Story of “Plan B”

I have a friend whose favorite past-time is to talk about “Plan B”s. We used to work together and every time we went for a walk after lunch, he would talk about what he would do if he were not doing the current job. Sometimes it was about “writing a book”, other times it was about “designing new tools”. Recently he actually changed his job. And guess what he is doing in the new job? Pretty much the same thing he was doing in the old job.

I am not a great believer in “Plan B”s. May be because I am not very good at creating them. The last time I went for a job interview was more than 10 years ago when I was returning back from the US. I stuck with one company I joined till the time I felt that I am completely satisfied with “employee” phase of life and the phase is now over. The feeling was similar to feeling in 10th standard that school was a fun place but we need to move on to the next phase. At that time (2 years ago) I started my new career as an independent consultant.

During the initial days of consulting career people used to ask me what I am going to consult on. I am sure whatever I used to say wasn’t convincing. Because immediately the next remark would be: You can always go back to a job if this doesn’t work out. Isn’t it? Frankly, that is not how I looked at the situation. You don’t say that if you don’t like a college, you will go back to school, do you? The idea is to enjoy college while being there.

Perhaps you have a much better experience with Plan Bs. In that case it will be good to exchange our notes some day.