I think proper balance is definitely important Susan, but I’ve found that the startups and SMEs I’ve worked with have far too little inertia to really get a lot of work done during office hours – pretty much all the cool stuff they do is stuff developers do at home and bring in, and that’s just, well, stupid, from a business model perspective. Larger companies may, it’s true, have too much inertia – but it’s easier to create a skunkworks and reduce inertia than it is to convince a manager that it’s a bad idea to flit about from job to job depending on the volume of the phone call from the client!

Firstly, I’m glad you have found a job that fits what you are looking for and setting criteria in advance sounds very wise.

I don’t think that working on a shorter-term, temporary basis is quite so terrible as you imagine. I agree there is less security but there can also be a lot of freedom. And surely the main things that are good for one’s personal life are a proper balance and happiness with one’s job?

I won’t be able to erase the image Mike Rowe has created for me for quite some time 🙂

My 2c

Susan