
How I got my dream job in the tech industry without a CS degree - leeny
https://billmei.net/blog/silicon-valley-job-search
======
steven777400
The author's comment on access to a mediocre/unknown university instructor for
a high fee vs free access to a very good set of lectures (Khan) is one of the
doubts that led me to quit my job as a college instructor. I had kind of the
existential "what are we doing here?" question -- why are students coming here
and paying us money when better instruction is available for free online?
Combined with a couple of education futurists predicting the imminent demise
of in-person college (to be replaced by canned lectures from the best speakers
and an army of automated or mechanical-turk graders), I decided to be first
out rather than forced out and quit. That was five years ago and the landscape
hasn't changed much.

The school I taught at, a community college issued associate's degrees in
computer programming, is still going strong largely as it was back then. I
still don't have an answer to my question, though: why are students paying for
that?

~~~
YZF
There's a big difference between having an instructor and learning things from
a book or video lectures. An instructor can correct your mistakes and give you
feedback. A book or a video can't do that.

Some people presumably don't have a right kind of discipline to study on their
own. This is why remote study programs can be a lot more difficult to complete
vs. on-site programs.

EDIT: There's a known effect, discussed in the Coursera "Learning How to
Learn" course, where you read through the material/watch a video and _think_
that you've actually mastered or learnt it while in fact you have not. If
you're aware of this and test your knowledge you can fix that but it's another
reason why a structured program with an instructor can have an advantage...

~~~
hackerboos
The Open University in the UK has a dropout rate of 87% [1] I'd imagine that's
even higher for online courses.

I can only speak for myself but I would not have been self-disciplined enough
to complete the courses that I did during my undergraduate CS degree.

The added bonus was the degree allowed me to emigrate fairly easily.

[1] - [https://www.timeshighereducation.com/letters/the-open-
univer...](https://www.timeshighereducation.com/letters/the-open-university-
ou-needs-to-make-it-personal#survey-answer)

~~~
dorfsmay
As an OU graduate (late 90s), my first thought was that a lot of people just
try the OU, others just like to take some classes without sticking to a
program and with no intention of getting a degree...

> the cost for an equivalent course for a resident of England is £2,786

The OU used to be about giving a chance to education to everybody. This is
sad...

~~~
jon-wood
To be fair OU courses are eligible for student loans in the same way going to
university is, but the price tag certainly put me off when I was looking into
doing some courses recently.

------
komali2
Damn, that guy busted his butt. I got a creative writing degree from a decent
but relatively unheard of Texas state school, spent a month studying
Javascript, got into a bootcamp, worked for the bootcamp as TA for 3 months,
then got a ~120k/yr job in the bay area within a month of leaving the
bootcamp. I had 3 projects on my resume and absolutely _nothing_ technical to
show for the time period prior to the bootcamp, other than a single Intro to
CS MOOC.

I always marveled at the people like this that seemed to do _so much more_
concrete things than me. I leveraged my strength - talking, knowledgeably -
and that worked well, but many of my peers got in on their technical ability
and work ethic alone.

I haven't written as in-depth a blog post as this guy but I have a couple
articles for those interested:

1\. Linkedin tips for bootcamp grads [http://blog.calebjay.com/2016/11/14/how-
to-use-linkedin-as-a...](http://blog.calebjay.com/2016/11/14/how-to-use-
linkedin-as-a-coding-bootcamp-grad/)

2\. Jobsearch tips for bootcamp grads
[http://blog.calebjay.com/2016/10/18/how-this-coding-
bootcamp...](http://blog.calebjay.com/2016/10/18/how-this-coding-bootcamp-
grad-found-a-job/)

This makes me think maybe I should put together a more holistic article on the
entire process.

EDIT: I'll be watching this for a while if anybody has questions on the
bootcamp experience, resulting jobsearch, etc.

~~~
popdoit
May I politely say "fuck you" for getting a 120k job after completing a
bootcamp. Starting salary of 120k/yr for someone with a 3-month vocational
program and an unrelated undergrad degree? That is literally insane.

~~~
komali2
Hah, you may, it does seem pretty crazy, doesn't it?

I would say that the reason it seems crazy isn't _rational_ , however. If I
was forced to break down the reasons that this worked, I would condense it to
three:

1\. I focused entirely upon a single skill that is highly desired right now
(Javascript / Web Development in JS/HTML/CSS/JS Frameworks). I didn't "waste"
any time learning other programming languages, systems designs, or even
anything beyond the most basic of algorithms and algorithm design. These
things are not necessary to build webapps in Angular/Backbone/React/Vanilla.
My bootcamp (hack reactor) assisted with a very focused curriculum.

2\. I was able to condense this learning to a short period of time by being
utterly focused on it and nothing else, all day, every day. I was learning the
one skill I needed to be employable from 8a-9p Mon-Sat for 3 months, and then
8a-5p Mon-Fri for another 3 months (when I was a TA).

3\. I am a highly sales-trained ex-recruiter, and know through experience and
training _exactly_ what I need to do to get a job, fast. This includes being
an annoying little bastard ;) but also includes streamlining my processes
(never spending more than 10 minutes on a single application, etc) and being
_very_ good at turning a "no" into a "oh, ok, let's talk more."

~~~
ryandrake
> being very good at turning a "no" into a "oh, ok, let's talk more."

Honestly wish there was a 3 month bootcamp for this.

~~~
komali2
Be a recruiter for a bit :P or any sales job, really.

Best advice I can give is treat every "no" like a probe from the other side to
learn more. They're not saying no, they're saying "I don't know enough about
this to want it." Obviously use common sense to avoid harassing someone, and
don't waste your time where no opportunity exists (Mark Cuban reacted to the
infamous "sell me your pen question" with "Do you need a pen? No? Ok, have a
nice day.")

So every "no" has a response -

1\. "No, you don't have enough experience."

Response: "I understand that this role requires the right experience. I
applied to the job because I'm confident I have the experience you need. What
about my background makes you feel otherwise? Do you have a coding challenge I
can complete to demonstrate my ability?"

2\. "No, we've had issues with bootcamp grads in the past. "

Response: "Hm, I can understand why having an experience like that would make
you wary about bootcamp graduates. Was there something specific about why that
grad didn't deliver? (choose response based on further information gathered,
then: ) Hm, that does sound challenging. I think that my x y or z demonstrates
why that issue wouldn't arise with me / I would love to demonstrate via a code
challenge why I wouldn't x y z / If you go to myproject.calebjay.com you can
see that I have quite a bit of hands-on experience with x y or z, so I'm
confident that a b c wouldn't be an issue.

I'm remembering now an old sales training "no" breakdown:

1\. Acknowledge the concern. Make the client feel that their concerns are
valid, do not challenge or attack them, but at the same time avoid perfectly
validating their belief that this is a harbringer that all similar solutions
warrant "nos." So: "Yea, it is quite frustrating when recruiters send
candidates that aren't even close to a good fit. You should see some of the
resumes we people send to us when we open a job!" === good. "Oh man recruiters
are so annoying, yea I would definitely never use them" === bad (when you're a
recruiter trying to sell your services. Also, "psh, recruiters never act that
way, you must have done something to annoy them" === bad.

2\. Information gather. Always good all the time anyway. Usually the first
"no" gives very little information and you could make some bad assumptions.
"We've had bad experience with recruiters in the past" tells you literally
nothing. The answer they give you can lead you straight into one of the fifty
sells your company has drilled into your head. "What happened with the
previous agencies?" "Well, they were sending bad resumes." \--> "Oh, we get
some hilariously off resumes. We like to think of ourselves as a filter for
our clients, so we get maybe fifty resumes for a posting which allows us to
hand-pick the best 3 for our clients." "Well, they would have three or four
recruiters constantly calling us." "That is frustrating, we decided two years
ago to only allow a single recruiter point of contact for our company because
of that exact feedback from our clients." Etc.

3\. Close. Of course.

------
markatkinson
I studied finance and logistics despite the fact that I had been programming
since grade 6. I have no idea why.

So when I started working in finance the ball dropped that I actually wanted
to be a programmer.

Well trying to become a software developer with no relevant qualifications and
only a grade 6 award for programming in Pascal is difficult, especially when
you are located in South Africa.

Luckily I worked for a fortune 500 company that would do anything to reduce
employee turnover except pay a decent wage. So I leveraged off that and got
them to move me horizontally into more and more technical roles automating
what I could and just getting involved in as many technical things as
possible.

~~~
danielbarla
I'm also in SA, and although I can't comment from a personal level (have
degree), I don't think we have it as bad as some other countries in terms of
degree snobbery. Sure, it will definitely lock you out of many large
corporations at an HR level. But many more are just hungry for developer
talent, and wouldn't think twice about hiring those without a degree. If it
was up to me, I'd hire anyone who a) shows a lot of interest in programming,
and b) can actually back that up in some fashion. Sadly it's often not up to
us techies, so it's definitely a disadvantage if you don't have one.

(Come to think of it, I've worked with a dev at one of the big 4 banks who
didn't even have a matric / grade 12. There may have been some protectionism
in the initial hiring, but nobody batted an eyelid after that since he was a
very good developer.)

------
vlucas
> " I eventually found what I was looking for: by changing a few lines of CSS,
> I could hack the layout of the page to push all the ads off the screen"

I remember doing stuff like this. I had a Geocities account back in the day as
well as one on a number of other providers like Angelfire, etc.

One of the simplest hacks was to just leave an opening <noscript> tag at the
bottom of your markup. Since the ad code and scripts were appended to the
bottom of the page markup, they would never execute or show up. One of the
free hosting providers started fighting back by putting a bunch of
</noscript></noscript></noscript> tags in a row right before their ad code
started. Savvy developers of course responded by placing even more opening
<noscript><noscript><noscript> tags. I forget which provider it was, but those
were some good times to be a rebellious teenage coder. :)

------
acchow
A bit odd to put "dream job" in the title and start the article with a picture
of him in the Googleplex...

But in the end find out he doesn't work at Google.

In any case, I meet people on the regular working at top tech companies
without a STEM degree, some without any degree at all. The stories are all
pretty similar:

1) Teach themselves programming

2) Make lots of actual software

~~~
pacaro
My path, with an allegedly irrelevant degree (History and Philosophy of
Science) was

1) tinker with computers as a kid

2) go to university and study something I wanted to learn about, randomly
learning C in passing (from a friend and a stolen copy of turbo c) because I
was interested

3) get a job at a small local ISV, qualified by having a degree in anything
and knowing how to write simple code

4) spend 4 years as an apprentice (informally) taking every opportunity to
learn

5) get a job at a startup

6) join Microsoft through acquisition

7) ...

Up until step 6, my resume probably didn't look that interesting, but once you
have one of the household name software companies on your resume the rest
becomes irrelevant

~~~
acchow
My early steps were pretty similar as well, tho I kind of "hacked" my way into
the industry by getting an internship

1) Tinker with computers as a kid

2) Go to University to study something I wanted to learn (Biochemistry) - took
CS101 to learn some programming

3) Go to grad school for something else unrelated (economics)

4) Work in something unrelated

5) Learn programming in spare time.

6) Quit job. Learn programming hardcore. Enroll in CS classes at a University
to become eligible for internships.

7) Land an internship at Google.

After that, it was smooth sailing.

~~~
ryandrake
Just curious, how close are you and pacaro to 40? Congratulations on your
success but you guys might find the smooth sailing become much less smooth the
older you get.

~~~
pacaro
I'm in my mid 40s, currently a Principal Engineer at Amazon. My experience is
probably not typical for all sorts of reasons

~~~
ryandrake
Fair--everyone's situation is different and I was making a generalization.
Congrats on your early good luck and sustained success!

------
whack
This article is so much more inspiring than the title suggests. The fact that
this guy got a job at FutureAdvisor after graduating with a business degree...
isn't really all that interesting. But the thought process and out-of-the-box
thinking he showed at every step, was awe inducing. Getting a business degree
instead of just sticking with something he had already mastered, was both
smart and brave at the same time. I may not agree with every decision he made,
but the fact that he abandoned well-trodden paths, and instead created his own
roadmap, is what impressed me the most.

Bill, if you're reading this and would like to collaborate together on any
side projects at some point, just shoot me an email (it's on my profile).

P.S. If anyone wants to read another story about non-CS-majors transitioning
into the SW industry, here's mine:
[http://www.thecaucus.net/#/content/caucus/tech_blog/107](http://www.thecaucus.net/#/content/caucus/tech_blog/107)

~~~
diminoten
If you think about it, him working at FutureAdvisor and getting a business
degree is, if nothing else, consistent with what he finds interesting and
rewarding.

I just wish I could be 10% as productive as he is in this story. It's really
incredible, and there doesn't seem to be a "magic sauce" to it, other than the
obvious dogged persistence.

------
Tomis02
Don't get me wrong, I'm glad OP is happy with where he is right now, but his
story's ending is underwhelming.

> Instead of emailing as many black holes as possible, I would spend a week
> deeply researching a company and the business problems it faced, then put
> together a working prototype that I would cold-email to the CEO as a product
> improvement. ... My strategy was working!

Really? Interesting, let's see the outcome.

> I made my cold-emails insanely customized: for the language-learning company
> Duolingo I sent them a video of me speaking four languages.

Seems like it's not really working, Bill.

> Getting attention is only the first step. The next step is to interview.

.... right. So OP wasted a lot of time on something that yielded the same
result as spam (applying to every job).

> I met Aline in San Francisco and she remains to this day the best recruiter
> I’ve ever worked with.

Ok, so it seems those weeks spent deeply researching companies were a huge
waste. Ouch. But at least the recruiter helped you get a job, right?

> Not only did she personally introduce me to companies, she helped me
> recognize that the recruiting practices of top Silicon Valley companies are
> largely based on superstition. This meant that if I wanted to interview
> well, I had to put in an unreasonable amount of practice.

Oh, so still no job. Tell me you found a way to avoid the bullshit interview
preparation and used your time to improve the skills you'd actually be using
in your job.

> I bought all the popular technical interviewing guidebooks and read them
> cover-to-cover.

Huh, dived head first into that one... might've just gone and gotten yourself
a CS degree then.

> At the same time, I continued to scour Hacker News and AngelList for
> companies with open positions, and continued to cold-email CEOs.

In for a penny, in for a pound.

> I also signed up for Hired which ended up having the best response
> rate—their platform is where I eventually found my current job.

... so why'd you put all that effort into making personalized emails for
companies? Ugh.

> In the end, after hundreds of awkward sales calls, hundreds of rejections,
> and thousands of hours coding, I was able to choose a company that best
> aligned with my personal values. I’m now working at FutureAdvisor.

Ok... never heard of them, but I do like the rose-tinted glasses. Not sure
what Bill's secret for being positive is, but it seems to be working for him.

~~~
totalrobe
These were my exact thoughts almost word for word...also the thoughts below
make zero sense back to back.

"At the same time, my old clients started referring me to other clients and
everything snowballed into a big, unstoppable avalanche of steady consulting
work. I took this as a clear sign that I found my calling in life.

Now that I was confident with the flow of consulting work, I began looking for
a full-time job."

What?! Why are you going to look for a job after finding your calling with an
overflow of consulting business?

~~~
mattmanser
I'd guess he was charging peanuts and rather than raising his rates he figured
a job paid more.

Then again, I think every programmer needs to work with people better than
them for a few years.

Most of the worst code I've seen is from programmers who have always been one-
man bands, or have been a one-man band for a very long time. It's often a case
of not knowing what you don't know.

------
gravypod
I don't think most of us want to be "Computer Scientists" as the colleges
define it.

I think most of us want some kind of Software Engineering degree which is not
what a Computer Science degree is. Most colleges want to teach "Computer
Science" as they see it which is basically just "Math with Data Structures and
other BS thrown in to make people hirable".

I think at this point what needs to happen is colleges need to stop branding
"Computer Science" as something that will get you a job and stick to what they
want to do, the hard algorithms and theory stuff and someone else needs to
offer a "Software Engineering" course that teaches all the stuff that colleges
threw in to make people hireable. If that happened we'd all be more happy.

The only way to make this happen is to stop posting job profiles asking for
"Computer Science" unless you _acctually need_ a Computer Scientist (theory-
side). You should instead say "Software Engineer or similar" in the posting.
Colleges will see this, parents will see this, students will see this and
after that all happens we'll all be able to make better choices. Students will
find colleges wanting to teach what they are interested, the stuanch theory CS
professors will be able to teach at colleges, and employers will actually find
programmers who can program after they've graduated from college. Maybe we'd
be able to kill off a few major zero days, save a chunk of change in the
global economy, or make something cool by making this small change.

I also don't think Software Engineering is as much of a "science" as it is a
"trade". Programmers program, painters paint, carpenters carpet.... I mean
build. We all have a skilled knowladge and tallent and know how to use that to
shape the world around us. Most of the information that must be taught is
experiance based and can be given in a trade-school enviroment. I think that's
also another way forward.

~~~
shultays
There are some 'buillshit' classes in C.S. which are highly theoretical which
and has nearly zero real world applications for an average programmer but data
structures is not one of them. The schools don't teach data structure just so
a graduate can answer related interview questions.

    
    
      I also don't think Software Engineering is as much of a "science" as it is a "trade" ... Most of the information that must be taught is experiance based and can be given in a trade-school enviroment
    

I disagree. Software Engineering is not just about experience. It is not
something that a master can pass to his students. It is also about constantly
improving yourself and learning new things.

~~~
gravypod
> The schools don't teach data structure just so a graduate can answer related
> interview questions.

At my university, "Data Strctures" is one course where you write no code,
another corse that is just about discrete math, and then at your senior year
you actually do a Data Structures class.

I have no problem with Data Structures and I of course think they are
important. I have a problem with what colleges think Data Structures are, or
how they should be taught.

~~~
jhall1468
Why would writing code matter? Data structure aren't "code", they are a way of
organizing data. Sure, in our jobs we use them practically, but the purpose of
college is to explain them and (the really important part) _when_ to use them.

There is a core difference between implementation and theory.

~~~
gravypod
What is implementation if not a perfect description of the theory?

------
lloydde
I enjoyed the article and the determined attitude of the author, but he failed
to answer some important questions. What makes this employer worth all the
work? And the job? How long is the long time he expects to work there? And
what leads him to anticipate that about himself and his employer? Neither are
likely to be the same in a few years.

I stayed with IBM for 4 years out of university. In hindsight, I wish I left
after two years as it was in those first years I learned the most about how
the large operate. The next two years was me getting too comfortable. I could
have kept my energy and learning higher by seeking new professional
experiences that are not available within an org.

------
m23khan
This is the _main_ reason I love being in IT - I myself have a MSc in Computer
Science but whenever I come across folks in IT who don't have CS or IT-related
degree (most of whom are as-smart-as or smarter then me), I look at them as
motivating and inspirational individuals.

This is the beauty of IT and the core of our industry's success - the
experience and thought processes of all the individuals from diverse academic
and work experiences combine to make IT a truly multi-dimensional job field.

------
jonkiddy
I believe that the general public does not understand the term computer
science. I also don't believe that any CS grad is better off in the job market
as a result of the courses taken, but rather is only highly sought after as a
job candidate because of the degree's title. I often wonder if HR/hiring-
managers will eventual wake up to the fact that a large part of the work that
is typically required for such jobs can be accomplished by any dedicated
individual willing to put in the time building a portfolio (aka ~10,000 hours)
and then learn on the job.

------
bestest
I bet there's quite a bit of us here, who could tell a story on "How _I_ got
my career in the tech industry without any degree at all".

Same for me. And although I could tell a longer story, the TLDR is "love what
you do and the rest will come naturally".

------
Quarrelsome
Why did he have to go through hundreds of applications and interviews? I feel
like someone should have hired him _much_ sooner. Just on the basis of his
words alone.

I too managed to get into programming without a degree but for me the path was
as simple as convincing an employer (while I was a cold-calling salesman) I
could write a better product than the one they were using.

------
DigitalSea
I don't think getting a programming job without possessing a degree is that
rare of a story anymore. You can teach yourself anything online. I am actually
self-taught developer and when I started, I was working primarily with people
who had degrees, occasionally coming across another self-taught developer. I
started about 12 years ago, but now I am increasingly encountering self-taught
programmers who can run rings around developers with degrees.

------
porter
Back in 2010 I quit my banking job and took all of the undergrad computer
science courses at a state college. This was still at the bottom of the
recession, before all these coding bootcamps got started. I learned a ton and
taught myself python/django on the side. Then I built a saas product and have
been doing that full time ever since. I'm not a great programmer, but I'm good
enough to work with developers I now hire. Back when I did this everyone
thought I was crazy and most finance people still thought programming was
lame. Now that seems to have totally switched and everyone wants to be a
programmer. It's a bit surreal looking back, but if I could do it again I'd
probably consider one of the programming bootcamps. Of course now you're
probably better off doing the uncool thing, like becoming a banker.

------
gigatexal
My main takeaway: the author was tremendously motivated and with perseverance
and skill he succeeded. That perseverance part is something I have to remind
myself of when I face setbacks.

Props to the author and his journey.

------
hbcondo714
> I also signed up for Hired which ended up having the best response
> rate—their platform is where I eventually found my current job.

Would the author of the article mind sharing their Hired.com preferences? I've
been trying Hired.com for 5 months and still receive the same response:

"You have great experience! Unfortunately, at this time we don’t have enough
opportunities that match your role and location preferences. We’ve added your
name to our waitlist and will be in touch as soon as we’re confident that we
can provide you with quality opportunities!"

------
austincheney
This article is full of assumptions.

First of all you don't need a college education to work in software
development. I have a Bachelor's, but not in CS and I have known some great
developers who have no college at all. I am completely self-taught. You have
endless time to learn this stuff on military deployments. Developers, who
don't suck, are in crazy demand... particularly if you have web skills and
don't suck. I rarely see CS graduates writing original JavaScript applications
without large frameworks, for example.

Secondly, it appears his dream job is in the bay area. If you are young and
single this might be true. The Y Combinator folks claim it is the place to be
to start a company, but for everybody else it is expensive. I can have a
larger house in Texas for 20% of the cost and reduced cost of living across
the board. That said I see little value in moving to the bay area because I
doubt there is a corporate dream job that is going to pay me 5x more to live
just as well. I have known several people who have moved from CA to TX just to
afford a house (any house).

Finally, there are major differences between development skill and marketing
skill (promotions). You can suck at one and rock at the other, but only one of
those is going to make a solid first impression and only one will actually
define your value after a year of employment.

------
synaesthesisx
Oddly enough developers at my last company who were self-taught were
consistently better than those that had formal CS education...

~~~
tonyedgecombe
Hiring is full of so many biases, in this industry in particular. Maybe your
employer is using that to their advantage by hiring good candidates other
people turn away for no good reason.

------
TheGRS
Great story! It kind of makes me wonder about my own story to be honest, since
I also do not have a CS degree yet I've learned to love coding. I am not
really sure what my "dream job" would be though. I've thought about it on a
few occasions and I always fall short of coming up with something that really
"wow's" me enough to start down a new career path. Would be interested if
anyone else has that same sort of existential crisis. I enjoy my job enough
that I can't seem to come up with anything else that I'd love doing with my
time, but I'm also not "in love" with my current job.

~~~
framebit
Your career does not have to be the great love of your life.

It's okay to have a job that's just a good day job and let your real passion
live outside of it: family, hobbies, volunteering, maybe religious practice if
you're so inclined. There is so much more to life than just your career.

------
HoppedUpMenace
What I got from this was that you got your job because you learned to say the
right things and show off the right stuff to the person(s) interviewing you,
after 100's of failed attempts. I guess statistically, you were bound to get a
hit eventually.

"Do a huge volume of work. It is only by going through a volume of work that
you’re going to catch up. And the work you’re making will be as good as your
ambitions."

\- Ira Glass

Yeah well... That doesn't necessarily translate into quality work in the real
world now does it? I'll even go as far as saying that that quote in particular
is the TLDR of this story.

------
rebootthesystem
Love these stories. That's the way you do it. No whining. Pick a goal and work
harder than others to achieve it. Plain and simple.

Also very much related to another discussion where the top n% (the rich) are
blamed for just about everything. Here's where I get pounded [1] for daring to
say opportunity in the US is what you make of it and the top n% have nothing
to do with it.

I am sure there are a thousand people who want to be Bill Mei. Yet few are
willing to take the risk and invest the time and effort he did in order to
rise well past the average. What's sad is when some choose to blame people
like Bill for their own failings.

Want a formula to be rich by the time you retire at, say, 55 years of age?

Work your tail off so that by the time you are 20 you can start to put away
$1,000 per month.

In other words, be Bill.

Be frugal.

Invest the money somewhere relatively safe where you can earn at least 7% per
year on average. If you pay attention that is not difficult at all in the long
term.

Marry well.

Be frugal.

Do this and you'll reach 55 years of age with around two million dollars in
the bank.

Continue to do it until you are 65 and you'll have nearly four million.

Or, if you actually start drawing $25,000 a year from your investment at 56
years of age, you will reach nearly $3.4 million by age 65.

It's actually better than that because I compounded interest annually in my
calculation.

With the opportunities available today in the US (and other places) almost
anyone can work hard for a couple of years and get to the point where they can
save $1,000 a month. This is particularly true for a couple. The key is not to
burn cash on stupid shit, which can be hard. After a while you make it part of
your normal process. I drive a car with over 200,000 miles. I can go out and
pay cash for just about any new car in the market today. Waste of money.

Not that hard folks.

I wish they taught kids about finance and money in high school.

[1]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13848530](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13848530)

------
asitdhal
It's a good story.

I know many people who studied life science subjects like Chemistry or Physics
and got jobs in top cs companies. Most of them were self taught(physics dudes
use some level of programming )

To be a programmer, you need to have a solid problem-solving skill. Pick up a
language(invest money in books in any one programming language, DS and Algo,
OOPS) and invest time in websites like hackerrank.

You can easily build anything on the above skills. No matter how well you
studied basic database and os stuffs, you will always need a google search
before using in real life.

------
kcorbitt
Very inspirational, but I'd be interested in knowing what exactly the author
was optimizing for in his job search, and how he decided that FutureAdvisor
"best aligned with [his] personal values." In the current hiring climate it's
not exactly hard to find a software development job in the Bay Area if you
show a bit of talent, so I'm assuming with the number of contacts he made he
wasn't just looking for the first company that would take him on.

------
halfnibble
This exact process is something I seriously considered doing, but then I
couldn't convince myself to spend that much time and effort trying to work for
someone else. So, I work for myself on behalf of some very grateful clients.
And that has turned out to be my dream _job_. (This became entirely too
obvious when I found the espresso machine in my kitchen to be better than
those in the most desirable Seattle-area startups).

------
ryandrake
I'm surprised the author mentioned taking linear algebra in high school. My
high school math was bottom-of-the-barrel shitty (we barely touched on
calculus, and the teacher didn't even know what an integral was). I don't know
a single person whose high school math curriculum contained more than one
calculus class, let alone linear algebra.

~~~
bigger_cheese
I was taught simple linear Algebra in year 11/12 in Australia during early
00's. Stuff like Matrix alegbra, vector multiplication and simple matrix
transformations (rotations, shear etc). This was in the advanced math class at
a public school.

At the time I thought it was pretty poorly taught and I didn't really
understand it very well until we covered the same topics in first year of
university.

------
navinsylvester
Really heart warming to see this kid. Hope he achieves the success he
deserves.

But he has to understand what skill sets him apart. The things that stood out
were all the non technical part. He looks like a solid entrepreneur material.
Hope he realizes and quit working for others soon.

------
yonatron
Good story. Well played! (Note: it's "cede control", not "secede control".)

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sauronlord
"Dream JOB"

There is no such thing my friends.

Unless you consider getting laid off or resigning within a few years your
dream.

You will never be long-term wealthy or happy with a job. You might get rich,
but not wealthy.

Mind your own business.

~~~
seattle_spring
> Mind your own business.

Speak for yourself, champ. Not everyone's dream is to become rich, or wealthy,
or anything of the sort. Some people just want to work on cool problems, be
around interesting people, and be paid relatively well to do so.

~~~
sauronlord
You're missing the point.

"Mind your own business" means structuring things simply and in such a way
that you get paid more (ie: minimize tax expense... which IS your biggest
expense).

Wealth = Time * Health

You basically proved my point with:

"Some people just want to work on cool problems, be around interesting people,
and be paid relatively well to do so."

Those things are possible due to time and health.

A job takes the best, sunniest part of the day away from you (usually) and
your autonomy (freedom to work on cool problems of Your choosing, being around
interesting people of your choosing and when you want to) and then your
biggest expense is your taxes.

Wealth as defined by time and health is something we all want. Health is our
most precious asset (ie: puts money in our pockets due to intelligence,
ability to work) and time is our most valuable resource (can never get more,
once it is spent you cannot earn more).

Anyone that does not place Wealth as one of their highest aims is either a
complete idiot at worst or grossly misinformed about what Wealth actually
means at best.

~~~
ashark
> "Mind your own business" means structuring things simply and in such a way
> that you get paid more (ie: minimize tax expense... which IS your biggest
> expense).

I'm having trouble figuring out what you could mean by this that isn't some
variety of "you know how to make money? Already have a lot of money." What
_do_ you mean?

~~~
sauronlord
Your dream could be to serve another man's or woman's dream. But why?

Quick example:

\- get paid $S as employee, government takes X% in income tax

\- get paid $S as consultant/corporation, government takes Y% in corporate tax

Usually X > Y and you have no ability to write-off your operating expenses as
an employee, but can as an incorporated entity (phone plan, fuel, portion of
your rent/mortgage, office supplies, etc)

It is about Structuring your life and professional dealings in a way to keep
more money in your pocket (and have your money work for You, instead of You
working for money).

------
mustafabisic1
I love this quote bro "No one owes you a great career [...] you need to earn
it—and the process won’t be easy."

And emails were cool as well. Way to show how to get your dream job <3

------
eng_monkey
Big revelation: Computer Science has very little to do with 'coding' Web pages
using FrontPage.

------
pfarnsworth
The author appears to be employed as a management consultant. If he's doing
programming, is he in breach of his visa, presumably a TN?

------
jaimex2
Whats the tldr of this story?

~~~
aquabib
He got a programming job without a CS degree. There are so many programmers
working without any degree, I fail to see why this blog post was worth writing
and posting anywhere. Nothing special here.

Actually he does not even state that the job he got was a programming job,
just that it was his "dream job." But what makes it a dream job?

