I took this selfie in Miami at the All-In Summit 2022 – my first tech conference since Grad school.
I left a decade plus bank career in 2022 to join Pllenty – a fintech “startup” in it’s 7th year. Join me as I reflect on how the last year shaped me. I wrote about the five things I love most at Pllenty in my previous post. In this post I look at how I have changed as a person as a result of my career shift.
The work we do shapes who we become.
When I started my career in 2007, I interviewed at three different jobs:
- One was at a small marketing agency.
- One was at the Provincial Government.
- One was at BMO’s Technology group, where I was hired.
If the first two jobs worked out, I would have been a VERY different person today.
When I left my bank job in 2022, in addition to doing something different, I knew I wanted to also BECOME someone different.
My role at Pllenty is flexible enough to let me explore paths completely closed to me at the Bank. And within a year, I am already different from who I would have been if I spent this last year at the Bank!
I am now a person who knows a lot about the Canadian non-profit landscape
Last year this time I knew almost nothing about Canadian non-profits. I donated to several organizations and had cursory awareness of the United Ways and YMCAs of the world. That’s about it.
Over the last year I have learned an incredible amount about charities in Canada. I learned how they help build communities and the nearly insurmountable barriers they face everyday.
Canadian charities are especially underserved technologically. Not just compared to the for-profit sector but also compared to US-based charities.
As a result, I have a worthy mission to enable Canadian NFPs exceed their fundraising goals while helping Pllenty become their number one tech partner.
I am a now a person who knows how to collaboratively build usable software (with the dev team)
I spent a chunk of my career as a Business Analyst – so providing requirements and testing things were always in my wheelhouse. However, I had minimal control over what the final products looked like or how quickly they were delivered.
I don’t code – so I hesitate to take too much credit here.
Yet, over the past year, I learned how to work with a solid dev team to produce usable, elegant software – with real life utility – quickly and efficiently.
Building capabilities real people use every day is so satisfying, especially when working with a bad-ass team.
I am a now a person who is growing a network of social innovators, technologists and entrepreneurs
I love my banker buddies. Nothing will ever change that. And I respect the hell out of what they do and the value they bring to society.
When I first left the Bank (and 80,000 colleagues), I was shocked by how tough it was to meet new people. Pllenty has a small team (half of them are well under 30) and except for a few partners, for months I didn’t get to meet anyone new.
As a result, I started to host and attend networking events and conferences. It is still so tough to build a meaningful relationship based on one shared drink at a vendor holiday party. But slowly I am beginning to feel like part of a community.
And this new community of people are those making daily dents in the world by starting charitable organizations, building a startup or investing in cool companies.
In the up coming year, I plan to continue to grow my network and contribute to this community even more.
I am a now a person who has a business partner
Dan Lee, the CTO of Pllenty, is a friend of almost 20 years.
I’ve known him through his wild University days, the young entrepreneur days, I partied at his wedding and our sons are now close friends.
But over the last year, we developed a business partnership.
Just like how life is better with a fabulous life partner, work is better with a fabulous business partner!
We compliment each other’s blind spots. Have mutual respects for our skillsets. We are aligned in our vision of excellence. And we are learning when to apply pressure… but also when to back off.
For the first time in my career, I feel like I am going to “make it” (whatever making it means) and Dan is a big part of this.
I am a now a person who is not calculating vacation days and retirement plans
I remember 10 years ago writing my ideal retirement age down, then working backwards to see how often I would require a promotion to save enough money for retirement.
Even last year I was calculating how to strategically use vacation days to maximize 4-day work weeks.
All that calculating stopped when I joined Pllenty.
I still LOVE going on vacations but I no longer NEED to go on vacations.
I don’t have the need to calculate anything as I am focused on a very different process of learning, creating, and growing.
I enjoy my job Pllenty. I was perfectly fine with my Bank job also. But now I feel I am at the start of the right journey and I don’t care about the end.
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