Why you should never turn down opportunities
My story
Hello, my name is Filip. I’m an IT student and a self-taught web developer. As a young person myself (only 21 years old), I was not thinking of developing any kind of career path in the following years. Not until today. My mindset has changed over the past few months and I’ve got an unexpected career-boost. And that is, well, because of many aspects. I will name one right now, in this post. My first one on Medium, by the way :)
I was not really a social guy and most of my acquired skills & studying time I’ve done were from the comfort of my own home, watching tutorials & taking online classes and courses with certifications. Oh boy, was I not aware that just one of those courses would change my career path to the fullest. One day, as I was scrolling through couple of online courses, I’ve stumbled upon one that got my attention and I immediately bought it without any doubt. And that was probably the best choice I’ve made in the past few months.
Knowledge is power.
After a few weeks when I finished listening to the instructor, I was overwhelmed by the knowledge that has been passed to me. It was incredible, the feeling was indescribable. The course was particularly about building websites from scratch. I had very limited knowledge about this subject until then. With what this course had offered me, I couldn’t believe that I went from a complete noobie to a decent developer. A starting one, but still a developer. I felt confident, ready to wander throughout the Internet world of Freelancing.
A couple of weeks later, I’ve got an unexpected call from an old friend.
The call
One day I got a call from an old high-school friend. He happened to be a member of a non-profit student organization called ESTIEM. I live in Macedonia, and in my country, every University has its own student organization like this one.
Interestingly, ESTIEM were organizing an international IT event called “IT School Skopje” where students from all over Europe came to the state’s capital in order to learn and absorb basic IT skills. It is worth noting that none of these students who participated in the event were IT students at a University in their country. So, basically, they were total beginners in the subject.
Overwhelmed by all the information, I’ve asked my friend over the phone what the event-agenda was. He mentioned that the event will be one week long and that the studying subjects were HTML & CSS, among others. He then told me to think about if I want to participate in the event as a trainer/teacher to these students.
The moment you start thinking positive, is the moment you start living your dream.
The decision
The interesting thing was that, both of these HTML & CSS technologies are a vital part of the process of creating websites, and I was familiar with both of them. I’ve been told that the event organizers will be also handing signed certificates to all of the trainers participating the event, so I knew that this was big for me. Being the inexperienced college graduate-to-be, I knew that this was a big opportunity for me and a huge ass mark to leave in my very empty CV.
However, because of my limited social skills, I couldn’t imagine myself teaching and talking to a large crowd of 15 strangers simultaneously. Being their mentor was unimaginable. But, because of the confidence I’ve collected from the course I talked to you about earlier, I promised to myself that this time I would at least CONSIDER taking this opportunity. Finally, after days of decision-making, I’ve called my high school friend who was among the event organizers and I’ve told him that I’m accepting the offer.
No one is the creator of your luck except yourself.
The event
You’ve guessed it. The first class was the hardest. I had the “honor” to break the ice and start the first classroom workshop. Every piece of attention was focused towards me as I was speaking to a (for me) huge group of 20+ people. The CEO of the student organization was attending the opening, as well as the college principal, plus a couple of IT guys, and random people who got an eye on the event.
Anyway, as I was opening the event my mouth got dry and there were no cups of water nearby. I’ve felt my heart pumping fast and was shaking on the inside…
Fast forwarding — as the days went by, it became much and much easier because I easily got along with the students as all of them were really nice people.
There were couple of more IT trainers just like me who were teaching different subjects to these students, but I was in charge of the HTML & CSS part. It felt good, having a real responsibility to look after. The event had a total of 14 students from 9 different Europe countries and a total of 7 IT trainers including me.
Notable moment here —As a “thank you” note, I’ve decided to use the project files from the course that gave me the courage to attend this event — me and my students were building the very same website that my instructor taught me how to build, a couple of weeks before the event. Huge thanks to my mentor & instructor Jonas Schmedtmann for making this whole thing possible. I feel proud for contributing to this, seemingly invisible, “teaching chain”.
Closing
We had a whole amazing week in which the students were building the final website for later use. The daytime was filled with workshops where students competed on their own projects, shared ideas and were helping each other under my mentoring. I was honored. Anyway, the night times were filled with crazy parties where we got along pretty well.
I’d like to mention “The International Night”, which is a party where everyone brings their traditional food & drinks from their own country for the other students from different nationalities to taste and drink! How awesome! I’ve got to taste Armenian vodka, Turkish baklava and French breakfast — honey, french cheese and red wine!
So… During the last few days of the event the students were separated into 2 groups to compete on which group will make a better website. I was the proud mentor.
In the end, those 2 groups were presenting their websites to selected juries/judges from ESTIEM — the IT company that was organizing the event, and, guess what — the winning website from my students was actually a whole lot better than the website of the IT company itself! And these students didn’t know anything about HTML & CSS a week ago! Can you imagine how proud I’ve felt!?
Last but not least —There was a competition which consisted of choosing the best IT trainer during the event. Now, out of all trainers competing, I was proudly selected as the best trainer according to the feedback given by the students participating! I don’t think I’ll ever forget the moment the officials handed me the winning certificate in front of everyone, and 1 week earlier I was too afraid and shy to even say a single word to those people!
Conclusion
Thanks to this experience, the earlier courses I took, the certificate and a dozen of recommendations, my portfolio showing my work — I am now looking forward to getting hired (my dream job!) in the next few months…
So, wherever you are, whoever you are reading this, never give up on your dreams. I truly mean that. And, never turn down an opportunity. Not even a tiniest one. Sometimes it only takes one phone call. That’s the only thing I want you to absorb from this read.
The only thing that’s eternal, is the change.
I think I (we) owe you at least a photo, so here is one with my students and me!
