Is jumping from job to job a bad idea?

Published in

WBS CODING SCHOOL

5 min readMar 6, 2020

Disclaimer: I work in the IT field, where it’s easier to find a job. I’ll speak only about my vision of my job and what I’ve saw during my past years. I’ll use examples from my own life and so speak a lot in the first-person.

Since my master’s degree in 2014, I worked with more than a dozen of companies (from a month to a whole year), this volatility can probably send a bad message to certain companies.

No, for me, it was not!

Why?

Because I worked with awesome people all around the globe and I had the chance to learn a lot of things from them.
You need to keep in mind that a company will hire you for your skills (human/technical) and your network, not for your degree. If it’s the case:

Where?

I was not afraid to move and in order to create a great network you have to move. It can be only in your city if you want, just look at the myriad of events on Meetup. I’m sure it’s possible for you to find a place where you can do your nest 🐤.

Today, I can travel to some capitals and have a beer with friends from there. You can not do that by staying on your couch (sorry bro 👊).

(Ok, I maybe lied… It’s possible from your couch 😉 — Hello remote fellows👋)

I highly recommend you to work with companies/people from different countries to see all the ways to work/manage a project. You can probably learn more in a week than in a year at school by simply switching from a timezone to another.

When?

Clearly not right after your degree, you need first to create a certain expertise before considering changing jobs. Remember, you’re selling your skills not your degree. It took me four years before having the courage to start this new life.

You don’t have this good foundation yet? Target your dream job, search for the necessary skills and start learning. You want to learn fast, that’s why coding bootcamps exist.

You don’t have the skills yet for your second job? Hey buddy, welcome to the 21st century where everything you want is on the internet. Once you have a strong first experience in development, it becomes easier to switch between technologies.

I’m working with technologies and processes that I never learnt at school. It’s a lot of investment, I know, but trust me, you can do it.

What?

Ok, you’ll meet people at your job and they will probably help you increase your field of activity with simple stuff like:

“Hey my brother works in an NGO, they need someone to work on a project for free. Can you help?”

During my last years, I’ve done a lot of projects for free in order to help my friends (probably too much, let’s be honest), but let’s look at an example:

I worked for a couple of friends few years ago to create the MVP of whyse.co. I really believed in this project and I wanted to help, no matter how. I’m not working on this project anymore but thanks to this project, I’ve now access to a network of +500 tech enthusiasts (mostly CTOs).

By helping people, sooner or later they will return the favor. It’s karma, right?
But don’t help to get something in return.

How?

For me the solution was “simple”, I created my company in 2015 in order to have this elasticity as a freelancer. I was able to work with people hundreds of miles away from me and at the same time to give a lecture to 70 students.

Yeah, by being your own boss you can work with multiple companies at the same time (with the insomnia that goes with it). I no longer have my company but it was a marvelous experience. If you feel like doing it, I strongly recommend it.

Create a company is not the only way, sure not! You can now work with companies from all over the world with websites like remoteok.io.

And now you maybe ask yourself, but where is the how much section. This is the best part 😉

By moving from job to job, you usually don’t ask less than your last salary. I let you do the math.

I clearly don’t tell you to quit your job, but think twice when you see an opportunity of any kind. Main point, don’t look at the salary first. What’s more horrible than a job where you stay only for the money?

Always look for more knowledge and awesome people to work with! You can see this knowledge as an investment on the long term.

Scientia potentia est (knowledge is power)

So in a nutshell, I moved from developer (with plethora of positions), to instructor, CEO, director of studies and trainers coordinator to my last position as manager of the whole technical infrastructure and of new curricula.