Ask HN: How to be happy in a corporate environment?
Hi HN,
I'm a fairly senior dev (10+ years) but I've never gotten the hang of working in a bigger company. I tend to be good at building and exploration in a way that is valuable at startups, but I go a little crazy in a corporate environment where there isn't seemingly a lot to do. The few times I've worked at a larger company I bailed pretty quickly because I felt anxious, despite my managers and team being sad to see me go.
I'm currently back in a BigCorp kind of role and feeling the same anxiety. There are lots of technical issues within the company but the primary blockers are politics and internal barriers. It feels like I could spend 80% of my time doing nothing and I would do fine on perf reviews, but that is stressful to me personally.
Has anyone successfully made the switch from builder/startup early employee to BigCorp cog? Advice?
I'm a fairly senior dev (10+ years) but I've never gotten the hang of working in a bigger company. I tend to be good at building and exploration in a way that is valuable at startups, but I go a little crazy in a corporate environment where there isn't seemingly a lot to do. The few times I've worked at a larger company I bailed pretty quickly because I felt anxious, despite my managers and team being sad to see me go.
I'm currently back in a BigCorp kind of role and feeling the same anxiety. There are lots of technical issues within the company but the primary blockers are politics and internal barriers. It feels like I could spend 80% of my time doing nothing and I would do fine on perf reviews, but that is stressful to me personally.
Has anyone successfully made the switch from builder/startup early employee to BigCorp cog? Advice?