It Was Never About the Trophies

On leaving a career, the people who shaped me, and what actually matters

Listen here.

I looked across the room and saw them gathered at the tables.

Engineers. Dozens of them. People I’d helped hire into our rotational program over the last decade. Some had been with the company for years now. Others were just getting started.

My friend Chuck threw a going-away party the night before my last day at a job I’d held for 21 years. The venue was a local brewery in our neighborhood, a place that already felt like home. I watched people walk through the door one after another, and it hit me. What a blessing it had been to be part of this.

I actually made a difference here.

Not in the way I used to chase. For most of my career, I measured impact by titles and promotions. Even back in engineering school, I got excited about awards and student leadership positions. I carried that into my career, always chasing the next accolade, the next rung on the ladder. I wanted the glass office. I wanted people to come to me because I was important.

The love of my life for 34 years, Susanna.

Of course, none of it filled the hole.

But standing in that room, looking at those faces, I realized what actually mattered. It was the relationships. It was the people.

I’m so proud of the Final Mile Engineering team

Somewhere along the way, I stopped chasing the ladder and started chasing purpose. And the best definition of purpose I’ve ever heard is simple: giving the best of what you have to serve others.

That’s what I saw in that room. Not a trophy case. Not a list of accomplishments. Just faces. People I’d invested in. People who had invested in me.

Karen and Mandy: two wonderful friends and difference makers

The week leading up to my last day was heavy.

People came up with notes and stories about moments I barely remembered. A conversation in the hallway. Feedback I’d given years ago that stuck with them. Small things. Daily things. The kind of things that don’t feel significant when you’re doing them. There were wonderful words. There were tears. There were hugs that lingered a little longer than usual.

Chuck, my brother from another mother

On my last day, I had planned to stay until mid-afternoon. But by noon, I couldn’t do it anymore. People kept stopping by my desk to say one more thing. The hugs. The questions. It became too much to hold.

I went home and let the weight of the last two decades settle in.

Here’s what I realized standing in that room at the party, and again sitting in the quiet of my house that afternoon:

I didn’t need any of it.

Not in the way I used to. There was a time when validation like that would have propped me up, made me feel like I was enough. Now I could receive it with gratitude without needing it to define me.

That felt like a gift.

Eric, my friend of 21 years, memorialized my last walkout

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So what’s next?

First, I’m going to rest. Really rest. I’ve never taken 2 weeks off in my entire career (please don’t follow my example).

I’ll share more about what I’m building in the weeks ahead.

But here’s what I want to leave you with.

Who have you impacted without realizing it?

You don’t have to wait for a going-away party to find out. The impact of your career won’t be measured in titles or trophies. It will be measured in faces. In the people you showed up for when it wasn’t convenient. In the hallway conversations you forgot you had. In the feedback you gave, you didn’t think twice about, but they never forgot.

That’s where purpose lives. In the ordinary days. In the seemingly small moments that had a lifelong impact.

Give the people around you the best of what you have until you take your final breath.

That’s what will make your life worth living.