Are You Willing to Buy Hardware?

I was rummaging through the storage in my home office and happened to find a Belkin keyboard in a box.  Scrawled across the box was my last name, “Bye”, marking it as personal property.  While in and of itself the keyboard is of little interest, the story of how it came into my possession is a good reminder.

When I first started at Move Networks I’d brought my own laptop, as I always do.  It wasn’t the latest and greatest.  In fact, within a few weeks of arriving, my keyboard started going south one Thursday.  Although new to the Move crew, I knew enough to know that I only had one option to keep going that day… I had to head to the nearest office supply / electronics store and buy myself a keyboard.  Without a second thought I hopped in the car, headed out and returned with this homely looking Belkin base model.  I plugged it in and kept coding away.  Within a day or two I had Dell support out to replace the motherboard and the keyboard.

I had other options.  I could’ve taken off for the day and cried.  I could’ve tried to deal with IT folks that had plenty of other things to do.  When you’re excited about the work, you’re willing to do what it takes to keep going. If someone has to remind you to have a sense of urgency, it’s time to move on.