It may have been a short and bumpy ride but, equally, it’s been educational and emotional. Last Summer, I started working at Yahoo! Europe in the heart of London’s West End. After nearly a year, it saddens me to say it is time to turn the page and move on to the next exhilirating chapter that is my career. As of 5pm this evening, I shall no longer be a Yahoo.

When I took the plunge last June and handed in my notice at West Midlands Fire Service, I knew I was signing up for quite a large challenge, mentally and physically. Yahoo! hired only the finest web developers in the industry so expectations were high. Personally, I had long admired the work of many Yahoo’s such as Christian Heilmann, Tom Coates and Drew Mclellan so it was a great honour to join the team too.

On joining the company, I was thrown in the deep end on a new community-driven website (that I’m still under an NDA on so can’t really elaborate). I was glad to see Yahoo! was mainly a PHP house so I felt comfortable getting my hands dirty on the code, as well as conversing with colleagues over Best Practises for certain aspects of the development process. It was a refreshing change to see active discussions in the team and department as a whole - it all felt right. Christian pushed the idea of Lightning Talks, giving members of the team a five minute outlet opportunity to showcase their recent studies, Norm was busy compiling “Norm’s Laws” (better described as Best Practises in the coding world) while everyone enjoyed the relaxed atmosphere of working in (arguably) the coolest company in the World. From a professional point of view, I was in heaven!

So what changed? Commuting to and from London daily was never going to be easy. Everyone said that. But, in all honesty, it didn’t bother me. Apart from the ridiculous maintenance works on the East Coast Mainline, it only took an hour and half from door to door and with 50 minutes or so on the train to relax or work. The biggest problem was the cost. With the hike in prices at the start of 2008, my monthly travel cost was in excess of £600 which simply exceeded my budget for travel. Among other reasons, I decided it was time to move on and find something local to home.

On browsing the Reed recruitment website, I found a few positions that interested me so sent off the recently refreshed resumé and got a fairly fast response from one company. The interview was pretty prompt and, within the day, they were offering me a package I couldn’t turn down. So, as of Tuesday 27th May, I shall be responsible for the migration and redevelopment of the online presence for high-end vehicle insurance company Premium Choice, a branch of KGM. The company are based in the recently refurbished Fort Dunlop building near the M6 of Birmingham so travelling will be cheaper and quicker and it also allows me to spend more time with the family (flexi time is certainly a benefit worth seeking too ).

While it is a shame to be leaving Yahoo! at such an interesting time (the products that are lined up for the next year or two look really exciting), as well as leaving behind a lot of great friends, I am really looking forward to starting the new job. There will be a lot more responsibility involved that shall cover a lot broader range of skills than was required at Yahoo! or WMFS but that hasn’t disheartened me. I am determined to deliver some high-end products to match the high-end market Premium Choices target and I already have some interesting ideas to develop with the company that have never really penetrated the insurance market up to now. Let’s just say “watch this space”…