Dear John 1

My decision time to accept a job as a project planner at an industrial company was nearly up. I was planning to write a "Dear John" letter as:

• The job was a more intense but narrower-focused job than my previous one
• Although it was on a bigger scale, I would be an even smaller cog in the machine, with less ability to influence schedules - only report on them
• The department was under-performing so my boss had to be pulled off another job to turn things around. I reckon that as soon as he saw how bad things were, he pleaded for more staff. So, I would have to turn-around a "problem child" and work with people who probably didn't like modern project management methods
• The money was poor and non-negotiable
  
• The job was far away from friends and family

I was preempted by my friendly HR contact at the company. He asked me if I was going to take the job. I said I was not. There was a long silence that was terminated by him saying he was going to tell the admin people. I then said that as we had this conversation, there was no need for me to write a letter. He said I should write one to "close the loop". I agreed. However, it won't be at the top of my To Do list.

So, that's one bird flown, the Japanese one will be taking-off soon as I'm pinning my hopes on the financial planner 2nd interview in June.