Be Master of your Fate, be Captain of your Soul

This road certainly did help me find some cool shit! Because I’d done so well in that job, I then got the opportunity of a lifetime. Boeing created an Advanced Systems team and we were asked to look widely across the global Boeing business and identify technologies, products, and services we delivered elsewhere that we could apply to the Australian market. I got great joy in delving into all sorts of wonderful capabilities and developing strategies to bring them to Australia

.I found a Boeing subsidiary that had the most efficient CPV solar power cell in the world. It was used in satellites, but they had an emerging interest in ground-based solar power. So I jumped into it and I was on the cusp of launching Boeing’s ground-based solar power business in Australia when Boeing went through a restructure and the Advanced Systems team was erased. But they loved the work I was doing and wanted me to keep doing it, but I had to move from Brisbane to Canberra. I doubt you find many people longing to move to Canberra, especially if they’d established such a good life as I had in Brisbane. But I was master of my fate and I made the big move.

I was then bludgeoned by chance yet again. Boeing decided it wasn’t in ground-based solar power and with a stroke of a pen it was gone. Then after less than a year in Canberra they asked me to move back to Brisbane, or take a redundancy. Once again, I was master of my fate, I was captain of my soul and I took the redundancy. I then took off on an around Australia motorbike ride, that led me halfway around Australia, back to Canberra and into the arms of my wife and we’ve created such a good life.

Then after my cancer journey, I returned to the job I left with Lockheed Martin in the space industry, with the most wonderful boss who had supported me so well during my cancer journey, welcomed me back with open arms, and then did everything he could to get me back up to speed. But I was bludgeoned by chance once more when the cognitive impairment I suffered during my journey meant that I was unable to work full time or do the wide thinking needed to develop strategies in the space industry. So they asked me to resign. So I was master of my fate and captain of my soul once more. I gracefully accepted the resignation and kindly thanked my boss for everything he had done for me, and I flew away on a wing and a prayer.

It was time to modify my chalk sketch once more and start drawing and dreaming. To find a job that suited my current cognitive capacity, whilst allowing me to get back up to speed. So I was master of my fate, I was captain of my soul. I really loved doing strategy development work, it’s easily the favourite work I’ve done. I had to reach back in my experience, to find a job that I knew really well that didn’t need the wide thinking skills I was currently lacking. A job such as quality assurance or delivering training courses.

Ironically enough it was the same boss who had offered me the redundancy with Boeing, and who also asked me to resign from Lockheed Martin. But I am master of my fate, I am captain of my soul. I recognise all the support, learnings and guidance he had provided. I respect that it was the company that forced him to both offer me the redundancy and ask me to resign. So we’re still good mates.

My new chalk sketches, then led me to the most amazing new job with an Australian-owned defence company. After working for so many multinational companies, it’s so delightful to work for an Australian company. They didn’t need me to set work hours, they allowed me to work from home, and I could increase my hours whenever I was comfortable. They have me working in Quality Assurance helping them get accredited to ISO27001, which is something I know really well and also suited to my current cognitive capacity. Once again that Corvette Queensland job is helping me out. But I’m also doing some market analysis which is helping me get back up to speed.

Being master of my fate, being captain of my soul, has led me to another amazing place. Thank you Mum, thank you Dad, for teaching me to be master of my fate, to be captain of my soul. You helped me create my unconquerable soul.