Daddy's Mini-Sabatical is almost over...

Job Change From:





To:





I've never considered myself a true Oracle employee even though my paycheck had Oracle stamped on it since January 2005. That was when Oracle completed it's hostile take-over of PeopleSoft. Hearing rumors that my manager's manager threaten one of his directs with termination when that individual applied to another department within Oracle....made me realize that my career at Oracle (formerly PeopleSoft) is a dead-end.

So I interviewed for Siemens Business Services (in Fremont) back in late August. It was a great interview. Subsequently I had two more interviews there. They assured me that they liked me. So I resigned from Oracle without a formal offer from Siemens a few weeks ago.

It gave me GREAT pleasure to resign. I wasn't the only one. Within Sept, two others have left. One went to Livermore Labs, the other to Robert Half International. And just this week, another one left. Back in April, my PeopleSoft manager left to become a teacher in San Ramon. In June 2 individuals in my team quit. By August the team morale was pretty bad... Oracle is doing very little to motivate ex-PeopleSoft employees to stick around.

The company itself is probably OK. I've met 2 classmates this quarter that works for Oracle. How ironic...I had to tell them the same story and they sympathized with me because they've heard similar stories from former PeopleSoft employees that have left their teams.

So, it was my differences with my immediate Oracle management that made my decision to leave quite easy. Despite the perks of being so close to my home (1.5 miles 1-way)...that no longer holds water.

PeopleSoft was a great company to work for. It valued its employees and treated them with respect & dignity. Oracle...well, it's a hit or miss. Some of the ex-PeopleSoft landed in nice patches, some landed in rocky situations.

Funny thing is...if all the good people are jumping ship...who's left? The people who are either 1) too comfortable and don't care about their positions, or 2) those who can't get another job elsewhere. Hm....what a way to run an organization...it's Dilbert's comic at it's best.

Siemens internal recruiter called me today (after I finished the paperwork yesterday) and I will be expecting an official written offer Monday. If I accept...my start date is likely to be Oct 30th.

That means no more naps with Thomas or feeding him breakfast at 10am and watching Elmo's World at 10:40am. That means no more walks to Barnes & Noble with Catherine and Thomas to browse the bookstore and ordering scones & coffee. That means no more staying up late (like now) and reading my textbooks. Sure we can do all that on weekends...but weekdays are so nice and uncrowded!!

However I am grateful that through out this transition, there's great peace about the decisions that were made. That's how Catherine and I know God's will is at work here. Events just seem to fit together nicely and in a very timely fashion! We're so blessed! The only issues were trying to get use to each other being around each other all the time but that passed after a few days.

Ok...enough commentary from dad for now. Will update when I start on the new job. Catherine might have less time to blog...since I'll be working and attend 2 evening classes. But the silver lining is that this is my last quarter at Cal State!