Jonathan Field - Maker of Random Stuff

(written en route from Boston to Atlanta)

In the past few weeks, I left behind an excellent job, sold off the vast majority of my possessions, and flew immediately away. I am technically homeless and unemployed now, sitting on a plane from Boston to Atlanta, my last stop before leaving the country for two months. I am just now getting a moment to consider what I’m doing and adjust. It will take a while to adjust. I think writing it down will help.

First: the job…

Despite any weariness I’ve felt over the past six and a half years, Zappos has been great for me. I accomplished more than I expected and learned so much. I worked hard and it was a success. Sure, there were criticisms, and I can find many things in looking back that I wish I’d done differently. But I am very confident stating that I did an admirable job. I worked as hard and smart as I could, I did what I believed to be best for the company and my team, and I held on to my convictions. I made a lot of good friends and had a lot of fun, too. It really has been a wonderful six and a half years.

I realize these days that a lot of what I do is motivated by the desire to remove all self-doubt. Perhaps it’s a little immature: even if I believe that I am a certain way, I seek out scenarios where I can prove it to myself. The ultimate goal being, I think, that other people’s innacurate perceptions of me are less worrisome or hurtful. Because I know I was tested. This usually works out well, though it can be trying. But that’s the point, right?

For example: I have never actually believed I was the type of person to give up when the going got tough. But I have left enough tasks incomplete over the years that I started to doubt myself. The perfect test arose for me two years ago when I was asked to lead the warehouse automation team at Zappos. What followed were the most difficult months of my professional life, and if there were ever a time I would have given up under pressure, it would have been then. So I promised myself I’d see that project through. And I did. Of course it was a team effort with Lisa, Keith, Craig, Charlotte, and many others, but I did my piece and I’m proud of it. And I know now that I can see even the most difficult and overwhelming projects through if I want to.

If I want to.

So why leave Zappos now? Obviously it’s not “done”, whatever that would mean. Sure, we just did over half a billion in sales last year, but it really is just the beginning. Why not stick around and “see it through”?

I guess it just came down to seeing my departure as the best thing for the company, and for myself.

For the company, there was its desire to grow in size and scope beyond what I preferred. My personal preferences of staying small and focused (which I won’t try to justify) came increasingly in conflict with the direction of the company, and it just didn’t seem fruitful. This isn’t a criticism of Zappos; the world needs big companies to do big things. I just don’t have an interest in it personally.

For myself, there was the realization that no matter how much success I achieved in this career, I wasn’t going to feel real personal satisfaction. I can’t explain why, but all this time later I get more joy out of the existence of Vendetta than I do over the existence of the warehouse, or any of the other numerous successful projects I’ve worked on at Zappos. The warehouse is bigger and more important than Vendetta in every measure. It has and will effect more people in a more profound way. Both were team efforts where I played only a small role. But even though I honestly enjoyed the process, I don’t have any desire to build another warehouse.

I should clarify also that this has nothing to do with the people… I have much love for the people I worked with. I hope I am lucky enough to work with them on other things someday. Or at least hang out and laugh about the good times.

So it came to me last fall my new fear about myself: the one that would motivate my actions now. The one was going to have to put to the test to eradicate. I was worried that I had become too comfortable with the pattern of my life.

Now don’t get me wrong, I am actually a big fan of comfort — my ultimate goal is to reach ulitmate comfort. Perhaps in a bath of Calgon bubbles some twenty years hence. But what worried me last fall was that I might be accepting a version of comfort that I wasn’t totally pleased with, but which was just good enough to keep me from trying something new and possibly better. I worried that my salary, and the predictable unpredictability of Zappos, had been distracting me from a truer calling. What that truer calling is I don’t fully know yet, but I would be quite disappointed in myself if I stopped looking now.

I think I envy people who aren’t guided by melodramatic ideas like a “true calling”. But that doesn’t dissuade me from feeling it.

I think that’s all I need to say about the job itself.

I tried uploading this post from the Atlanta airport before I hopped on the first international leg of the journey, to Dakar, Senegal. Didn’t get a chance, though, and now I’m flying over the Atlantic. And that describes the pace of things for the past several weeks. No time for anything other than motion. I have so many thoughts that I want to wrap up and express before they start fading in the energy of new experiences.