Hi everyone - I've always found WSO to be an extremely valuable resource, and I am in the middle of probably the most challenging dilemmas of my career. I could really use some advice on where to go from here.
I'll try to keep this as short as I can. So at the end of 2019, I was speaking with a developer that is based in a different market than the one that I live in now, but ultimately is based in the part of the country that my wife and I would want to live in long-term. At the time I was not really looking for another opportunity, but a headhunter had reached out about the opportunity and I had always heard good thing about the developer through the grapevine so figured it was worth spec'ing some time, if only to build a bridge for a few years down the road. Long story short, the conversations went extremely well, and after a few discussions the opportunity morphed from being a senior level acquisitions opportunity into me being cut into the company and taking over all acquisitions/development opportunities from him after a few years. In essence, so long as I could produce, after I few years I'd have the opportunity to essentially become the company's CIO. So, market the wife and I would like to move to eventually, great company, really interesting product type, and what appeared to be an awesome opportunity...everything seemed to check out. We started talking comp/role specifics in Feb 2020 and everything was going well. I was going to have to convince the wife to move a few years earlier than we may have planned to, but she was starting to come around.
Covid hit in March and the communication started to break down. Once a week phone calls turned into texts that turned into setting up phone calls that the developer would not answer and then text back a few days earlier with an apology, only to do the same thing a week or two later. I got extremely sick of it and essentially wrote him off.
Fast forward to earlier this year and I'm having a really difficult time dealing with burnout at my job. I realized it's not what I want to do anymore, we've had a few people leave that created more work for those who remained, and management started to get really stingy with comp. I was talking with my wife who knows about everything that went on last year and she advises to just reach back out to the developer I was speaking with in 2020. What could it hurt? I set up a call with him and it ends up being a two-hour conversation that goes really well. Very similar to the meetings we had last year, he apologized for how the communications went but that at the start of Covid was really difficult figuring out how things were going to go but that 2020 ended up being one of his best years yet, and that most importantly he wants to start up conversations again about me joining his company.
That was two-ish months ago. Since then, he's texted me a few times with questions or ideas, but he's fallen back into the same communication patterns that were getting to be so frustrating in 2020 (ie, taking 4-5 days to respond to emails, making plans for in-person meetings only to cancel, and most frustratingly, he blew off a call last week that he set up and that I had moved several meetings to make work).
I have never had this frustrating of an experience with someone in my career. Every time we manage to actually talk, it goes extremely well, but getting any sort of consistent communication with him has been really challenging. I halted all other job interviews to focus on this (to be fair, I wasn't really interviewing for something else I was super interested in), and it's what I really want to do. Again, I've gotten really good feedback from people about him and his company - this doesn't appear to be the case of a scumbag developer. And I've tried to be really delicate about not reaching out too often, but it shouldn't take two months to have a phone call.
My wife and I got some unexpected news last week that is going to move up our timeline of needing to figure out the next few years of lives. Unfortunately, whether or not I take this role is the bottleneck and it's really stressing me out.
So WSO, what do you think I should do? Is this guy blowing smoke up my ass, or is there something else I'm not thinking about? Where should I go from here?
The communication with everything moving very positively and then silence, repeatedly, seems more like a mildly dysfunctional dating relationships than a future business partnership. I suggest getting some unequivocal closure and then moving on to finding the next right opportunity. You will feel relieved to have this behind you and if you bump into this developer later in your career he may have some begrudging respect. If you are hesitant than write down a few unemotional bullets, schedule a 10 minute call, and convey that it's likely he isn't ready to bring you on - is he? In other words break things off. Don't count on him trying to talk you out of this, it probably won't happen or if it does he is trying to keep you "warm" until he has more confidence in his business to bring someone on. If there really is a good reason for his waffling, and I can't image what this would be, make him prove it with a contract and deadline.
All good points - really appreciate your thoughts...needed to hear it from someone else, but that's how I was viewing it as well.
The only thing I could think of while reading your story was if this is how he is treating you now during the 'courting phase' - how is he going to treat you when you actually work for/with him. Assuming you'll find the same style of communication, if this is what you like, go for it, but it doesn't sound like this style of communication works for you. With that in mind, I would cut off the talks and politely let you know it doesn't seem like the right opportunity.
That's been my biggest concern about moving forward under any circumstance, although that fear is partly mitigated by the fact that I've heard good things from the people who work with him. That being said, if this is how he communicates with his employees and partners that's not someone I'd want to work for. My guess is this is tied to something 114421dsp said - basically him not sure if he can bring someone on - and isn't necessarily his communication style. Regardless though, we are all adults and if things/timing changes, just be upfront about that.
Did you end up getting an offer, how did it go?
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