An Age of Not Knowing Again
Chapter 14
The young developer told me he was quitting shortly after lunch.
At first, I thought he was moving to another company.
"Where are you going?"
I asked.
He laughed for a moment.
"I don't have one yet."
"You don't have one?"
"No. I'm just going to take a break."
I couldn't hide my surprise.
"You're not going after deciding on your next place?"
"That's right."
"Will that be okay?"
He shrugged his shoulders.
"I want to think things through."
"About what?"
"Whether to keep developing."
I was momentarily at a loss for words.
He was more than twenty years younger than me. He was at an age where his career was just beginning to build.
From my perspective, it seemed like he had so many things he could do ahead.
But he said that it was actually burdensome.
"I wonder if I should keep doing this going forward."
"Did you get tired of development?"
"It's not that I hate it."
He thought for a moment.
"Before, I thought it was just about doing well. I studied, built my career, and thought if I did well, I could keep going."
"Now?"
"I don't know."
He laughed.
"With AI and how the company runs, I don't even know what I should prepare for."
Hearing that felt strange.
When I was young, I rarely felt anxious about not having a future.
I knew nothing, but that was actually fine.
I only thought about what to do right now.
This friend was the opposite.
He had many choices, lots of information, and knew too much about all the possibilities for change ahead.
So he seemed even more lost.
"Is there anything you want to do?"
"I don't know that either."
He laughed.
"I'm going to think about it."
I didn't ask further.
A few days later, his resignation announcement came up.
People left comments one by one on the team messenger.
Thank you for all your hard work.
I hope only good things await you!
Let's stay in touch after you leave :)
I wrote something similar.
On his last day, there was a small farewell gathering.
It wasn't like before where we'd stay at a bar until dawn.
We had dinner at a restaurant near the company and it was over.
He said something to me.
"Seeing you work here for so long, it really seems amazing."
I laughed.
"I just kept doing it."
"I don't have the confidence to do this for so long."
"When I was in my twenties, I didn't know I'd make it this far."
"So how did you keep going for so long?"
This time, I thought for a moment.
"Because there was always something next."
"Something next?"
"Yeah. When one thing ended, there was always something else."
He nodded.
It was probably not a very helpful answer.
The day after his resignation, his desk was empty.
His monitor was gone, and the small figurine that was on his desk was gone too.
For the first few days, it was noticeable.
When going to lunch, I could feel that one person was missing.
During a meeting, someone asked about the work he used to handle.
The team lead said.
"Let's distribute that part for now."
His responsibilities were divided among several people.
I got one too.
In the past, the talk of hiring a new person would have come up first.
This time, no one said anything like that.
Instead, the team lead said.
"Try to minimize the repetitive parts with AI."
Some of his analysis work was indeed done that way.
Put in a document and summaries came out,
put in existing code and the flow was organized,
and test case drafts were quickly created.
It wasn't a complete replacement.
A person still had to verify.
But what was clear was,
that even with one person gone, there was no immediate major problem.
That fact was uncomfortable.
From the company's perspective, it was good news.
Work didn't stop.
For the remaining people, overtime didn't increase significantly like before.
AI filled the gap to some extent.
I sometimes looked at his empty desk.
At first, the empty desk caught my eye.
After a few weeks, I got used to it.
I had to think briefly to remember who had sat there.
That was even stranger.
It took time for the person to disappear,
but it didn't take long to get used to the empty space.
One day while eating lunch, the youngest staff member said.
"What's he doing these days?"
"I don't know. Haven't contacted him."
"I saw on SNS last time that he went on a trip."
"Really?"
"I was envious."
"Are you thinking about quitting too?"
The youngest laughed.
"Not yet."
Hearing that, I laughed too.
Before, I used the phrase "not yet" like hope.
For now, it's fine.
For now, there's work.
For now, I'm needed.
These days, that phrase sounded a bit different.
It came closer to meaning "for now, that's how it is," though I didn't know how long it would last.
In the afternoon, the team lead called me.
"Senior, do you have a moment?"
We went into the conference room.
The team lead brought up next quarter's staffing plan.
"This time, I'm thinking of trying a PoC to automatically analyze some of the operations side with AI."
I looked at the screen.
Collecting incident logs.
Checking related deployment history.
Searching for similar past incidents.
Organizing potential causes.
The work I had been doing for a long time was listed as items.
The team lead said.
"Since you know this side the best, I was hoping you could help us with this."
I laughed.
"Am I creating the thing that will eliminate my job?"
The team lead laughed too.
"Not to that extent."
It passed off like a joke.
I had said it as a joke too.
But as I left the conference room and went back to my desk, that sentence came back to me.
The work I do well,
I could explain it best.
So I was the most suitable person to automate it.
It was too obvious to call it irony.
If someone had to do it, it was right that I do it.
I opened my laptop.
I opened the AI window too.
And I created a new document.
Operations Incident Analysis Automation PoC
I typed the title and paused for a moment.
I wrote the first item.
Information to Check First When an Incident Occurs
In the past, this was content I would have explained to a junior.
Now I was trying to explain it to a system.
