First Draft #3: Network

A lot of people seem to impressed with my dedication to get into tech. A lot of people got caught up in the "bootcamp kool-aid". The promise of 'Learn to Code: and get a 6 figure salary in just 6 months'.

This was back in 2016. I bought into that. I was a Janitor at the local hospital, the major breadwinner of my family. I had a young kid. Who wouldn't be bright eyed about earning 4x more than they currently made and didn't come home smelling like bleach. Looking back I think the biggest thing was the promise of REMOTE work.

The idea of making 4x the median income in my area, AND be able to work from home?! Sign me up!

But this brings me to networking, my strength. All of my opportunities have come from Social Media. First it was a getting a tech degree sponsored by an Ed Tech company, then rebranding a marketing site, next it was contract Dev Rel for a software consultancy. All of these things were while I worked full time at the hospital in the ER (different position than janitor), and had our second kid in this time frame as well.

Twitter has been a great part of my journey. Being able to connect with people throughout the world from my small corner of NY state. Booking calls and interviews with people I highly respect.

The biggest thing is getting to work alongside with some of the people I learned from when I started this wild journey.

And it all boils down to building meaningful things in the world with wonderful people.