Constant Change

Things change. Sometimes change is good. Sometimes, it's better not to change. And sometimes it's just hard to be sure what is best, and you have to stay the course.

After giving my resignation on Monday morning to pursue a career with a new company (I listed the reasons for that change here), my Human Resources Department, my District Manager, and my Divisional Vice President committed to some changes in my current situation in an effort to keep me from leaving. While they provided no financial incentive, money was never the reason for leaving.

They made the following commitments:

• to assign me to a store in Indianapolis within ninety days, which would cut my driving time in half;
• to give me first claim on the Bloomington, Indiana, store (should it come open), which is the closest location to my home;
• to develop with me a roadmap that will put me on track for advancement within my current company to a District Manager position.

These, in part, address two of the major reasons that I decided to leave the company in the first place. The only thing that they can't immediately address is the health benefits, which I believe the company will make some new major changes to in the next open enrollment next January.

My wife and I discussed the matter, and weighed the pros and cons of both staying and leaving carefully. I feel that there are just enough uncertainties with the new company that I was going to join to make it the less attractive of the two options, and agreed to stay on board with my current company. It obviously isn't a perfect situation, but I feel that things will be better going forward, and my future is probably a bit more secure with my current company than it would be starting over someplace else at this point.

Joe