Changing Jobs . . . Again

If it feels like I just wrote a post about changing jobs, this isn't a Groundhog Day situation because I did in October of 2022. I'm changing jobs for the second time in less than a year, and while that kind of frowned upon in the professional world, it's an incredible opportunity for me. I've spent the past 10 months with the Emergency Medical Services and Preparedness Section as a Management Analyst III doing fiscal work and special projects in Smyrna. My tenure with that office will end just two days shy of 11 months. Staying there at least a year would have been optimal, well not leaving at all would have been the best case scenario, but I couldn't pass up applying for my new position.

There were a lot of factors that went into the decision to even apply and even more that had to be considered before accepting if it got offered to me. My time in my current section has been an absolute whirlwind and as I like to put it "a crash course in fiscal and grant management". Using all of the knowledge and experience I've gained over the past 10-11 months will help me excel in my new position. I'm truly going to miss the people I've been working with. I came into a section with two other people on the same day and then we subsequently lost a handful of others while I've been there. However, we were able to build a great little group within our much larger section and that's what I'm going to miss the most.

I find the subject matter of the work the Preparedness Section does to be endlessly fascinating. If you know me personally, you know I have a pension for all weather and disaster related phenomena. Had I been in a programmatic role within that section instead of my current fiscal role, I might have stayed. In the end, while I'm very capable of balancing budgets and doing grant management, it just isn't what I want the primary function of my job to be. Those things will be part of my new job, but I'll be supervising someone doing the majority of the fiscal work. That's enough teasing, let's get to the big reveal.

Last week I accepted the role of Primary Care Office Director in the Bureau of Health Planning and Resources Management. The official state job title is Public Health Treatment Program Administrator, but the office contains both Primary Care and Rural Health programs and my job duties are Primary Care focused. If the name of the section sounds familiar to you at all, it's because I worked there for almost 10 years before moving into my current position with EMSPS. That's right, I'm going back to my old section. I'll now be in a managerial role and second in command of the tiny five person section. I was obviously a natural fit to move into the role because of my experience, but now even more so after rounding out the skills I didn't have in grant work.

I am really looking forward to the new challenges I'll face as we work to make access to healthcare better for all Delawareans. Going back to a section where I'm very familiar with the work and people should make the transition into the role very smooth. I'll be commuting back to Dover to the building the section was in originally before moving to the building I was working in before leaving. They've done extensive renovations that have made the work space much better than before. My new position comes with a two pay grade bump and my own office like I have now. As I mentioned I'll be doing some supervising as well, which is basically new to me because I only did some while working for a credit union in NY over a decade ago. I've been told that I'd be a good manager by people within Public Health and don't foresee any real struggles with that. I am, after all, an awesome human being who is easy to get along with.

I never expected to rise to this level within the State government, after sort of stumbling into working there in the first place. I'm still fairly young and have quite a few years left to work if I want full pension and benefits, so who knows where things will lead. But for now I'm going to focus on this new chapter in my career and do everything I can to make access to healthcare in Delaware better.