My Google. July 3, 2006 - Dec 30, 2011.

{I can safely say now that I saw this coming on the back of my previous post. Something changed on Oct 6, 2011 for me.}

I finally put down my papers at an organisation I was living and breathing for over 5 years. It felt strange for a bit. It was a snap decision early November when something I had passionately chased for a while, didn't come my way. To see my Mgmt failing to back me in a fierce battle for spots on a sought after annual course, finally made me realize that if I wasn't in the right place sitting and eating with the right people ... even Google wasn't going to be fair to my aspirations.

It was time to move on. To go out there and see if all the struggle for learning and experience was worth it. To leave the comfort zone that Google and the city of Hyderabad had become. Well ... discomfort to be true to myself.

What next? There was much I could build upon, plan for, pass time constructively via. Home and Bangalore beckoned.

I'll save the emotions for another post. My farewell email then :

Hi,

I am writing this email to you because at some point in my time at Google I've shared a meaningful/memorable conversation/moment with you. As I approach my last day in official capacity here, December 30, 2011, I wanted to drop a note of gratitude.

I leave because I felt the time was finally right to apply my incubation-like experience here to less conventional and more needy environments outside. Surely Google and all of you will have many better times to come, yet I'll look back at these 5.5 years with immense satisfaction and take just enough inspiration from them to keep myself chugging along.

This was my first job and I've seen enough within and outside to know that from a pure intellectual and social development opportunity perspective, this environment is arguably unmatched across the globe. I say *opportunity* because it still needs a fair amount of chasing at the individual level to feel the true Google spirit and learning. Hope you all get a feel of that spirit during your time here and continue to grow personally and professionally in life ahead.

Thanks for being a part of my growth! For the rest of my life I will say with pride and a smile - "Yes! I worked at Google."

I head home to Bangalore for now. Please stay in touch over phone (will update my new # on facebook and g+ soon), email (rahul.libra@gmail.com), in person, on facebook / g+ or via LinkedIn.

Warmest regards,

r.