Promotions Without Burnout - Principal Engineering Manager AMA

I should have switched my internet before I connected here, but hopefully this works. There's one way to find out. Let's see how we do. All right, folks. I'm just getting the streams going. We'll test out the chat in a sec. My lens on my camera is all screwed up. Unfortunately, that's how it goes sometimes. This is the second time. This is the second lens I'm on and the the second time that it's broken. So, the autofocus ends up going. And I'm not sure why. Um, the first time I think the motor actually broke in the lens and then this time I don't know because if I put it in a manual focus mode like it is now, I actually can't adjust the the lens at all. And it also seems like it is stuck doing something weird with the um I don't know like the the aperture or something something funky with camera stuff. I think there's too much light going into the lens. So, I actually have my lights dimmed because it was like a wall of white and I don't know how to fix it. But yeah, like it's not focusing on anything now, but I have in manual focus mode. So, hopefully if I keep my head right here, everything will be okay. But welcome to the live stream, folks. Um, got a topic for today. It's going to be promotions without burnout. If you're new to the live streams, welcome. I'm happy to have you here. These live streams are very much like an AMA format. So um if you are new then you know feel free at any point jump into the chat. Um you know I have you can't see unless you're in my room and I don't know but you can't see but I have a bunch of windows pulled up to see that if I can like watch the chat and stuff which reminds me I got to pull up Substack here so that I'm not lying about saying that. Um, but that way, yeah, if you want to send messages in the chat, I can watch on Instagram, which is a separate chat. Um, I already have to, um, block someone on kick. Um, not new, might as well be. Uh, chat display the messages from all the platforms look bigger today. Yeah, I'm not sure. Um, you're on YouTube. That's interesting. Uh, do you mean in the video feed or do you mean on YouTube itself? because maybe it's just a YouTube platform update or something something funky. I didn't change anything. So, if it looks different in the video itself, maybe that's me somehow. Um, I would be responsible for that. But I didn't change it. So, if it is different, then something changed under my nose and I didn't realize. But yeah, jump into the chat if you have anything you want to talk about. Uh, the topic for the day is promotions without burnout. like I mentioned. So again, if you're new, these topics come from my one YouTube channel called Code Commute. Um I try to take like questions or I go to Reddit to try and look up interesting things to talk about uh chat about them on in the video feed. If anything, making it a little bigger wouldn't be a bad thing. Okay, I can do that. Let me Is that that big? Maybe. Is that changing as I do it? Can you guys see that? Oh, yeah, you can. Cool. It's very delayed. So, let's let's do that right there. Something beside my head. Um, yeah. So, code commute is where I try to do questions from uh that are submitted or from Reddit and then I talk through them and then I write a newsletter article. So, if you want to see it, the newsletter article is here. Just going to put it into the chat. And um it's an email newsletter, but if you're like, "Hey, that sounds dumb. I don't want to get more email." Uh, that's totally cool. You can check out weekly.devleer.ca and just kind of treat it like a blog. Um, and that way if you enjoy the live streams, you can see what the topic's going to be. I will remind folks right now because I will forget that um I'm going to actually be on vacation this weekend coming up. Um, that means I I have to see. I might I might still do a newsletter article. Uh, but I won't have a live stream. Am I going to be in Las Vegas? My wife and I are going to a concert and I think it's called When We Were When We Were Young or something, but it's like all these like punk rock bands and like rock bands from when we were young. So, I think like like Blink182 is going to be there. It's going to be super cool. Um, yeah, the nostalgia. I can I can taste it. Yeah. So, I won't do a live stream unfortunately, but I will probably do a newsletter article because I like writing them. I like getting this stuff out there. But yeah, it's going to be about burnout. So, one sec. Oh, am I being silly today? Yeah. You know what? Give me one sec. I don't have to do what I'm doing over here. Oh, I can't get rid of that. Um, I set I set up my stuff for like doing uh like YouTube video recording. So, I have two like recording things set up and I don't need to do that. I just need this one. But I was just going to show you that if I go over to this view, uh this is where the newsletter article is if you want to check it out. Um and again, um if you are interested like code commute, this is the video I did talking about this topic. And I try to if I'm going to be doing a live stream, I will put uh the link to the live stream like right at the top of the newsletter article. So again, if you enjoy being here, check out this check out the newsletter and then you can click the link at the top. Uh but for now, you can look at my my big dumb face here. Yeah, do a live stream from the event. That would be cool. I actually um I have to get over like my I don't know. It's probably fear, my awkwardness of doing like recording at places. So, for example, when I went to that um that conference recently, commit your code that was in Dallas. I I brought my like camera. So, I brought my my code commute camera. Had it all with me. I brought microphones and I was like, "Oh, I'm going to talk to people when I'm there and like I'll record and I have two mics and it'll be fun." and I brought my my 360 cam and I was like all excited and then I like didn't pull it out. And I think it's because um that is a situation where like my introvertedness like takes over and I'm like I can't I'm not going to pull a camera out here. But you know what? I feel kind of stupid for it because I think if I would have just gotten started doing it, it would have been a lot of fun. Uh but I think I'm like too self-conscious about it. So um someday but I feel too awkward right now. But anyway, topic is promotion without burnout because the topic that came from Reddit, this is kind of an interesting one. Um, I didn't write the newsletter article with this like specifically in mind, the the Reddit topic, but the Reddit topic was an individual that was in their post. They were kind of talking about the situation. It sounds like they had talked to their manager about promotion and stuff like that. Their manager is like, "Yeah, like you're on track. Like you're doing all the right things." And then this person was like, "Yeah, but like I think I need to do more." So like, "Hey, Reddit, like what are the things I should be doing more of?" And I thought this was interesting because I mean for a couple different reasons. One is like the the feedback from a manager when they're like, "Hey, yeah, you're you're doing great. Pat on the back." Um, it's a bit of like a crappy way to give feedback, but at the same time, I have absolutely had people like on my teams where in my mind I'm like, "This person is definitely on track for promotion. Like, the next time there's rewards, conversations, and stuff like I plan to put them up for promotion, this kind of thing." And so, part of me wants to be like, "Yes, you are doing a good job. No, there's nothing else you need to be doing aside from what you're currently doing. Everything's on track." But this feedback feels kind of weird because it's like the end result is the same where it's like I just, you know, keep doing what you're doing. But I think the difference is really like offering clarity aside from just like yeah, you're doing a good job. Pat on the back. This is sort of the the cheater feedback. It feels kind of like there's there's no effort put into it and it doesn't feel actionable. But at the same time, I know that I have tried to give feedback to people where it's like, I don't expect that you're going to do other sorts of, you know, intense things like taking on, you know, random new projects and stuff. I just want you to keep doing what you're focused on and things are in in good shape. So, when I was reading this post originally on Reddit, I was thinking like I I don't know which angle to take here because maybe their manager is sort of like the typical not so great manager that's like you're doing a good job and you're like does that actually mean I'm doing a good job or or what? Um, so I'm like maybe that's one angle, but then the other side was I was like I feel like this person even the way they wrote it, even if they had feedback from their manager that was like, "Hey, look man, like next promotion cycle we're putting you up for promotion. I feel confident about this, I feel like based on how they wrote it, they wouldn't really believe that and they would still want to do more." So, I took it um more along the lines of like, hey, look, like here's things to focus on, but at the same time, if you get clear feedback, which is one of the things I talk about all of the time is like level set expectations, right? Have this conversation. If you're getting that feedback and then you still on top of that try to do more, like you are probably on a path for just like doing too much and burning yourself out. So, that was kind of the meta point that I wanted to get across when I was writing this. Um, and just checking the chat. Um, Ryan says, "Unless they explicitly say in the Oh, oh, talking about the the the filming." Yeah, I I don't know at the concert the concert I probably won't just cuz if I'm with my wife, she's going to be like, "Don't you dare pull your camera out." Um, because even if I can get over the awkwardness, I don't think she can. Um, which reminds me, I like a year ago I tried to film um a video with my wife on the couch. That sounds terrible. Um, we were talking about uh burnout. Um, and I actually I the reason I got the second mic for my setup was so that I could sit down with my wife and we did like a an interview, but the audio wasn't on. It was so so frustrating cuz uh she's a therapist and so we were talking about burnout and she was giving her perspective on it from like I don't know like a a better perspective than mine cuz she actually knows what she's talking about and um and then there was no audio so I should probably ask her to film that again. Um I was so proud that she did it um it was super cool um and I thought that it was super helpful so I'll I'll ask her again but we'll see. Um, yeah, Deon says, "At one job, I got the pat on the back feedback for 5 years." Uh, yes, I stayed there too long. Yeah. Um, unfortunately, right, it's it's hard. It's there's a a tricky balance because there's some environments where like it feels like you're I feel like I don't I haven't really had this, but I've heard from people saying like no matter what like their manager is just like like it feels like they have a terrible manager. They're like, "I hate doing what I'm doing. my manager is always asking for more and like it's like they're a tyrant but at the same time um if you guys haven't heard the um there's like radical cander which is a book it's awesome but in that book they talk about another sort of quadrant and it's called um ruinous empathy and that's uh like one of the worst um to be in as a manager because you end up thinking that you're helping people just by like being nice, right? like, "Yeah, good job." And it's like, "Is that actually helpful?" Like, it's one thing to let people know when they're doing a good job, but if you never give them constructive criticism or help them grow, then like then you're not actually helping them, right? Is the video dead. I hope not. Someone on YouTube, let me know. I have to maybe I'll join on LinkedIn and see. That's crappy. Um it's going to be one of those days. It must be Monday, right? But anyway, um yeah, ruinous empathy empathy is pretty crappy. Um but it's a hard balance because you you need to find someone who's willing to give you feedback that's going to help you grow without like overwhelming you or just feeling negative all the the time. Awesome. Thanks, Devin. Um sorry, Nick Clark. I hope it comes back on LinkedIn. I don't see anything on my side that says it's busted. So, give her the old refresh. Refresher. Um, cool. So, and then Ryan says, "I've always been in conflict about the whole do the work equivalent to your pay and only do more when you get paid more thing." Yeah. Um, it's tricky, right? the I think one of the the points I was hopefully trying to get across in this article and I'm not sure if it came across in the code commute video to be honest. I can't remember um I can't remember how that conversation actually went but the one of the things I was trying to convey was like there's a balance for everyone right there's some people and it will change at different points in your life and in your career and stuff but there's going to be times uh for I would say probably for most people where you're like hell yeah motivated and you're like I want to do more I want I want whatever's next like want to level up and and bust your ass for it and that's great. But at the same time, like if you go your entire life like that, unless you just enjoy that process, you're probably going to reach a point where you're like, "Oh my god, what am I doing?" Like um and it's kind of like dangerous. Dangerous feels like a strong word, but I feel like dangerous for like your mental health and and probably your well-being in general because like at that point, like what are you actually doing with your life aside from just like perpetual burnout? The flip side is like, you know, you probably want people to be able to strive for a little bit more for improving themselves and, you know, achieving more, but there is a balance and that's going to look different for everyone. That's going to look different for individuals at different points in their life. So, um, yeah, and then I'm just reading Devon's comment because the the one thing I wanted to add on was like there is this idea that um, and it's I would say I don't have like stats to prove this, but I feel like the the most common thing when it comes for promotions is like as managers, sorry, there's so much dog and cat hair on this. I can see it like flapping in front of my face and I just want to like pull it. um it's very distracting but um as managers we want to make sure that people are operating at that next level before giving them the promotion and that's because what you generally don't want to do is hope and pray that someone is going to be able to do the job so you're like you take the risk on them to do it um I say this as the more common thing right there's ab like I would say even when I was made a manager when I was at a startup they probably took a risk on me because they were like we don't know what the hell's going on. We need a manager and you know you can talk to the engineers or like lead these teams. So like that that's probably not the common thing right but in general it's like you don't want to promise something to someone like here's the next level I hope you can do it. You kind of want to see that they are doing it. And one of the the reasons for that, I mean there's a handful, but one of them is like especially at higher levels as a manager, like I need to go advocate for that employee, right? So I need to make a case for them to my peers, to my manager, to my skip level manager. And sometimes like to the point where my skip level would need to go to the rest of like their peers and advocate as well. So if I don't feel super confident, like that's not going to pan out so well. I'm not going to go, hey, like, you know, Bob Bob can probably do it. I feel like Bob could probably do it. So, like, maybe we should we should do that for Bob and then we can see if Bob will do it. It's like, no, Bob better be proving that Bob can do it. And I need the evidence and that way I can go convince and influence beyond. Right. So, um, that's kind of the framing there. Deon says, "I think some managers would like to promote, but the org makes it too difficult." Yep. In those cases, the manager might feel helpless but not feel like they can share that with the reports. Yeah, absolutely. Um there's situations like this, right? There's there's budget constraints. Um there's timing constraints with budget as well. So like just to give you an example at Microsoft, at least in uh the Office 365 side of the world where I work, there's four promotion times of the year. There's the primary one and that's sort of like where you have promotions and rewards like for the company basically or at least in our org. I'm assuming it's the same across the company. I don't know. It's big. And then there's like the exact opposite time of the year, right? Right. So like 6 months later and that's the next biggest promotion, but it's like that that the amount of promotions around that time are like a small fraction compared to the the main the main one. And then there's two others sort of at the other like quarters of the year. And that that last quarter it's not the I don't know if you call it the last or the first. The third quarter, let's call it that. Um that one is the least, right? that's like there's there's not a lot of budget by that time usually and it's like okay well if if you're kind of on the fence at that point you might as well wait for the main one unless there is budget and then you try to push people through but it's like it's weird um so there's situations where I'm like yeah this person if there was budget I would probably try to push for this person um but often there isn't so it's like I have to wait and I can I can imagine in different teams and different companies and stuff like you might be looking at a situ I'm imagining like a startup or something, right? And it's like, okay, you want to promote this person, but like I don't know like what's that going to mean budget-wise? What's that going to mean for team structure-wise? Um, do we have too I'm just making this up. Do we have too many people on this team that are like now going to be like at a senior level or something? And like there's no juniors left on the team. Should we reshuffle people across these teams so it's more balanced? Like there's a lot of weird stuff going on. You might be in a position as a manager where like um for some reason, you know, you you feel like you have a good handle on the team. Um you feel like you can advocate for people, but when it comes to convincing others, like you're getting weird push back that you don't understand. So the the word that Devon used was like was feeling helpless and like so you could imagine that there's different circumstances that would result in a manager being like I can't influence the way I need to and again different organizations different teams and stuff that could that could be uh certainly contributing factors to that and then you're left in a position where you're like like I will I I want to say I will never I'm I hope I never again in my career uh promised people promotions and timing because I have before where I've I've been convinced that um like things were going to happen. I've literally been in situations where um I had like fought for someone to get promoted and then like had gone through multiple rounds of like fighting for them because there was budget and then that budget got pulled but I had told them. So, um I will try to never do that again because that is uh one of the worst conversations to ever have. So, don't want to repeat that. Okay. Um article-wise, what did I say? Um I kind of already talked about this first one promoting uh for um like evidence-based, not hopebased. It's kind of the first thing I talked about. So I think the sort of the last point on this topic that I I wanted to mention was like I think that's an important mindset shift for individuals because um if you're feeling like you're not being given a chance, right? If that's the mental framing you have like I wish someone would take the chance on me to put me into that level or to like to make me senior whatever the next level is. If you're like, I wish someone would give me the chance for it. I think you will continuously be frustrated. And I say that because I just think that framing is sort of like the wrong way to look at it. It's not I need the chance, right? Not chance or the, you know, give me the opportunity and hope it works. It's you need to be able to prove it. Now, it's different if you're saying those opportunities aren't coming up or you're trying different things and people are taking those opportunities from you. That's different when it comes to projects and stuff. But if you're like kind of waiting that this is the sort of the the difference, pardon me. If you're waiting and going like I wish someone would give me the chance, I think that's where you're going to continually be frustrated. So, uh try to shift that that perspective. That's kind of the first part I was writing about and wanted to touch on here. Um the one of the big sort of takeaways from this um was really around like more work not being the solution necessarily. And I think I I probably wrote a a silly example in the newsletter and I don't know if on code commute I actually did a better job or not, but the sort of contrived example I think through is like um when we're when we're more junior as developers, um I don't know if people, you know, you might be junior right now if you're watching this. Um, there might be individuals that can remember this in the beginning like when you're first joining a team or you're first getting started. There's going to be situations where you're like, you know, you're getting your first, you know, story or bug fix or whatever and it's small, but like you're working through it and like you get it done, right? And then you get another one and then at some point you're able to kind of juggle a couple of these. And the point is that like in the beginning the work is, you know, it's relatively small. It's relatively well scoped. It's not overly complex, right? This is on purpose. It's because people want to make sure that you have momentum so that you can keep delivering. You can build the momentum and build autonomy as well. And that way you become more independent. Independent doesn't mean siloed, by the way, or like isolated. It just means that you don't need to rely on other people at every step along the way. But it's kind of expected in the beginning like you're going to have a lot of questions. People have to guide you more. That's totally fine. But over time, you build this momentum and you build some independence. The the reality is that as that work becomes more complex, right, it's more ambiguous, more complex, you're going to be working on things that have bigger impact. But what's not happening is like it doesn't scale linearly in terms of like the number of things you're doing. So, as an example, I don't have good numbers in my head, so this is going to be right off the top of my head, and I hope it doesn't come back to bite me when I try to go through this. But in if you're like, you know, when you're very junior, like you're able to juggle one thing at a time, and maybe I don't know if you're doing two week sprints or something, if you even use sprints, like you're in two weeks, you get, you know, uh, one thing done and then at some point, you know, not long after, you're getting two things done in the sprint, right? So like one thing delivered per week and then you start building more and more momentum till you get to the point where maybe like in a sprint that's two weeks maybe you're getting like you know three or four things done. That's like three or four times what you were doing in the beginning. Like that's that's pretty good, right? But what doesn't happen in terms of scaling is it's not like okay well now you're senior you got to get 10 things done in the sprint. You got to get 15 things done in the sprint. Oh, you want to get to principal level? That's 30 things done in the sprint. Like, it doesn't it doesn't work that way, right? I'm trying to use like a kind of a silly example to illustrate it, but it's not just more things because if that were the mindset, it's like, okay, well, there's not enough time. Like, we have to find more time, so I got to work late. I got to work the weekends. I got to get more of these things done, right? That's not how it works. It's that the work that you're doing is more impactful. It's more complex. It's more ambiguous. It requires coordination with more people, different stakeholders, and the impact that you're delivering is greater. It might even take you a longer time horizon. So, it actually goes the opposite way. Maybe in a sprint, you don't land, you know, the the big project that you're working on. Maybe that's going to take you five sprints in total, right? You deliver things along the way, but like it's not just about landing more and more things. So the the idea here is that like this this more and more thing can kind of scale in the beginning. It kind of does happen because the things you are working on are smaller and more well understood. That's totally fine but it will change. And so I I want people to think about this mental model of like the work that you're doing becomes more impactful and it's not just about doing more individual things. But that's part of it. The other thing is that like there were did I okay no I kind of I kind of talked about it here but I think I talked about it in code commute and um this like I think I I like I knew this already but I think the way that my manager had talked to me about it like he said it in a pretty succinct way and I I was like that's going to I feel like it's easier like for me to kind of recall this and like repeat it but the way that he talked about promotions and stuff. He was he was like, "Look, like if you find that in order to like work towards a promotion if you're like that's going to require like late nights, right?" Because some people will do this. Like I got to bust my ass if I want to get promoted, right? Like if you're trying to be at the next level, you have to, you know, do more and work harder. And like it's like kind of true. But if you're doing this like working late nights all the time or like you're trading all of your weekends all the time, you're kind of working like six or seven days a week like you know 10 to 12 hours a day and then you're like well it's okay because if I do that I'm going to get promoted and then once I'm promoted it's okay. It doesn't it doesn't work that way and that's only partially true. It might work. Okay. So let me let me be clear. It might work. You might get promoted doing that. The problem is that when you are promoted and the level goes up, the expectations go up. If you remember one of the first things we were talking about on this stream so far is that you need to be operate like in general, you should be operating at the next level to earn the next level. So if you are doing all of these things to get your productivity or the effectiveness of your work at the next level, if that requires that you're always working late, always working weekends and just like way way way more work, you're doing that to be at the next level. Now you're proving you're at that next level. So what happens when you go, great, I got there. Now I don't need to work the weekends. Now we don't need to work extra hours. You were here now, right? You're not you're not making use of your time effectively. You're just adding in more time to get more stuff done. So you either stay at that spot and you burn the hell out or you need to work on becoming more effective. So what I'm not saying is you should never work extra or you can never work a weekend or whatever. You need to find balance. But the point is, if that's the only way or the only sort of leverage you have to get more effective is just to add in more time, you probably will not be able to sustain that long term. Um, Ryan says, "Working more to the point of destroying your priorities of things like family and life and your own mental sanity, it is not worth it." Um, and Devon agrees, so I agree as well. Um I have said this on code commute like when I tell sort of my story before Microsoft and stuff when I worked at a startup I like I I like to work just for transparency. Uh and I'm not saying that that makes me better or anything like that. I enjoy working because I like creating things and like it makes me feel good to be part of like making things like it it just feels good. So, I like to work. Um, I also like that's nuance. I don't just like doing like if someone's like here's an order, go do it. Like that's not going to make me feel good. I like being creative and getting to do that. But when I worked at a startup before Microsoft, um, I didn't really have like other priorities and stuff going on in life. So, it was pretty simple and straightforward like wake up, work, go to the gym, work. Like, that was it. And I was, you know, I I want to say I was happy. I probably was not a happy human. Realistically, there's probably a lot of things like I didn't realize like kind of behind the scenes going on, but like that was a feedback loop that I was bought into. like I enjoyed work and I didn't have other responsibilities. But what I didn't realize, and the reason I'm saying this is because as Ryan put it in his message, I feel like that's a very um and I think it's good. It's a very obvious like understandable way, right? Like to working to the point of destroying your priorities of things like family, family life, and your own mental sanity, right? The reason I'm giving my example is because I didn't realize I was destroying my priorities. I didn't realize I was destroying family life, right? I had moved away from home and it was like I'd periodically see my family. I didn't have a girlfriend or anything for most of that time. So, like wasn't married, no kids or anything like that. But I could go back and visit my parents. My sister had moved across Canada, so she was far away. But hey, my parents, they're an hour and a half away. my friends, you know, they're all like an hour, an hour and a half away. Um, like, you know, friends from high school and stuff. I have some friends in the in the city, whatever, right? But what I what I didn't realize was that over time, like those things were taking more and more and more of a backseat. I was not aware of what Ryan wrote in his message. I wasn't aware these things like like work life was kind of destroying everything else around me because it didn't feel like that, right? I'm I'm doing what I enjoy and I still go to the gym and stuff every day. So, I like I got my got the health part down, you know? I'm doing well in my career. I'm enjoying the work. Like, what else do I need? So, the reason I I walk through my example is like for for those of you that may be in a situation like I was, um, I just wasn't aware. I didn't have the awareness for it. I'm realizing now from my wife that might be more things like ADHD or something. Maybe I should go talk to someone about that so I can understand it better. But maybe that's something going on where I don't have the ability to like filter those things effectively. And as a result, it was like just kind of this uh perpetual thing going on. So, um you know, the one thing I did along the way to try and help with that, and I've told this story before, like I got my dog Laya. Um so, that was something that I did to try and break me out of the pattern of like wake up, go to work, stay at work, go to the gym, go back to work. Like, I got to do something else. I need to be around for this animal. It's a life that I have to take care of. So, um, yeah, I just I totally agree with what Ryan says. I'm just kind of adding in that you may not be aware that that kind of thing's happening. Um, and maybe you are aware and maybe it's something like you're not sure how to break out of it. Um, but I think the first step is like awareness, right? If you're not aware, it's very hard to take action. Deon says, "During my startup, uh, my time at a startup, I was taking care of uh everything, but I was so immersed in work that I wasn't taking time to learn." Interesting. So, my effectiveness wasn't great. Yeah, that's that's interesting, right? So, like there's a trade-off, right? And that Devon's trade-off that he's describing is, you know, different than than what my trade-off was. But the point being that when you're very immersed in this kind of stuff, like probably something's going to give because the thing that we're all trading is like more time at work, being more immersed in work. So like that's the thing that we're trading or that's the thing that we're doing and the things that we're trading for that might look different. Um so yeah hopefully that part makes sense where it's not just like you can't indefinitely add more capacity. You may have points in time in your life. So the the sort of the the devil's advocate that I would like to give in my example um because I if if someone said well Nick would you change what you did I'm not sure to be honest even with the hindsight like part of me wants to say yes right like I think that you know I developed social anxiety so I think I'd like to like make that better I was always introverted but like it got to the point where I was like I don't even know if I want to hang out with my friends because if they're around other people I don't know then like that might be kind of weird and like maybe it's just easier to stay at home. So I didn't like that part about my life. Um I think realistically I was probably um like way low like this is going to sound kind of funny but I I mean it like at a like at a human level I was probably way lonelier than I cared to admit to myself or like even acknowledge or realize. And like that's like going back to the social anxiety and stuff. So part of me was like, hey, well, if I just remove myself from people, but then you become lonely as a result of that. I just don't think I really clued into that. So I think there are aspects to that that I would like to change, if I could go back and do it again. But at the same time, like I I am not I don't regret like working my ass off. I don't regret that. I enjoyed it. I learned a ton. um made a lot of progress doing that. You know, I feel like I put my career in the right direction. Like there's a lot of good things that came out of that. So, I think I would adjust it a little bit or like have a little bit more self-awareness, but I don't think that I would fundamentally change how I did that. Now, at this point in my life, right, like I am married, we don't have kids, but I can't work like 12 or 14 hour days. can't do that or like and like this is sometimes it's kind of hard because like I like to do content creation and stuff after work and like on weekends I am trying to do like some work but it's not my 9 to5 but I have to be careful about how much time I'm spending doing stuff because I have other things going on in my life. Uh Ryan says the biggest problem is you don't realize you're destroying your priorities until it's too late. Yeah, exactly. So you're able to catch it early, take the bull by the horns and fix it. Yeah, before it's too late. Exactly. Totally agreed. So I think I think that's the number one thing if I could go back I would probably like try to give myself more awareness to be like hey you realize this has an impact because I don't think that um I understood that and I've said this on code commute before. I talk about um my HR leader that I had throughout my time at that startup and she would tell me all the time. She's like you are going to burn yourself out. And I remember being like, "Look, like, no, I'm not like, I'm fine. I I'm enjoying what I'm doing. I don't feel like burnt out. Like, like I would stop if I didn't like what I was doing, right? Is very adamant about this. I'm not going to burn myself out. I'm not going to burn myself out." But she's smarter than me and it's just that it looked different, right? It this just goes back to I didn't realize I was kind of giving up these other things in my life. she had a lot more awareness being able to observe me and being like, "Hey, like that's not a sustainable thing." So, um, saying this all out loud because maybe you're thinking about it like how I used to and I think just a different perspective can kind of help. Okay. Um, one of the things I wrote down in this article was around like I titled the section like stretch don't snap. And what I mean by that is like I think it's okay and like it makes sense that you need to stretch a little bit when you're trying to go like for the next level. What does this mean? Well, like if you think about what you're doing now versus what you need to be doing at the next level, that might require that you're doing more things. It might require that you're doing things that you're uncomfortable with because you haven't done them yet before, right? You need to stretch in some way so that you can be trying things at that next level. What that doesn't mean is that you overload yourself with a bunch of stuff that you can't do or a bunch of stuff that's going to take so much of your time and sort of distract you from your core responsibilities that all of a sudden you can't keep up with your normal work, right? That's not what we want to have happen. We want to make sure that we can I don't know like I'm using the word stretch. I hope that makes sense. I know it's kind of a weird you word to use for like people like we're stretching people but like you know kind of putting yourself into a situation where it's a little bit uncomfortable because you are learning things or you're doing things you haven't like you don't feel like you've mastered yet. This is the whole point like you're trying to do things at that next level, right? Got to stretch a little bit. It's got to be sustainable and you need to make sure that you're not like sort of messing up everything else because now you can't focus on it or you're so focused on this new project that you can't get your other work done that people were expecting you to do. People are expecting that you're doing your core responsibilities as planned because that's what you're getting paid for and then you need to be able to on top of that demonstrate this next level of impact. So it I'm saying that because yes, it is a tricky thing to balance. I'm not trying to make it sound like it's trivial to get promoted and work towards the next level. It is hard work. It does mean getting uncomfortable trying new things, building that experience up, but that's part of it, right? There is a balance to be struck. This next part is really the code commute special because I say this all the time on code commute, but just comes down to having a conversation with your manager early. And uh ideally often, the word often is going to look different for different people, but the idea is of course like get on the same page as your manager because if you are having a perspective about what you're doing, how that's moving you towards promotion, if you have that perspective in your mind, and that is a different perspective than your manager has, you will likely be disappointed. there is this chance that you won't be disappointed. You'll be pleasantly surprised. But regardless, I would say that you want to be like the ideal situation is that you're on the same page and you understand the progress that you're making. I also say that fully acknowledging that not every manager will do a good job of that and being transparent, this kind of thing. So, I get it. Um, but at the same time like you also have a responsibility in that conversation. So, um, I always recommend to people like if if the thought of what I'm about to say makes you feel like wildly uncomfortable about trying to have this conversation with your manager, there's probably a different conversation we should be having before this, which is like like why why is it so difficult for you to to have conversations with your manager? Like what does that working relationship look like? you need to kind of work towards that and improve on that type of situation before you can have meaningful conversations because a lot of what I talk about when I say like, "Hey, you should go, you know, level set expectations with your manager." Like I know I know this cuz I'll read it in comments where people are like, "Oh, my manager like I could never have a conversation like that." And I'm like, "Well, okay, we got to break this down because like is it because you've never tried? Is it because you have tried multiple times?" and like you got a crappy manager like like what what's going on? We have to go figure this situation out first. So again, not saying that's trivial. I don't mean to minimize that, but that is the the first focus. Get to a point where you can have open, honest conversations with your manager. In some cases, that means you're working under a crappy manager. You might be in the wrong spot. In other cases, that might be because you actually have not put in an effort to do it. I hate to be the person to break that to you, but that's potentially the case. Just means you need to go try doing that, right? Um, what I would recommend is once you're in a position where you can have open, honest conversations with your manager, like I think, and I've talked about this on Code Commute, I've actually I've had people come to me and say like, "Hey, like I want to talk about like working towards the next level. Like, can we have a conversation about this?" and like being very direct, very straightforward, not it's not rude, it's not pushy, it's just like, you know, here's the conversation I want to have, here's why I want to have it, and like can we talk through that? Like, absolutely, cool. Like, for me, that's great. Like, I I really appreciate that personally because I understand like sorry, it helps me understand what someone wants to focus their time on. You know, in one-on-one conversations, I like leaving it open for people to bring up what's top of mind for them. Sometimes that's status updates, sometimes that's career stuff, sometimes that's because they got personal stuff going on in their life they need to talk about, balance their time, whatever. But if someone's like, "Hey, I want clarity on like career progression." Excellent. Let's talk through it. Right? So, I wrote down start with intent. So, like go in to have the conversation with your manager and like bring this up as something you want clarity on. And then specifics, right? We kind of talked about this in the beginning. It can be tricky to get specifics because at some point, and I I was trying to be honest and transparent about this earlier. I can't I don't promise people timing for promotions. What I do feel more comfortable saying is like if there's a promotion cycle up, letting people know like, hey, look, like based on everything we're doing, I feel confident going into that to have a conversation about it, right? I I don't feel terrible or too awkward saying that, but I try to be transparent with them, right? Like, I cannot promise you a promotion. I can't that's not it's literally not in my control to do that. I cannot promise it. But I think you asking for specifics around like, hey, if we're talking about things I need to focus on, like what are those things? This is how you try to break through that like oh like you're doing good like pat on the back type of feedback. Cool. I'm doing good. Awesome. What are the what are the things that I'm doing good? Like what are those strengths? Okay. Awesome. Should I continue to focus on those strengths? Like are those the things that are really pushing me forward and I should double down? Because that that can be feedback that's like, hey, these are things that are really stand out for you and like you should keep doing those things. And in some cases it might be like you're doing these things awesome but this other thing over here I don't see enough of that could be a combination of them right ask for specifics and try to talk through that with your manager if you have something like a talent guide or a rubric or a career guide or whatever your company calls it try to walk through that right we have that at Microsoft at least in the office 365 side of things we call it the talent guide actually I think it's called the it's called a rainbow dot sometimes because the the categories of it and stuff are all like colorcoordinated. So like we have that to walk through and those are in that guide. It's like highle things and then I can try to talk to individuals about the projects and stuff they're working on and say here's how this part like parts of this project correspond to this right this is how I get around this. I don't like saying to people finish this project you get promoted. I think that's not a good strategy. But I can say if you work on this project like these are the things that you are building experience in or building like um what's the word like evidence right you're demonstrating evidence of these characteristics by working on this project right at higher levels there is this idea around like what impact have you delivered so sometimes that will mean like if you haven't landed anything and you haven't actually had impact like that becomes a more difficult conversation because at least when I have to go represent someone and make a case for them I need to talk about their impact and if it's like well they haven't actually landed anything or they haven't demonstrated that impact yet that becomes a more difficult conversation. Um, I wrote down plan together and I think that's important because it's really just around like that's where the aligned expectations are. So, if your manager is like, "Hey, I think you need to focus on these things." and you're like, you're not agreeing with it or whatever it happens to be, like that's the thing that you really need to kind of nail down because if you leave a conversation like that and you're just not on the same page, like you you need to have another follow-up conversation to close that gap or else time will elapse and you're going to be left there going like like I don't know like they said this but I I've been focusing on these other things still and like I hope that works. It's like it probably won't if they were giving you clear feedback and you're just ignoring it, right? Or if they're giving you feedback and it's not clear to you, like get on the same page. That was step three in this in this article. Um, and then I wrote down planning a timeline. And I said like like I called out in this part that for me it's not about um like I don't promise an exact timeline or whatever, but I can at least let people know how confident I'm feeling to go represent them, right? And so at least where I'm working now, I kind of mentioned the quarterly promotion um kind of cycles so I can at least have conversations around that. But I try to make it very clear with people. I don't promise exactness. I just think that it's important that you you get alignment on what that looks like because someone might say like, "Hey, I think I'm I think I'm ready for promotion." And if a manager's like, "Hey, I think you're doing good work." but in their mind they're like, "Oh, this person needs like another year." Like, you got to make sure that that's like coming through clearly because if if you're not discussing what that means, again, you're not aligned on what those expectations are. So, just trying to nail that down a little bit more clearly, I think, helps. And then check in regularly, right? So, don't make this a conversation you have once, right? It's it's just I feel like it's a recipe for for frustration, right? I talked to you 12 months ago when you said, "I'm doing good." I don't know. Did things change? Like Like did did good mean like, "Yeah, you're doing good and my expectations is is at your level. It takes three years to go to the next level." Like setting check-ins will help you kind of realign along the way. I think that's super important. So, it's like in code commute videos or even on this stream if I talk about like, oh, it's good to do like a self-reflection and see where you're at. That's not a one-time thing you do in your life. It's like, oh, I turned I turned 36, like time to do a reflection, like my one my one reflection per lifetime. Like, no. Have check-ins. Uh, do reflections, this kind of stuff. And that way you can see like what progress have I made and where do I still have to make more improvements or or gather more evidence. Right? And then that leads me to one of the last points here. Um I've written whole like newsletter articles on this and this looks different for everyone but I think having some way to try and document the stuff that you're doing in terms of impact is very helpful. Some people will use um like I think I have a I think I still have it. There's like a free thing that I have. Um one sec. I'm just checking the website to see if it's there. Yeah, like I have a a brag document template. It's free. Um Gumroad like lets you put in like an optional price. Please don't. Um don't put anything. I mean it. Seriously, because the whole point of this was I just wanted to show people like you can literally have a um I don't know like something that's a minimal organizer just to take some notes in. So, some people call them brag documents. I don't like the word brag because I think it makes makes me feel uncomfortable. I was always told like bragging is a bad thing, like don't brag. But people call them brag documents. I called it a highlight tracker. Um, you could call it like an impact document or whatever you want, but the whole thing is just come up with a structure that lets you record your accomplishments, right? Have something. I've um I've worked with people that use draft emails to themselves, right? They have an email in Outlook or whatever email client they use and they just take their notes there. I think there's enough note-taking tools now you don't need a draft email but right you can use I don't know Obsidian notion you can use a pad of paper whatever you want record your accomplishments and that way you can bring those to conversations with your manager whether that's periodic check-ins whether that's like in your one-on- ones whether that's these conversations you're having about your career take some notes and make sure that periodically you're leveraging the information in those notes to check in with um I think the last thing I wanted to mention with all this and we talked about it near the beginning was just like um your work life balance right so when you're doing this all this stuff we're talking about like don't lose sight of the work life balance we kind of talked about it near the beginning I'm bringing it up um at the end oh doing it in Slack canvas there you go I I I haven't used Slack in the workspace for for five years cuz I'm a Teams guy now. Uh I actually like using Teams at work and I know that probably makes some people feel sick to their stomach. I used to hate Teams. Hate it. Where I used to work, we had Slack and we were talking about doing a team switch and I use Teams and I was like, "Oh, I can't stand this. This is the worst." And then when I and I'm like I'm saying this in full true transparency. I don't mind using Teams at work. kind of like it, but it feels like there's a million more features in Teams that I use at work versus if I use like a I don't know like Teams that's on this current computer that I'm on. And the only like honestly the only problem I have with Teams at work is that we have it on what we call like the dog food ring. So, if you haven't heard the phrase like uh uh eat your own dog food, you're like basically testing the software internally. So, we get the earliest features and stuff. So, sometimes it breaks because that's what happens when you're in the earliest uh you know, usage of a product, but um it's really not the end of the world. It's uh I actually like using Teams, but I use Slack outside of uh outside of work for everything. So, I just haven't gone back to explore a lot of the features. So, like huddles in Slack, like that feels kind of weird to me. I know it's just like a group call, but the way that they pop it up in Slack is just it's bizarre. I don't know. But I like Slack overall. Um, the thing I was getting at before the Slack canvas thing was that uh work life balance, right? So when we're talking about all this stuff for you know working towards promotion one of the things from the beginning was like we need to make sure that we are maintaining work life balance that will look different for everyone that will look different for you at different points in your career in your life right things change don't lose sight of that because at the end of the day if you're just working to like I don't know like what's the goal Right? If your goal, if you have a goal in like the shorter time horizon for yourself where you're like, "Hey, I I do want to focus on my career. This is really important to me." Great. That's fine. I'm not saying that's wrong. But I think that it gets a little bit risky to like to not re-evaluate things along the way. And I remind people like I have a tattoo on my arm. I can never show it because the angle of this thing, but like there's a there's an hourglass. It's kind of hard to see. I can see it when I look at my own arm, and that's the whole reason I have it. Um, but I have an hourglass on my forearm, and it shows money falling from the top of the hourglass into the bottom into an open pit. And it's just a reminder to myself that if your only goal is to try and make money and that is the goal. Make number go up, you will not live a fulfilling life. That does not mean that I'm not allowed to try and make more money or that I can't, you know, have goals that are financial or anything like that. It's not what it means. The the point of the tattoo on my arm is to remind myself if all you do is try to work to make a number go up, it will be a very empty life. And I would say that is the same mindset that I want to remind people of when it comes to promotions and stuff. If the only thing that you're doing is just to be able to say I have a different title or to make dollar go up, right? At some point it becomes kind of empty. So, that's my reminder for folks and we're right right about on time. So, I want to say thanks to everyone for being here. Um, I'll start signing off now. But, of course, if people have questions in the chat, drop them in there. I feel like I feel like my chat doesn't show Twitter anymore, which is kind of concerning, but I think Twitter people have chimed in and they're like, "It works. It's just that um yeah, like just to give you an example, right now there's uh on Twitter, if I look on Twitter, I can see that there's 36 people on the stream from Twitter, which is great. That's cool. On my view, it shows that there's no one from Twitter. So, I'm like, "Okay, is it broken or what's going on? Do people on Twitter hate me now?" Um, Bogdan says, "Uh, happy to not be laid off for now." Yeah, Twitter test. There's DJ Neil. What's up? Good to see you, man. I got to meet DJ. It was sweet. I met DJ in Dallas. I thought that was super cool. Hey, Claus, good to see you. Devin's testing it as well. Okay. Okay, it works. It works. Cool. Um, okay, folks. I'm gonna Let me shrink my chat again. Ryan, I'm going to make it a little smaller. Hopefully, you can still read it. There we go. Um, cool. Let me flip on over. There's the chat again. We'll pull it back up. Um, for folks that didn't see, um, temperature hot. Yeah. Dallas DJ, are I think you told me you're from around there though, right? I I know you told me and I can't remember, so I apologize. I don't I don't think you're from like right there, but I think you're from at least You're closer to there than I am. That's for sure. Um, sorry, folks. I'm trying to get this. This is where the newsletter is. Like I said at the beginning of this stream, um it's an email newsletter. I will remind people every stream like please do not subscribe to my email newsletter if you don't want email. It's totally cool. I'm not going to be offended. Oh, sorry. Okay, DJ, I apologize. Um you're from Jersey. That's much closer actually to where I live back home. Um, but like two hours south of Dallas. Wait, Jersey. Oh, but I live two hours south. Okay. Okay. I see. I see. I It says like, but I think it's supposed to say live. So, left the cold. Yeah. I I told my wife like, well, I've told myself for many years. I'm like, when I move from Canada, I'm going somewhere hot. And then we moved further north to Seattle, but it snows less here, so it's okay. Um, yeah. So, this is where the newsletter is. Uh, folks, this is going to be the topic basically every single live stream. Don't need to subscribe. You can just go to weekly.devleer.ca if you want to see what the topic is. This is the one that I was going through today. So, usually on these live streams, if you didn't catch on, usually what I'm doing is just kind of scrolling through and picking out some ideas that I wrote about. And um again, if you missed it, then I usually write the newsletter article on a code commute video. I'll jump over to code commute next. Code commute is the YouTube channel that I have where I do like Q&A. So you can, you know, on any video you can leave a comment, ask questions. Um you can send me a message on any platform, doesn't matter. You go to codemute.com. Sorry, I should have said flashbang warning. Uh you can go to codecommute.com. There's this anonymous checkbox, right? Write whatever you want in here. It sends it over to me. I have no idea who you are when it does this. It comes from my email. So, if you write something and I can't figure it out, then I can't help you. So, try to offer detail. Um, but like I said, I can't, you know, if you submit this way and you are ambiguous, I can't even ask you to clarify things because I don't know who you are. Uh but Code Commutes also available on Spotify. Um so you can check that out. Some people asked for uh for Spotify episodes because they don't have YouTube premium. A lot of people that watch Code Commute just leave it in the background. They go do chores. They go do whatever else. They stay busy doing important stuff and they leave Code Commute on in the background. So they said, "Hey, like I don't have Premium. I don't want to leave my phone open. Can you put it on Spotify?" So, I think I got up to 312, I think, videos scheduled on Spotify. So, only about 50 behind from YouTube, which is pretty cool. Um, and I'll keep posting there. Um, YouTube channel wise, I got a couple others. This is where I'm streaming to right now on YouTube. This is the Dev Leader podcast. Um, I have a few of the podcasts I still have to re-release on this channel. Um, but slowly doing that. I got a couple more going up. So, I just interviewed um Danny Thompson and Rob Oel from This.Labs. They're actually um Danny was the person who hosted the conference that I I got to meet DJ at in Dallas. So, I interviewed him. Um I have one that's going up on Wednesday uh with a person named Claire. I met her at the conference. And then I have uh one that I'm recording on Friday. and I didn't meet her in Dallas, but she was also at that conference. So, I followed up with her and we're gonna we'll do a chat. And I got I don't know like I think I me I wrote it down in my notebook. I think there's like 15 people or something that I messaged from the conference and I was like, "Hey, we got to get on a podcast together." So, um I live streamed this. Is it not showing the live? What's going on? Oh, there it is. Okay. Was waiting for that. Um, so yeah, uh, this is where I do that live streams and podcasts. My main YouTube channel is just Dev Leader. This one is now going to be all, um, programming tutorials primarily in C because that's what I program in. It's my language of choice and uh, and then some AI stuff on top of that. I kind of feel like I need to be making AI videos to show people at least my perspective on building software with AI. So, I'll be doing more videos like that. Which reminds me, folks, if you're watching this and you're like, "Hey, it would be really cool to see how to build X or like how to use, you know, like how do I use Claude or C-Pilot or whatever, uh, cursor, like just let me know. I'll go make tutorials on it. This is this is the main channel. Dev Leader is my main channel. I need to be making content on this channel. That's the one that pays the bills. Just kidding. It uh it doesn't even cover my code commute bill when I drive to the office. Um Dev Leader Path to Tech is where I do resume reviews. I had a couple people send them in recently. Um so I have two more that are going up. Ré reviews are free. So if you want your resume to be reviewed, send it on in. I will do my best to give you constructive criticism, which means good and bad, right? I don't do ré roasts. I don't think that that's helpful for anyone. So, my goal is not to make fun of you. My goal is just to offer my perspective if I were reading the resume as a hiring manager. And what else? Oh, this is where I got to this is the one this is the one that pays the bills. So, I have courses available. Um, I still need to follow up with Nick Chapsis because I have another course um that I proposed and I I don't know if I'm actually I need to wait for my new lens to start recording it, but I don't know if I have the official sign off on it. Let me accept all the all the cookies. Um, but if you're interested, I have Courses. So, these two like getting started in the deep dive, there's a bundle available if you check out the bundle section. Oh, they changed it. Oh, interesting. The this the site is new since I've been here last live stream. Maybe there is no bundles. I don't know. I don't know. Maybe they got rid of the bundles. I should check some of my links because I put bundles linked everywhere. Um Oh, maybe it's here. Hey, look. I'm right at the top. Okay. So, anyway, I got Courses if you're interested in others. Um, I have some other stuff that's not programming specific. So, I paired up with Ryan Murphy to do career management. There's getting promoted, behavioral interviews, soft skills. So, there's stuff for other people that aren't just net developers. But, there's this one that I want to start recording. I just need to get signed off. I want the official sign off or else uh I might it's not level set expectations with Nick Chapses. So I will take my own feedback. Um yeah uh Ryan on the cost thing. So unfortunately I don't control the the um the actual cost but there is a a sale. There's a Black Friday stuff on right now. So what does that cost? One sec. Uh, so a lot of it's moving to the pro subscription. So that's a that is a big cost for the year, right? But I think if you were to do all courses, I haven't tried this yet, so I don't even know. Um, let's go back here. We're just doing my courses. Okay. So I think I think you can get Yeah. Like so a month is 40 bucks. So like if you wanted to Oh, when build annually. So what is it? You can do a quarter. Okay. So it ends up being I haven't like I said I haven't actually tried going through it before and this has changed a little bit, right? Um but if you were to do quarterly, then ends up being like 165 bucks. But can you not do again? He might have just changed this and I didn't realize. I don't want to click that. Oh, you know what? It probably just works that way. Um maybe Oh, I didn't realize. But this button or this little icon here is pro only. So I guess I have some courses that are only pro. Um I wonder are all of them like that? Maybe. Sorry, I'm kind of realizing this for the first time because some stuff's been changed up. Um but yeah, it looks like a bunch of stuff has moved to pro only. But there are like I think the Black Friday stuff or it says Black October 40. Um yeah, so this sale like with 40% off I think is as high as it goes. Uh the only other time was at the beginning at least for my courses for the C ones we did we we gave them away actually. So um sorry I keep clicking around here because I don't know how to navigate the site anymore. Um here we go. Um, we gave away these two choruses, which is kind of cool. Um, but yeah, that that ends up being a Nick Chapsis kind of thing to focus on. I I don't have any other like I don't have uh the power to give them away or like uh special discounts or anything, but right now it's 40% off. So I think my re like my recommendation would be I don't know again on affordability this will be different for everyone but if it's 40% off now if you're like hey I I'm just making this up cuz I got two courses right at the top here. If you're like I want to learn C and I can tolerate Nick's voice for 11 and a half hours. If you're like willing to go, you know, spend the 11 and a half hours within a month, I feel like you could do the $165. Uh, I guess it's in a quarter. Sorry, it's not even per month. So, you have a quarter. So, it's three months to go do it and you get 40% off. So, I think right now that feels like the best bang for your buck that you can get on Dome Train currently. Um, because I don't know of other times where he goes over 40%. Um and yeah there is a discount for Visual Studio which is pretty cool but um that's also a thing that costs too. That's interestingly like the one thing that I software wise I get from Microsoft for free. I pay for my own Windows and Office. We don't get uh Office for free. Um, but yeah, this I totally I was about to highlight it on my side when you won't see it, but yeah, the the 500 a year like that it adds up, right? Um, no denying that. This is why um I actually had people that came up to me when I was speaking in Dallas. Don't don't tell Nick Chapsis this, but um they came up to me and they're like, "Hey, you said you have courses. Like, what courses can I buy from you?" And I was like, "Hey, look, I need I need to be transparent with you. Maybe I'm a terrible salesperson." Um, oh, and Ryan did get my courses. Nice. Um, but I'm maybe I'm a terrible salesperson, but I I think it's because I'm trying to be honest with people. I said, I don't like I don't know you and like I don't want you to think that I'm trying to, you know, pressure you into buying courses. I said, some people learn well from courses because there is like an accountability thing. Like, I paid money for this. I better go actually spend the time to learn it. And that can work well for some people. But I said like I try to put out as much free content as I possibly can because I enjoy doing it and I want to help. So my goal is not to try and like take all your money because I would much rather just try to help you in any way I can. One of the ways I do that is by offering courses because I think that helps for some people. And so I told someone at this conference, I said, "Here's where you can find my courses, but if you just want to like learn things, like I have a YouTube channel and if there's stuff that's not there that you want to learn about, just message me. I'll try my best to make videos for you." Right? That's like the entire reason I have my my code commute channel is for that. It's not programming specifically, but that's like there's like 360 vlogs on there where I'm just trying to like tell people stuff from my experience because I'm just trying to help. Um, oh yeah, and that's a good point. Uh, see Devon, Devon's a good salesperson, but yeah, there might be training budget and stuff too. Um I like as a manager like I'm not given an explicit training budget but technically if people came to me on my team I know that there is budget for training. I just don't know the dollar amount. So if anyone came to me and they're like hey I want to go to a conference or I want training or something. I can go kind of bubble that up to my manager and my skip and um if there's budget for it then they can they can look into it. Um, okay folks, last thing I'm just going to look at is Brand Ghost. Um, Brand Ghost is the thing I build on the side, uh, for folks that see the content I post on other social media platforms. So, all of you Twitter people, if you see my 11:00 p.m. Pacific jokes, my tech jokes on Twitter every day. They come from Brand Ghost. I built Brand Ghost to help me with my content creation so that I can focus on creating content, not posting it everywhere. Right? So if you see posts that I make um I'll give you another example. Uh I posted on today I shared a video I I for the first time in a long time I did a manual post to LinkedIn on Friday last week and I posted a video of me deadlifting PR 490 pounds. Felt awesome. Actually tore my hand open. It's only it's all blurry now but only a little cut left. Um, but I use Brand Ghost today and I like I just I sort of cross-osted it to every other platform. U, but I use Brand Ghost to like perpetually schedule all my content. So, if I pull it up, I like showing this because I think it's cool. Give me one sec. Get in there. Uh, so this is my content calendar, right? This is October. This is November. This is December. This is January of next year. This is February of next year. If you notice, um, all of these days already have content, uh, forever. Right? This is April 2026 on a, uh, on a Tuesday, the 14th. Right? There's all my posts that are going out. These are posts that I've written. Right? If I just show you very briefly. One sec. just want to move it from under my head. But see, like this is one where uh I'm posting a short form video to all of these platforms at once, right? So for me, this is a game changer because every day at 9:00 a.m. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 platforms get a short form video for me. every day at 9:00, right? So, that's work I don't have to do manually and that is a huge timesaver for me. So, uh I got to meet a couple people at that uh that Dallas conference and some of them were interested in doing uh like learning in public, so they signed up. Um it's free, right? There's a paid for version of it, but that's if you're kind of I don't know if you're running a small business and you're trying to like have content going out for your business. um paid for version might be helpful. But again, like this is hopefully it comes across this way when you watch my content. Like my goal is to try and help. I feel like I feel like if I'm not helping people, then like let me say it a different way. If I'm helping you, you may find at some point you're like, "Hey, maybe there's more that I can pay for that would be beneficial." I don't want it to be the other way where it's like it feels slimy and like I'm trying to take your money for stuff and you're like I don't even really trust this guy. Like I will give you brand goes for free. It's free. Go use it. And I hope that I do a good enough job where you're like hell yeah this thing rocks. And if it doesn't then you tell me and then I make it so that you're like hell yeah this thing rocks. to the point where you're like, I would pay money for the next level of this. That's my goal. That's how I plan to build everything for the rest of my life. If you're not convinced that it's going to be a hell yeah thing, I don't want your money. So, I want it to be a hell yeah thing for you. And that means like if you have uh if you want to learn in public, you're probably not making money from that. So, paying for to post doesn't make sense. So, just use it for free. I would much rather you try to learn in public and post your stuff for free and you're actually doing it than not. So do that. And then maybe you're like down the road you're like I want to get into content creation. I got a bunch of followers now. I want to do sponsored posts. Cool. Maybe you pay for brand ghost at that point. Maybe you don't. That's fine. If you have a small business, same idea, right? If you're like, I feel stuck. I don't know how to make content and post it regularly. Send me a message for free. Let's talk about it. Let me get you set up on Brand Ghost for free. And then if you're finding that it's helping you, then you might go, "This makes sense for my business. I'll pay for it." And if not, tell me, give me the feedback and I'll make it better. And if it's still not a good fit for you, that's totally fine. But like I said, my goal is to be able to help and that way you feel comfortable exchanging money for value. Folks, thank you so much. Um, I am going to be doing, as long as it gets scheduled, I'm going to do another plug-in uh presentation. Uh, it will be at the I don't know if they're going to stream it. It's going to be at one of the net meetups, meetup groups in Albuquerque, New Mexico in a couple weeks. Um, I'm going to take the presentation I gave recently and uh revamp it and talk more specifically about brand ghost and plug-in architecture. But um I'll see if that content gets uh recorded then I will share it out. If not I might um might make a couple YouTube videos out of that and see how it goes. So again thank you for being here. Newsletter I'll try to do this weekend. There will be no live stream next week because I'll be in Las Vegas not gambling. I don't do that because I get too much anxiety. But I will be watching Blink182 and Weezer and who else? Averil Lavine's going to be there. I probably won't watch Aver Leavine. Not a was never a huge fan. I don't know. It's going to be fun though. So see you folks soon. Thanks for being here.