why we built whereabouts the way we did
No man or woman would say I “go quietly.” That fact, I am absolutely certain, is one we can rely on with the utmost of truthfulness. And since I’m writing this post, I will agree that these nebulous and undefined folks are correct. I do not go quietly into that good night. I go loudly, strongly, with the conviction (and the pattern recognition) of a neurodivergent woman who can sense injustice from several mountainous miles away. I will go kicking and screaming until I am blue in the face and you’re reaching into your backpack for ear protection. I am proud of this. I am proud of who I am. And while I take pride in who I am, it can also be exhausting to live your life in an environment where you are being told to go quietly, and you, simply, truthfully, painfully, cannot.
That’s where whereabouts comes in. It turns out that you can create your own environment.
When I began thinking about founding whereabouts, I thought chiefly of myself. No, I don’t mean that I was the only colleague who mattered in the equation. I mean that I had decades of work experience from which I could distill several core thoughts.
I was not interested in creating an environment that was anything less than aggressively accommodating.
The amount of times I have had to pull over to write a strongly worded email asking for an offer commensurate with my experience while I am driving to Asheville on vacation is too high. 1 is too many. 2 is just something else entirely.
I didn’t want to work 60 hours. I didn’t want to work 40 hours. I didn’t even want to work 20 or 10 to be honest, but we all make sacrifices so our cats can have the taller cat tower and the nicer water fountain. And last but not least,
I didn’t want any of my colleagues to think, for even a single second, that they could not come to me with their earnest thoughts, concerns, ideas, and impressions. I wanted them to know that respectful discourse and constructive criticism were the expectation and not the exception.
And really, that’s about it. I took my core distillations and I determined how I could reflect what constituted my essential values into my actual organizational components, from pay, to culture, to benefits, to process. My colleagues, current and future, will be accommodated; they will know what they will be paid and when they will be paid it; they will work a 32-hour work week; and they will be able to come to me in earnest discourse. You know, if they want to. And for that, I am also proud.
