Why did you leave Apple? about ama

[mxcl]

I was a bad fit and frankly too full of myself for the position at the time. I did not work well in the corporate structure, but due to my past successes I felt I didn’t need to adapt to their way (and to be fair, their way is not ideal, but it does work, if you give it the requisite three or so years it requires for you to start making progress within it).

If I'd made more effort I think I could have been happy there, but I was not incentivized to do so because also me and my wife both found living in the Bay Area a serious step down in quality of life versus Chicago.

After Swift was open sourced I also found it very difficult balancing the needs of the community for the Swift Package Manager versus the continuous battle it was to get anything built in the way I felt it needed to be to make the best tool for the Swift package ecosystem. The battle being the hierarchy at Apple.

Me and my manager really didn't get along either. Nothing I did was ever right as far as he was concerned. Good things I did were generally not commented upon while everything else was examined under a level of microscope that was excessive. There was a lot of meetings where minor details (of the product) were discussed endlessly while important matters were ignored.

My attitude was a big issue, and I came out of the experience suitably chastised, so I gained from it.

I think success often goes to peoples’ heads and this was my wake up call. I feel bad about it though.