As I prepare for my move to Switzerland to start my new job as Web Manager at Shelter Centre (many thanks to Eric at Development Seed), I am excited to be back in a position where I get to concentrate on one (or just a handful) of sites. Don’t get me wrong, my time at Chicago Tech and Trellon over the past year and a half have been wonderful, and I have learned many things. But I am excited for the focus of a single project job.

My original intention with this post was to compare the difference between working at a Drupal shop, and working for a single Drupal project. But what it really comes down to is personal preference. Instead, I started to think about just the general idea of the quality of our Drupal jobs and how we, as community members, represent that quality. There are plenty of Drupal folks that don’t make Drupal their means of making a living, but there is a large amount (majority even) that call Drupal our day (and night) job and are really happy about that. I sure am.

But I don’t see this conversation out in the open. Maybe it is a cultural thing, or a contractual agreement, or maybe people just don’t care, but there is no open discussion about what it’s like being a Drupal employee. We talk about a lot of things, from code, to architecture, project management, drinking, community, minorities, respect, products, finances, and right back to code. And I think, indirectly, we all kind of put our woes and excitements about our jobs into the community in some form. But we still seem to be quiet about our jobs as Drupalers.

This post may be entitled “The Drupal Union”, but I am not endorsing or condoning a Drupal Union. I simply feel that it would be nice to be able to openly discuss the things we love and hate about our Drupal jobs. Maybe, just given Drupal’s success, it’s safe to say that a Drupal job is heaven, but I think there is more to it and that its important to start these discussions out in the open.