Let this be inspiration to whoever is afraid of trying, failing and being fired. Every single one of these jobs has taught me lessons I've used daily in my career.
I don't have exact dates on these, but my first jobs were:
I ended up walking out on the delivery job, but that's a story for another day.
Most of what I learned from these jobs were the value of labor and when to just shut up and give people exactly what they are asking for. Even if it's what they might not want.
The following table is a history of my software career by title, date and salary (company names are omitted).
Title | Start Date | End Date | Days Worked | Salary | How I Left |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Junior Systems Administrator | 2013-11-11 | 2014-01-06 | 56 | USD$50000/year | terminated |
Software Engineering Intern | 2014-07-14 | 2014-08-27 | 44 | USD$35000/year | terminated |
Consultant | 2014-09-17 | 2014-10-15 | 28 | USD$90/hour | contract not renewed |
Consultant | 2014-10-27 | 2015-02-09 | 105 | USD$90/hour | contract not renewed |
Site Reliability Engineer | 2015-03-30 | 2016-03-07 | 343 | USD$125000/year20000 options. Vesting for 4 years with a cliff of 1 year. | demoted |
Systems Administrator | 2016-03-08 | 2016-04-01 | 24 | USD$105000/year | quit |
Member of Technical Staff | 2016-04-04 | 2016-08-03 | 121 | USD$135000/year5000 liquid granted shares. Vesting for 4 years with a cliff of 1 year. | quit |
Software Engineer | 2016-08-24 | 2016-11-22 | 90 | USD$105000/year85000 options. Vesting for 4 years with a cliff of 1 year. | terminated |
Consultant | 2017-02-13 | 2017-11-13 | 273 | USD$120/hour | hired |
Senior Software Engineer | 2017-11-13 | 2019-03-08 | 480 | USD$150000/year | quit |
Expert principal en fiabilité du site | 2019-05-06 | 2020-11-27 | 540 | CAD$115000/year7500 liquid options. Vesting for 4 years with a cliff of 1 year. | quit |
Software Designer | 2020-12-14 | 2022-03-01 | 442 | CAD$135000/year | raise |
Archmage of Infrastructure | 2022-03-01 | current | n/a | CAD$147150/year | n/a |
Even though I've been fired three times, I don't regret my career as it's been thus far. I've been able to work on experimental technology integrating into phone systems. I've worked in a mixed PHP/Haskell/Erlang/Go/Perl production environment. I've literally rebuilt most of the tool that was catalytic to my career a few times over. It's been the ride of a lifetime.
Even though I was fired, each of these failures in this chain of jobs enabled me to succeed the way I have. I can't wait to see what's next out of it. I only wonder how I can be transformed even more. I really wonder what it's gonna be like with the company that hired me over the border.
Fear stops you. Nothing prevents you.
Please go out and try, Creator. Go for your larger dreams of success. Inaction is a lot easier to regret than action is.
Be well.
Converted from this Twitter thread
.i la budza pu cusku
lu <<.i ko do snura
.i ko do kanro
.i ko do panpi
.i ko do gleki
If you can, please make a blogpost similar to this. Don't include company names. Include start date, end date, time spent there, time spent job hunting, salary (if you remember it) and how you left it. Let's end salary secrecy one step at a time.
This article was posted on M03 14 2019. Facts and circumstances may have changed since publication. Please contact me before jumping to conclusions if something seems wrong or unclear.
This post was not WebMentioned yet. You could be the first!
The art for Mara was drawn by Selicre.
The art for Cadey was drawn by ArtZora Studios.