Me.Next()

I’m back at the job after a long break (including a month vacationing in Australia – trip report coming). I spent a chunk of time after the Xbox One ship figuring out what the next step in my software career was going to be.

In the days up to the Xbox One launch, I hinted on twitter that after One was out the door, I was on to something else. At the time, I had no idea what I’d be doing – while development and improvement on Xbox One will continue for years, there will never be another opportunity to ship the initial One hardware and operating systems. I still have a ton of passion for the consumer space, and I fell in love with the Xbox as a living room entertainment device over the past two years, but I knew I was ready to do something new.

I’ve been at Microsoft for nineteen years now (yes, I’m old), and despite that, I try to keep an eye of what’s going on in the industry and consider non-MS opportunities if they’re the right choice at the right time. The career advice I give frequently (and follow adamantly) is to follow the Three P’s – the Person, the People, and the Product. This means that you should work for a person you respect and will enjoy working with; with people (a team) that works the way you like; and on a product (or technology) you are passionate about. Surprisingly, I found these in a company outside of Microsoft – along with all of the goodies that would make the move a good one for my family…but in the end, the relocation wasn’t the best move for me now, so I ended up passing (and hopefully didn’t burn bridges in the process).

In the end, I followed my Three P’s advice and chose to work follow my Xbox manager to a new team, working with people I know and enjoy working with, and on a really cool (and unannounced) technology. I’m really happy with the choice I made and I’m excited to get back in the groove with a new team and new project.

Oh – and Happy New Year.