Reflection

The Rearview Mirror

On leaving a team, and the feelings that come with it.

June 2026

I have only left a handful of jobs and teams across my professional career. Every one has felt bittersweet - because of the people.

There was an underlying sadness I couldn't place at first. "I should feel excited, happy, but what is this?" It had been almost 6 years since I had sat with that feeling. And I had to remind myself: feelings are not absolute. Two opposing feelings can be true at once. You can feel excited and scared at the same time. You can feel happy and sad at the same time.

When I think about grief, at least for myself, I tend to attribute it to heavy loss, or big life events. But it's been a good reminder lately that grief can come in different forms; there is no upper or lower limit to how big or small it can be.

Work is a funny thing. It becomes something you grow used to, a sense of stability. The relationships you develop at work may not be the same as family, or close friends, or your partner, but they are genuine ones, built with the people you interact with daily. You come to know a picture of who they are, their lives, their hopes, goals and dreams, even if in a different light than a purely personal one.

One week, you are talking to these team members weekly, daily - and then one day, you are no longer talking to them, or nearly as much as you used to. It is a real loss.

As I say my final goodbyes to my team today, I want to take a moment to recognize all of my feelings, move through them, appreciate them, and allow all of it to simply be.

I consider it a blessing, to feel this way. To have had the privilege to build something - to have connected with other people at a human level, and to know that I will always carry those moments with me. The vividness of the memories may fade, but the feelings will stay. And the beautiful thing is, not every goodbye means forever. It may only be, "goodbye for now."

What's Playing Today

Now playing Liminal Space - LE SSERAFIM on Spotify →

Not so much a song. Conversation up till the midpoint, background music slowly moving toward the foreground, until the conversation fully fades and it's just the music. Somehow, it feels like saying goodbye.

The views and opinions expressed in this article are my own. They do not represent the positions, strategies, or opinions of any company I work for now or have worked for in the past.