http://whijo.net/taxonomy/term/110/feed The taxonomy view with a depth of 0. en http://whijo.net/blog/brad/2007/10/10/moving.html <p>Yesterday I posted off my signed letter of acceptance for a job offer from <a href="http://openvoice.co.za/">Open Voice</a>. On October 1 I submitted my letter of resignation from Rhodes University. This means the Whijos are moving to the bottom end of the Cape, to take up residence in South Africa's mountain capital, Cape Town.</p> <p>What prompted this? I was approached by Open Voice a few weeks ago, with an expressing of interest in me, this was due to a reference from <a href="http://vhata.net">Jonathan Hitchcock</a>. They were looking for someone to be their web guy, someone with strategy and skills (and handsome, if possible). I am that guy, and I think they stole the job description from my head, because it fits me like a whole human glove. They are also offering an improvement in my salary which fits me a lot better, and the opportunity of working in Cape Town (which I have been fantasising about for quite a long time), with trips to JHB (I don't hate Johannesburg, I just don't want to live there). I am not only a money whore, there are a few reasons why this makes sense as a move:</p> <ul> <li>Room for growth in the job (Academic structures are fixed, unmoving, and quite tall)</li> <li>A better fit to my skills and potential</li> <li>Very little bureaucracy to deal with</li> <li>Cape Town has cool things like geekdinners, podcamps, campcamps, pylug, clug, mugs, vegetables and assorted goods.</li> <li>Cape Town improves property purchasing options because there is more of it</li> <li>It could be a spring board into some work overseas</li> </ul> <p>So, what about the leaving Rhodes part of the equation? I am unhappy to leave Rhodes:</p> <ul> <li>We were starting to get settled in in Grahamstown, so this move is means yet another tipsy turvy 6-8 months in a time in my life when I would like to live somewhere for more than 1 year, and have a vegetable garden, friends, and more</li> <li>There are some cool projects hanging around in the NML which I would like to work on, and improve (like Cue, grocotts online, etc.)</li> <li>Grahamstown is a small town, and living 3 minutes from my house is going to be hard to match</li> <li>Friends</li> <li>Ratatouille humble pies from BP</li> </ul> <p>I am happy to leave Rhodes because:</p> <ul> <li>Rhodes and higher education are in a quagmire (a few, actually) that means they cannot compete with industry rates for skilled people (industry is paying between 2 and 4 times RU)</li> <li>Rhodes and higher education institutions have an established and comfortable senior academic class which places a glass ceiling on growth, interest and integration on junior staff.</li> <li>Academic institutions have so much red tape and bureaucracy (partly because of the senior academics, partly because they are big institutions, and partly because they have limited budgets). This red tape makes me want to gouge my eyes out, and I back away faster than anything from problems that may brush up against policy, simply because my energy is better spent on other things.</li> <li>It is time to leave Grahamstown, since I have been here for a long time now</li> <li>Grahamstown is a small town, and some times you just can't buy the things you want, and things take longer, and its quaint and frustrating</li> <li>I don't have peers who speak the same language as me for a high portion of my skillset, so I miss speaking geek, and doing geek, with geeks</li> </ul> <p>There are lots of complexity things involved in this whole lot, but we decided the move was in a good direction, I am happy but fearful, Mandy is happy but fearful, and we are on a journey to a new and interesting part of our lives.</p> http://whijo.net/blog/brad/2007/10/10/moving.html#comments job lecturing openvoice rhodes university voip Wed, 10 Oct 2007 12:00:51 +0200 brad 406 at http://whijo.net