I had a boss at a major insurance company years ago who was determined to prevent me from advancing my career.  She did everything she could to prevent me from leaving her team because the rest of the employees in the group were long-term folks who had eased into a cadence and their production was suspect, as was the quality of their work in medical underwriting.  I was the new guy on the team, and I was working rings around people, embracing the new technology these others were constantly complaining about.  It got to the point where I was tapped for a special project that moved me from medical underwriting to the IT department to work on a re-engineering project. 

 

While working on this special project, I had an opportunity to work with a lot of different people, and to learn a ton of new technology.  I was on loan to the IT group for the project and beyond as we implemented the plan our team had developed.  Unfortunately, what ended up happening is the company I worked for decided to outsource their entire systems division to IBM. So, I had to return to my old position, and when I did, she made it clear I was stuck with her.  Within a month, I'd turned my notice in and was out of there to go into consulting.  She couldn't believe it when I decided to quit, and neither could the director she reported to.  I made it clear why I was leaving, and the director did try to retain my services, but it didn't get me away from this manager I worked for.  I ended up leaving and doing consulting work for a year.

 

What's funny is that a year later I was approached by one of the people I was on the re-engineering team with.  She'd been promoted to a director over an IT department that was brought back in house, and she wanted to bring me in to manage the systems that supported my old division.  I ended up coming back making a lot more money, got my years bridged so I had all of my vacation and benefits based on the time I was there previously, and best of all, I was over the manager who had held me back previously.  Needless to say, she wasn't a happy camper when I showed up in a meeting and I was on the other side of the table from her telling her what she needed to do.  She never got over that, and truly despised me right up to the point when they laid her and that entirely useless group of underwriters off a year later. 

 

Karma.   Good stuff.

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