1

A year ago I worked in a company as "senior engineer" on a large public facing website. Not the job of my life, but at least in the line of what I like to do.

Then a large computer manufacturer offered me a better position to work on their large scale, public facing website. I accepted and resigned my previous job.

Since then due to some internal politics, my department was removed from those projects and became only responsible for an internal back-office software. Which is the thing I hate and I never wanted to do.

I complained at that time, and was told to wait since a new project of a large public facing site would come up. Two months ago I got confirmation that such a thing is not happening and I asked to be moved to the department that works in such projects. The answer has been negative. Saying that because my department is short of people they cannot authorize such a move.

The person blocking the move is my department manager and HR says they need his authorization.

What can I do?

I cannot get back to my previous job since my position is already covered. It is kind of difficult to find jobs about public facing websites with the technology that I usually work with and the fact that I am not doing that anymore is lessening my employability.

I live and work in Ireland, and of course my contract do not specify nothing beyond the job title. I have a PDF with the position I applied for, and I have the emails where that link was sent to me.

Improve this question
3
  • What exactly is your question? Right now this is coming off as more of a rant. Remember that Real Questions have Answers.
    – David K
    Commented Nov 16, 2015 at 19:55
  • 1
    Also, potential duplicates: How do I bring up being misled about my job role during the interview period?; Actual work is different than expected
    – David K
    Commented Nov 16, 2015 at 19:57
  • 2
    "because my department is short of people they cannot authorize such move". They'll be equally short on people if you leave for another company as another department. Probably better to express that in a more politic way, such as "If I'm working with web group, internal-app group will still be able to ask questions on an occasional basis concerning the work I did for them, while if I find my dream job outside the company, internal-app group loses my knowledge completely". And only if you're actually willing to leave if they react badly.
    – Ben Voigt
    Commented Nov 16, 2015 at 22:31

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
6

It is kind of difficult to find jobs about public facing websites with the technology that I usually work, and the fact that I am not doing that anymore is lessening my employability.

That's... quite a contradiction right there. It really sounds like you should not go back to the field of work that is not employable, and like you are, in fact, doing something more employable now.

To officially answer your question, risk looking for work "you love" or learn to like what you are doing now. Those are your options. It sounds pretty clear to me that you have a stronger career in your new field. No one giving you sound career advice is going to tell you to ignore that.

Improve this answer
0
4

What can I do?

There are a few things you can do right now. The first is to realize that, especially in software engineering, priorities change. Projects are routinely cancelled and new ones take a while to get started. This means you should either decide to expand your horizons by learning the things that are put in front of you or seek employment elsewhere.

It is kind of difficult to find jobs about public facing websites with the technology that I usually work with and the fact that I am not doing that anymore is lessening my employability.

This statement raises quite a few red flags. If it's already difficult to find jobs using the tech you want then you need to seriously consider changing direction. As a developer, limiting yourself to a specific platform is a career limiting move as platforms come and go all the time. Also, not using a given platform for even a year shouldn't put you at a disadvantage unless there's something wrong with the platform.

You should reflect on this because even if you do find a job working with the tools you want, if the job pool is decreasing then you are going to find yourself in an even worse position later.

Improve this answer
1
  • yep, there's really only the two options
    – Kilisi
    Commented Nov 17, 2015 at 2:50