Chan's Personal Blog

This is a follow-up article to "I Am Not A Mercenary Coder" because there is a new chapter to the story, and no, I have not joined a mercenary outfit. If you don't want to re-read it, let me give a brief overview again. A couple months ago, one of my friends joined a shady start-up in Silicon Valley and kept pestering to me to visit him for lunch. I finally went to visit him, but the lunch turned out to be a trap, and they were trying to recruit me to their organization, and I had to sit through a sales pitch by their CEO. After that incident, relations with my friend has been chilly at best since I decried their recruiting tactics.

Fast forward a couple months, and I come across my friend again at a dinner and movie event because the party organizer is a mutual friend. We go out for dinner first before the movie, and the friend is supposed to join us for the movie. We hold seats for him until the theater becomes packed, and we're forced to surrender the seat. Looks like the guy is a no show. The organizer is visibly annoyed because he's been blowing off events like this consistently. As we're driving away from the theater, we receive a text message from the friend saying he just got here, and wanted to do dessert.

Over dessert, I discover that this guy has jumped ship to yet another start-up in less than three months; however, this time, the start-up is even smaller, and the business plan is even more unsound. Throughout the rest of the night, he pokes around asking if I'm still happy with my current job, and whether I'm being properly compensated. Obviously the guy is on a fishing trip, trying to recruit me yet again. At this point, I start providing short conversation ending responses.

After that, I thought to myself how stupid it would be to follow this guy around. If I had joined his previous start-up, he would have jumped ship, and I would be stuck either at the start-up, or I'd be following him to yet another job. It was only a couple months ago when he was ranting and raving about his previous employer. It's also not ideal that he's now super busy and constantly canceling on friends at the last minute.

I hope I never become that man.