A year ago, I founded Ministry of Velocity to build the consulting company I wanted to work at. Overall, it’s been a good year. I’ve spent roughly half my time pairing with developers at client companies, leveling up their teams. The other half has been longer-term community stuff like conferences, writing, and open source.
In the course of the year, I discovered three interesting things:
First, I really like refactoring large codebases. I’ve gathered that for normal people, these projects are a punishment. But I love looking other people’s code. Usually I learn more about people from their code than the other way around.
Second, the half-and-half mix of project and community work is pretty amazing. It keeps my head in real-life-development-land, while giving me time to reflect and write and work on the community stuff I think is important. I am so, so grateful to be where I am.
Third, running a company is not for me. This was the hardest realization to come by, and the saddest. Right now I’m doing too many things; I would like to do fewer things, but be better at them. And there’s a lifestyle mismatch, too. What the Ministry really needs right now is more time on client work, and less time on community work. Given even just my current commitments, though, that’s not in the cards for me.
TL;DR
The Ministry and I are parting ways. Friday September 12th is my last day. It breaks my heart, but of course they’ll go on without me. Doc Ritezel, my co-founder, is a great developer and also human being, and I look forward to seeing the Ministry continue to grow and thrive without me.
Plans
Of course I have them. Come Monday September 15th, I’m delighted to be joining Chicago-based Devmynd Software as Chief Consultant. I’ve known the founders, Brad and JC, for a while now, and I’m excited by how much our philosophies and ways of working overlap. They’ve built a fantastic team that I’m really looking forward to working with.
Logistically speaking, I’m staying in San Francisco, doing consulting, teaching, and writing around here, pretty much like I have been. However, those of you in Chicago will be seeing more of me than you did before.
But not to worry – the Devmynd folks have already issued me the standard California advisories: that a hoodie does not constitute a “real” coat, and that sometimes I won’t want to wear sandals. Which, ha ha ha! Midwesterners are such jokers!
But just in case…maybe when I come out in November, I’ll bring two hoodies.
<3
Congratulations, and thanks for being so candid in explaining your reasoning and detailing your experiences.