TL;DR: overwhelmed, sleepless, and overstressed at my new job and it’s slowly destroying me. Are there any alternatives?
Throwaway just in case. This is another mid-life crisis type of post, although working at an eikaiwa is not on the cards. I think it’s mostly the stress and lack of sleep talking, but I’m feeling really terrible at my current company.
So, I joined this fintech startup (not one of the well-known ones) as a high-level product manager. I speak both English and Japanese fluently.
The industry is new to me, but they immediately assigned me to the most complex project they’ve had since their inception (probably more complex than their inception), in a domain that’s new even for them. It’s almost like building a complex new company from scratch in an area I know nothing about except that the Minimum Viable Product requirements are insanely high and constantly changing. And the timelines are aggressive as hell (by an order of magnitude). Note that I hadn’t heard of that project at all during the interviews.
I’ve hit the ground running (I haven’t even been there 3 months!), poured my all into understanding the whole thing, the industry, the technical details, writing their longest and most detailed (but still not as detailed as necessary, and constantly changing) spec document ever, interacting with the internal teams and partner companies, but I find myself regularly overwhelmed and dazed. I barely get any sleep because my brain won’t stop thinking about the damn project, I’m getting stress-related body aches that have brought me to chiropractors and 整形外科, and overall I’m feeling like I’ve been given an impossible task. Some days I feel like it’s awesome that I’m working on such a project, and feel invigorated. But most of the time I crash back down. It’s quite the roller coaster.
I feel stuck, because in terms of career, leaving a job quickly is a huge Red Flag, but at the same time, I feel like this is somewhat destroying me. And because I’m so new and in a senior position it’s difficult to ask to be reassigned. I’m close to just calling the whole thing quits and taking a 6 months sabbatical while trying to start a business or whatever.
I do have a small YouTube channel that generates around USD 1,000-1,300 per month, so I wouldn’t be completely without income. But I have a wife who’s currently studying law at Todai (so is expensive) and pay monthly child support for my son from a previous marriage (whom I haven’t been able to see in three years despite court agreement, repeated requests, etc. because this is Japan). Hopefully my wife will pass the bar exam this year.
Any advice?
6 comments
The thing I realised with time is that lower pay jobs do not necessarily mean lower stress. If anything, the amount of bullshit to endure decreases as you go up the pay grade. Low pay jobs are often paid low because many people can do them. And if there’s more people there’s more competition. Besides, low paid jobs often have incompetent managers which increases the grade of nonsense.
In short, take few days off, think it through and maybe find a different job with same or higher pay. Or leave japan, because, you know, burnout is endemic here.
I’d say don’t aim for lower pay, aim for a bigger corporate. Startups are all like that. That’s the reality of tech startups and you have to be ok with it. But if you go to Rakuten or other big companies that hire a lot of foreign product managers, you’ll be chillin’. These guys get paid pretending to work 9 to 5 all day long.
I don’t think stress has anything to do with pay. In my experience, as my salary went up, my stress went down, to the point where I feel bad about how little work I do for how much I get paid these days. You are stressed because you’re at a startup.
Join a big profitable multinational corporation and everybody is really chill because there’s plenty of money and you just need to avoid gigantic fuckups.
Without getting into your details, most jobs that will help you grow and stretch you tend to start out like this. I tell people all the time you will hit rock bottom at 3 months, when you feel like nothing is making sense. Then it gets better and in 6 months you will get your head above water and all the learning you have done in 6 months will finally start to connect and things will start to make sense.
Probably not what you want to here but don’t stress, new role in a new industry means you have a lot of learning to do and startups move fast which means you always feel behind.
Oh and find out how you de stress. It’s usually physical activities which helps most people balance the stress in your life. Surfing, skiing, running, biking what ever let’s you forget about your job and get the natural stress relief hormones going in your body. (Sorry I am not a wellness guru)
I’m working at one of the bigger tech companies here, echoing what others have said, lower pay doesn’t mean lower stress, quite the contrary per my limited experience.
Also, the bigger ones tend to have deeper pockets, and less pressure to ship, which leads to less stress on the employees.
Don’t be afraid of leaving after 3 months if you think the job is not for you. Your health is more important. Sure some hiring managers may raise eyebrows, but who gives a shit, if you’re half decent, you will find a new one.
Happy to be a sounding board; been doing a fintech startup for the past 6 years and it takes a toll. Def recc staying a year minimum to not bounce too quickly. PM me if you want to discuss more.