have career growth here (responsibility and authority), or whether the only way up is out. My gut tells me that I'm not on the fast-track, mostly because I've never sold radio before and that gains an element of suspicion from a lot of people. Nothing I can do about that; it is what it is. I perceive my strength to be living in that area between software development and the customer, helping get the right things built and deployed. Some days that pulls me farther to the development side, but I really don't think going further in that direction is an option for me at Arbitron (they do too many things wrong and I wouldn't be popular for pointing them out). Other days it puts me squarely in the job I think I have, but that lacks authority throughout the rest of the company. I know that's not uncommon many places and in many positions, and furthermore that the onus is on me educate them and, ideally, win people over to why I'm adding value so that they want me involved, but if the rest of the organization doesn't regard that in any way formally, it is hard to make stick. And frankly, I'm not sure that's getting better with management changes, despite early hopes that having "higher" representation in the company would make a difference.