Goodbye MNN, Hello China

I announced my resignation from MNN today sending a short to-the-point note to entire staff. I told key staff, including the E.D, of my resignation weeks, and in some cases months, before finally settling upon a date.

My last day at MNN will be June 1st.

There were a lot of factors leading to my decision to leave MNN. The primary reason is that Diana and I have decided to move to China. Yes that's right we are moving to China. The exact dates of departure and the arrival cities are still unknown but those are details we can fill in later.

The other factors are more short term superficial items that MNN can solve rather easily. Burn out played a major role in my decision. MNN is going through a lot of transitions and because of these transitions I found myself putting in more 15+ hour days than I care to remember. I have slept at the office on more than one occassions due to the sheer amount of work that needed to be done. Of course this doesn't take into account the out of work networking, conferences and personal time dedicated to cheerleading/advancing MNN in some aspect. In the 18 months I worked for the organization I was able to do a very large amount of work spread across many disciplines.

A quick list includes

• Redesigned/Implemented a new physical and IP network
• Installed configured
• LDAP services
• email services (including postfix, imapd, mailman, etc.)
• DHCP, DNS, WINS, AFP, Cifs services
• Internal and External firewalls (iptables)
• Webserver
• Tape backup system (including offsite storage and disaster recovery plans)
  
• Developed plan and found vendors to install IP Telephony system (reducing monthly costs)
• Wrote several hundred pages of documentation
• Reworked many vendor contracts and established support contracts
• Installed a 10mb IP fiber line w/o raising costs; providing significantly improved service to the organization
• Setup employee/producer discount Apple purchases
• Created a system that can easily handle p/t, interns and volunteers without compromising security or significantly increasing management support
• Redeveloped MNN.org and setup translation system.
  

Of course I didn't do all of these things solely on my own. I was responsible for hiring individuals to help me accomplish all of this. It is also those individuals and positions that are remaining at MNN to help sustain this in the future. In my opinion this was a large part of my position. I was not simply building something at MNN but I was developing a sustainable system for MNN.

I honestly feel as though I am leaving the organization in a significantly better position that when I took the position. If I were to stay another 3 to 5 years I could do even more, however, I have reached a point of where it is time for someone else to take the reigns. A new administrator can take over the network without having to build much and can take a much more relaxed sustaining role. This person can focus on providing better staff support and planning for the future.

Before moving to China and, most likely, while in China I am shifting my job role to Drupal development. There is a significant amount of work being done in Drupal that focuses on the non-profit sector; including software used by MNN. I think that I can add some value in this industry, helping to plan out and develop software that can be used by non-profits nation (world?) wide. While I could have done this work at MNN leaving MNN will allow me to better focus on the development.

I will miss working at MNN but I'm incredibly excited about moving to China.