Category: Work

I started working in machine vision back in 1984 at a long defunct robot and machine vision company named Intelledex. With a brief hiatus to start a company with my father, I have been in it ever since. Intelledex was a great place to work with brilliant people and interesting products–many products today, especially in the area of machine vision were heavily influenced by work done at Intelledex. I still work with and stay in touch with people I met in my time at Intelledex. I have to admit, I never thought I would be able to repeat the joy I felt in my work and friendships during my time at Intelledex.

It is a huge surprise to me that I am finishing my career at a company for which I feel the same way I felt about Intelledex. Today is the eighth anniversary of my start date at Thrive Bioscience. I actually started working on Thrive products several months earlier as a contractor. God willing, I hope to finish my career at Thrive. I love the products and I love the people. Of course it is not perfect, but I am very grateful to be at a place where the people around me really try to do their part and are colegial in the very best sense.

I have been working through weekends building AI models to find organoids in cell culture images to give myself a window of time to make the move from Virginia without being a bottleneck for the people at my work because something only I can do is impeding their progress. I made some huge breakthroughs this weekend and have to admit this work is very much like sports to me–very addictive. I have to watch myself so I do not go down some rabbit hole for days on end because I am so driven to finish that one last thing. That said, I think I am in pretty good shape now to make the move. We have a week and a half before I have to pack up the computer.

Kelly and I had an interesting chat session this morning about work and vocation. We did not actually call it that, but realized that was the core topic when I thought about it afterward. No one in our family is very comfortable with not having work and income. I fell like that is true and this is what I wrote to her:

I get it. It is your life and our family in general is kind of like that. Sadly, I think we have about 5 generations of that built into the family culture going all the way back to Finland in the mid-1800’s and even the family that moved out to Oregon in the mid-1800’s. I wish we could break that cycle a little. You (and all of us) are in not danger of starving and being uncomfortable is not a bad thing if it leads to something great.

I think it would be very sad for any of us to not follow a vocation given to us by God. Of course, one has to put beans on the table, but it is also true that a vocation given to us from God will do that.

…and people who are not and do not are just part of everyday work life. I truly love my job. I had the good fortune to have helped build an incredible work culture during my eight years at the company. It is hard to watch that culture break under the weight of a non-contributor, especially if that non-contribution is both in attitude, work ethic, and competence. It is a huge relief, from the company perspective, to see an influence like that removed whether it is through their on volition or not. That happened to day at my work. My colleague said something to the effect that something happened that was going to make me very pleased. It had the opposite effect. I was just saddened that years and resources were wasted, both the company’s years and resources and that of the ex-employee. It was good for no one.