There is a trend on LinkedIn of people posting about their first day on a new job. In general they are very happy and excited, and share a picture of nice shiny objects, which are the gifts they got from the company.

Of course we can understand the enthusiasm of a person when he/she starts a new job. Probably this represents some progress in this person’s professional career, and also an increase in salary.

But I think that we should be really celebrating when a person is still happy after many years on the same job.

Below I’m sharing the picture of my employee tag at Perion, where I work as a part-time Machine Learning consultant. This tag is not a shiny object, actually it is 3-years old.

At Perion I started working for Undertone, developing models to predict the user journey, and now I’m at CodeFuel, working on models to understand user intent.

During these 3 years we developed several Machine Learning projects that were both interesting and challenging, and many of them are now running in production and generating revenue.

So I invite you to share your experience when you have been for several years on the same job and you are still having fun.

Instead of celebrating people who are happy because they left their previous job, let’s hear from people who have no intention of quitting their current job.

Some notes:

Besides working as a part-time Machine Learning consultant at Perion, I also have my own company KashKlik, and I’m in the Advisory Board of two other startup companies: TropX and Mecomi.

Please notice that I’m not criticizing people who are happy because they are starting a new job. This is perfectly normal. People should celebrate any important milestone in their professional careers. I’m just saying that we should have more posts in which people tell us how happy they are with their current jobs.

I wrote this post in the context of recent research that shows that most young people are unhappy in their current jobs. Many articles are being published about the “Great Resignation“ happening now in the US, and people have been complaining a lot about the lack of work-life balance. There seems to be a great disconnect between employers and their employees regarding expectations and priorities.

Therefore, I think it is very important to show that it is possible to find happiness in our jobs. I believe that it is dangerous to motivate others to immediately leave their jobs if they are feeling unhappy. If someone is not satisfied, there should be other alternatives besides quitting.

Please feel free to share your opinion and/or experience in the comments below.