Thought I'd stop by and say hi! :)

Hey all,

I know I haven’t been active on the boards in a while, so I thought I’d poke my head in and say hi, see whats going on, and give a quick update on whats going on in my world.

Life has been chaotic since I last checked in after the Super Bowl. I had been heads down since then on a big project at work up until mid-July when I was blindsided with news I thought I’d never get.

After nearly 15 years of being a great contributor and performer @ Microsoft, I was part of the 18,000 employees Microsoft laid off. Truly came as a shock to myself, my managers, my director, anyone I worked with. I joined Microsoft almost directly after high school, so it really had been my entire professional career. Fortunately for me, I’ve been very responsible with my finances and the severance package from Microsoft was quite lucrative. Not to mention, they kept us on payroll through 9/15 which allowed me to collect my annual bonus and vesting stock for this FY, plus medical benefits are good until 3/15/15. Like, I said, not terrible for me.

I decided to take my 2 month “paid vacation” and enjoy the summer with my wife and daughter. Spent a lot of time relaxing, going on vacations to Kona and several other smaller trips, hiking, camping, etc. Just really trying to focus on some quality family time, time with friends, and decompressing from the whole situation.

While on our long vacation in Kona, I received a job offer that I couldn’t refuse so I’ll be joining the rat race again after 10 weeks of screwing off and becoming a contributing member of society once again. :rofl:

On Monday (9/29), I’ll be joining Amazon as a QA Manager on the Digital Apps team for Fire Phone, Kindle Fire, and Fire TV. I’m pretty excited for “What’s Next” in my career.

So now you guys can’t blame me for anything Microsoft related anymore (You hear that Ken? ). Instead, you can yell at me for Amazon related stuff.

Hope to be more active on TUG again.

-Nico

Good luck to you in your new endeavors!!!

Pat

I am also in the tech industry and have survived through many rounds of layoffs over the years. The one thing I learned is that for almost everyone, the layoff was a blessing in disguise. People generally end up with a better job for them. I'm glad to see it worked out well for you also!

Kurt

Good job bouncing back!

Shame on you for neglecting us so long!

Can we ask you about drones in our neighborhood, looking in our bathroom windows?

Can you supply me with a "KILL the DRONE" app for my smart phone?

Welcome back, Nico

Been wondering if you survived the layoff and how you were. Our DS is still there, and running the 'New' MSN and Bing Mobile teams. Glad you are still in town and being productive. Have you joined the mob there commuting by Tesla?

Jim

Sorry to hear your news but so happy to hear the latest development. I've been with large companies and small. Sometimes I've left on my own, sometimes I've been downsized. No matter what, each next job had positives and I learned a lot from each job.

Good luck in your new company.

GL with amazon!

we all expect discounted prime memberships now =)

Good to see that you bounced back so quickly. Congrats on the new opportunity.

I'll be sure to give you feedback on the kindle apps going forward.

Congratulations on your new opportunity. Also glad you got to spend that "down time" with your family. The value of that can't be calculated!

Great to hear that you landed a job quickly and you were able to take advantage of the down-time to travel with family. Nowadays, layoff is just part of life here in the tech industry. DH works for a well know tech company in Silicon Valley and there has been mass layoff announcement every year for the past 3-5 years. He was laid off once, went to work for a different company, then got called back with full re-installment of benefit and seniority plus a salary raise. Did not make sense...We are preparing ourselves for retirement at this point and he is hoping to get laid-off or an early retirement package in the next year or two.

Hi Nico,

Welcome back and congrats on your new job opportunity. Will you be working at Amazon's downtown Seattle Campus?

Glad you had a chance for some quality family time too.

Best regards,

Richard

Congratulations.

Have missed your posts.


All the best !




-

I'm so happy you were able to land at another great company. My hubby was downsized in 2009 from Ford and he still has not been able to secure a direct hire opportunity. He has had multiple contract opportunities but they all only last months and then he back to looking again. I think when you are 58 most companies don't want to hire you. I'm fortunate in that I'm at a stable company making a good salary. However the one thing I learned is I'm only loyal to me and if a better opportunity presents itself I'm there.

So ironic to see this post from you here on the Lounge, as I saw an older post from you the other day and was wondering what happened to you.

Also in high-tech, I've survived a layoff, got re-hired to the same company, and got an early retirement offer not too long ago that I couldn't refuse (but of course I'm 'just a bit' older than you). Hard as it is to believe at the time, layoffs are often blessings in disguise and in no way reflect on your past contributions to the company.

Taking the time with your family when you had the chance was a good move. And now you've landed back on your feet with another new adventure. Congrats!

Very strange timing because I was just thinking of you this weekend. I was in Seattle this weekend and was wondering what hapenned to you and whether you were caught up in that big layoff. Glad to hear you just had to move a little bit south!

BTW, I went to the game this Sunday with my wife! It's my one game to go to per year.

Congrats, Nico! Sounds like a good move for you. Isn't it nice to have options?

Dave

When one door closes another one opens. Good luck for your new professional job!

Wait! Don't leave yet!! I need to find out how we can finally download mine craft!!!

Good luck with Amazon -

As the owner of MULTIPLE Kindle Fires, I know who to blame now if things go wrong

I use Amazon appstore almost exclusively - even on my smartphone, where I COULD use google playstore.
Seriously - never had anything wrong in my experiences with Amazon yet (so don't screw it up!!)

Good luck on the job change! It'll be very interesting to hear your perspective on the Amazon products - looking forward to it.

Good luck in your new job; some times a job change is great. Next time do not stay away so long.

Congratulations on the job change! And the fact that you got to enjoy a bit of time off :whoopie:

... and now that you no longer work for MSFT, tell us what you really think about them !!! :rofl:

Glad you were able to bounce back into the working world so quickly. Congrats on the new job.

Suzanne