How to be what you want to be when you grow up
Inspired by social media
This post was inspired by a Twitter thread on how to get started in technology. To be honest, when I look back on how I got to where I am today I realize that I got started in technology through a lot of exploration, and trial and error. I never knew what I really wanted to do, but I had ideas. Lots of ideas. It wasn’t until I tried those ideas that I was really able to see if it was for me or not. The best advice I can give on starting a career in technology is try whatever you think it is you might like or be good at and go from there. None of us have it all figured out. There is value in learning by doing and being able to take your experience and apply it elsewhere.
I like to call that last line a pivot.
That word has been a recurring theme in my career and will be throughout this article. In this article I will explain how I knew when and what to pivot to. Most of knowing when is determined by how satisfied or happy you are doing what you are doing, and then what to pivot to is purely your interest and or passion.
Me, today
I am currently a Blockchain Solution Architect and Technology Lead within my firm’s Innovation and Enterprise group. This is categorized as a technical role where I design and build the blockchain solutions we are trying to implement for clients. Most of my work is in the enterprise space and crypto custody space. Blockchain solution building involves a lot of design thinking in the beginning. Most clients want to use blockchain to solve a problem, otherwise it is difficult to demonstrate the value add. Designing a blockchain solution starts with identifying the problem, how blockchain can help, and then mapping out what the new future state looks like. It is essential to define the personas (system users) and then their actions, inputs, and outputs. This initial part is pretty business oriented. Once that is defined and sorted, you can start to work on the technical aspect. At a high level, this includes figuring out which blockchain ledger would be most beneficial for the use case based on speed, security, scalability, integrity, and privacy requirements, as well as the choice cloud environment and cloud services to use to make this come to life. From here, the real technical work takes place. I break this out into two parts, smart contract development, and software application development. You can develop the smart contract, but you need an application to bring it to life. Usually via a web or mobile app. I won’t get into too much detail here as I will be writing a blog post around blockchain development methodologies in the future and don’t want to spoil it here. I do want to point out that there are so many technical opportunities in the blockchain space as well as non-technical opportunities. Below is a general list to get you thinking. It is important to note that you need to build and secure the blockchain, AND the applications on top of it.
Blockchain roles you can look into
Blockchain technical roles: developer, solution architect, security architect, software development engineer, full stack engineer, backend engineer, UI/UX designer, and UI/UX developer, just to name a few.
As I mentioned above, not all blockchain work is technical, a lot of it is functional and business oriented. Some blockchain functional roles: consultant (can be technical or business oriented), sales rep, customer service rep, project manager, product manager, marketing rep, legal counsel, investment analyst (crypto), creative analyst, and research analyst.
Where I started
When I graduated from college I began my career as a staff level tax accountant at a big 4 firm. In the span of about 5 years I have had 3 very different roles, but have made my experience translate from one role to the next. I did not take a traditional path into solution architecture and application development. I did not study computer engineering or any engineering for that matter. I have an undergraduate degree in accounting with a minor in management information systems, and a master’s in management information systems (inspired by interest in technology which I explain below). I taught myself everything I know about cloud, blockchain, application development, data science, and all of my other interests (with the help of some university classes and Udemy of course). One thing I will emphasize is that if you are looking to get into technology you better be comfy or get comfy with self-teaching. You can get 95% of the information you need from someone else, but if you don’t learn it an apply it on your own, you won’t really know it. Do the 5%.
Upon starting college I initially knew I wanted to study business. My mother was a career working woman and I was always inspired by her professional outfits and what she was able to accomplish. I chose to study accounting because I figured it would translate well into any business and I knew I would get a job. At the time, job security was a big concern for recent college graduates. I began my career at PwC (PricewaterhouseCoopers, LLP). I was an entry level tax accountant working on partnership returns for the most part. I soon realized that this was not for me! But what else could I do? While joining the big firm was a good experience right out of school I wanted more freedom and ability to explore and try new things. I switched over to a mid size firm that offered just that. The deal was to do continue to do tax work for one busy season and then I could explore other opportunities. I knew what I was currently doing wasn’t for me so it was time to pivot to something else that was of more interest to me. The key here was doing something for some time (I did this for 1 year) and knowing that this was not where I wanted to take my career. Trial and error. In this case, error.
The smaller firm I worked for had recently acquired a risk advisory services firm. What is risk advisory services? Risk advisory services cover SOC/PCI/ISO and other compliance regulation assessments. At a high level my job was to assess an organization’s tech environment for a SaaS/PaaS product offering against their risk and controls framework to ensure compliance. For more details on what this entails you can refer to this blog post http://callmemikeb.com/is-that-thing-you-do-considered-tech/ . Believe it or not this a more technical role than most people think.
Discovering by doing
As I began auditing and assessing these environments, most of them were cloud based and mainly on AWS. Essentially, I was looking into an organizations entire cloud infrastructure and architecture for their product. My mind was blown. I quickly became very passionate about cloud and what it could do and I wanted to know more. Again, I pivoted. I spent as much time as I could understanding why organizations were moving to the cloud, what benefits it offered over traditional data centers, and how this would begin to shape the future in which we are currently in today. i wanted to know what I was looking at and what the security risks and considerations were. The key to this pivot was finding something I liked. I knew I liked the cloud and wanted to focus on it. Again, it was time for a change.
Once I became confident in the skill set I was developing, I began researching other careers and jobs related to cloud, cloud security, cloud development, and cloud engineering. I wanted to be where all of this was happening. I took a new job in the Bay Area so I could get as much exposure to cloud environments as possible and place myself in the center of disruption. While most of the work I was doing remained the same, I was doing it on a bigger stage where I was able to test out my knowledge and figure out what else I needed to learn. I would consider this another pivot. I had a good understanding of cloud but what my clients were doing regarding DevOps, Orchestration, Automation, and Security was astounding. There was still more for me to learn. I began to see the true importance of technology and how it can make a difference in everything we are doing today. The clients I served were changing the world, building new and improved products everyday, and they were doing it on the cloud. This is where I started to realize that my purpose, which I always believed to be was to make a difference and to genuinely help people, could become true. While I enjoyed cloud, I didn’t truly feel like the work I was doing was making a difference in the lives of people. It was, but in a very removed way and I wanted to be closer to it. What is coming next? You guessed it, time to pivot again.
Alignment to your purpose (or whatever you want to call it)
I happened to be in the Bay Area when blockchain was slowly but surely becoming more visible to the market. Several of my friends had left their jobs to go work at Coinbase, and others were buying Bitcoin and Litecoins like candy. I naturally wondered what all the buzz was about and quickly learned how powerful blockchain really was. And where does the blockchain magic happen? In the cloud, of course. All of my cloud knowledge and experience enabled me to pick up blockchain quickly and understand that this had to be my next move. I began asking around my current company to see what we were doing in the space and ended being able to move to NYC to work on blockchain full time. This was not easy. I spent almost every hour of every day working on my blockchain knowledge and skillset (I still do this now). The learning curve was steep but I realized I had a big head start on most of the people within the company still struggling to understand the concept of blockchain. I finally felt like I had been able to match my skillset with my passion in creating the systems of a decentralized future that will enable the token economy and new generations of wealth for millions of people.
Imagine, try it, master it, then move on
If you had asked tax accountant me what she thought she would be doing 5 years from then, she would have said something like, tax manager. My transition into technology was not something I decided in college, or something I always knew I wanted to do. It came from a natural interest by exploring, doing, and translating what I knew into something else. There will always be the next thing. Its human nature to be curious and explore.
Working with cloud and blockchain has led me down other paths as well. Emerging technology is best when it is coupled with other emerging technologies and the cloud makes it all possible. While I primarily work with cloud and blockchain I also have interests in data science, cryptography, cryptocurrency, IoT, and various others.
The technology we work with today won’t be the same in 10, 20, or 50 years. Cloud adoption took 50 years. When working in technology it is essential to be able to pivot and take what you know and apply it elsewhere, whether it is a new company, role, another technology, or a passion.
Imagine it, try it, master it, then pivot to the next great thing.
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