Big Announcement #1: I’m Transitioning

Yes, you read that right. Surprised?  So was I.

Lest you think I’m talking about transitioning from JibberJobber… well, no. I’m definitely not.

Many of you know that for the past four years I’ve been working with Pluralsight to develop their soft skills and professional development content.  That has been a fun ride. I planned on giving them another three years, but as any JibberJobber user knows, things change.

I have created thirty one awesome courses (well, at least 30 of them are awesome :p) that have been watched by many of Pluralsight’s customers.  In 2015 I worked on fourteen courses… no one does that.  It was insane.  I figured doing fourteen courses would entitle you to a therapist and a masseuse… alas, I got neither 🙂

What I did get over the last four years was an amazing education. I learned from Aaron Skonnard what a startup CEO looks like, talks, and how he/she thinks.  I learned about culture in a different way than I had every been exposed.  I learned that the heart of a company is the sales team.  Er, perhaps it is the environment and culture.  Or, perhaps it is the strategy, vision, and execution.  Oh wait, it might just be hiring amazing people and enabling them to do stuff. Or, actually, they kept telling us that we (the content producers) were the heart or key of the company’s success.  What success?  Massive revenue growth.  Unicorn status.

So, I’m transitioning FROM doing Pluralsight videos.  What am I transitioning TO?  That will be the Big Announcement #2, hopefully the week of the 19th.

What I learned is that no matter what your plans are, if you aren’t in 100% control, then things will change.  I learned this almost 11 years ago… when I got laid off (Friday the 13th, January of 2006).

It was then that I decided that I would have multiple revenue streams. I didn’t want want one employer to be able to yank 100% of my personal income.  JibberJobber was started as a project in the hopes that I would eventually make $100 a month… which would be that mental safety blanket when I landed my next job.  Fortunately, I wasn’t good at landing my next job.

Anyway, if I have any regrets about the past four years with Pluralsight, it is that I neglected JibberJobber.  Sure, I worked on it. Sure, my team kept working on it.  But looking back on it now, I think there are many product manager things that I should have been doing that I simply didn’t do.

That is being corrected.

So, hang tight… I have a Big Announcement #2 coming in about a week.  It’s something we’ve been working on for a while now, and we’re really, really excited to finally roll out the first phase of it.

Any guesses?

Oh yeah, one final thought. I really think Pluralsight is awesome, and I’ll continue to do whatever I can to help them grow. I’m not leaving on bad terms, it’s just a change in their needs. If they come back with some more work, I’d be happy to look at it. So, yeah, that’s where we stand 🙂