It's been eight months since Michael Lin left his job at Netflix
Everyone around Michael Lin thought he was crazy when he quit his well-paying job at Netflix. His parents didn't take it well, believing he was “throwing away their hard work of immigrating to the US” and his colleagues told him it was a bad idea to quit without another job lined up. They were worried about him.
Mr Lin used to make $4,50,000 a year and had unlimited paid time off at Netflix, which he joined in 2017 after leaving his job at Amazon. In his own words, working at Netflix was “the Big Tech dream”. But eight months later, he feels he made the right career choice.
“I was happy to get a promotion and return home to the Bay Area,” he told Business Insider. “At the time, I thought I would stay with Netflix forever.”
Initially, he said he learned new things every day but the “shine began to wear off” after two years. “The engineering work began to feel like copy and paste.”
When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, Mr Lin began to see that the perks his job offered disappeared. The office shut down and there was no one to socialise. The only thing left was the work, which he didn't enjoy anymore.
He gradually lost motivation to work and it negatively affected his performance. Unfortunately, his boss became aware of the situation. Mr Lin, soon, found himself in a heated exchange with his manager during his performance review in April 2021. He tried to change his role within the organisation but that too didn't work.
He thought about his future for two weeks after the performance review and decided to have a conversation with his manager. During the one-on-one meeting, Mr Lin suggested that the company consider a severance package with him. In a final meeting, Netflix decided to pre-emptively terminate his service with the company, and he got his severance package.
After leaving Netflix, he was concerned that he would have no social life because his life had previously centred around work. However, the exact opposite happened.
Mr Lin said that starting his own firm allowed him to meet more people, including other entrepreneurs, writers, and innovators. Now, he has a firm belief that everything will work out eventually.
It's been eight months since he left his job at Netflix, and made the decision to work for himself full-time. Though he is just getting started and has no reliable sources of income, Mr Lin said that he would trust the process and believed that if he did work that energised him, good things will happen.