My biggest mistake was not investing enough in relationships - especially with peers. To anyone starting out now, this would be my number one point of encouragement: greet each day with love, invest in your relationships from the outset - perhaps moreso than you think is typical.
Ask HN: What huge mistake did you make early in your career?
151–160 of 505 posts
Re: Ask HN: What huge mistake did you make early in your career?
#152It was 2006 and I was working at CollegeHumor, my first job after graduating from college. During my first week I dropped the production database. I thought I would be fired…
I ended up working there for 4 years and eventually managed the backend engineering team. I haven’t dropped a production database since.
Re: Ask HN: What huge mistake did you make early in your career?
#153My biggest mistake was to discount and ignore the importance of management as a skill.
As a good technician, I moved up to being a junior officer in the Navy and completely missed the point that I was to work through the enlisted sailors, not join them.
I found myself staring East all night wondering why I was struggling. Suddenly, it dawned on me.
Re: Ask HN: What huge mistake did you make early in your career?
#154Earlier quoted context omitted.
I agree, but just a note: it doesn't do your career any good to hop a lot. I won't hire someone that looks flaky. If you find yourself at a bad job, sure, move on. But work on sussing out the good from the bad so you don't put yourself in a bad situation repeatedly.
Last I checked, nearly everyone in tech hops jobs frequently. In fact that’s common advice for comp advancement. In my personal experience that advice holds true, even though I change jobs much less frequently than most of my peers (which means my comp tends to lag behind theirs).
What is "frequently"? I'd like to see a minimum of three years ahead of a transition, and a decent story why. Often the contract ends, the company is sold and the new policies are draconian, etc. Fine.
Given the level of effort involved in bringing someone on, my outfit cannot afford to be staffed like a fast food joint.
Re: Ask HN: What huge mistake did you make early in your career?
#155- Not leaving jobs often (even without clear immediate reasons).
- Not being aggressive about trying to get better salaries. This was mostly due to the previous point.
- Not leaving shitty managers and teams ASAP (“trying” is the biggest mistake in such situations).
But when I look real close then the single biggest mistake is:
- Having not identified early that Software/CS simply doesn’t interest me. It’s just a skill because I happened to study it and then started working. For me there’s just zero passion in it. And not trying to find an alternative career path early.
Re: Ask HN: What huge mistake did you make early in your career?
#156Earlier quoted context omitted.
I have this weird feeling that I'm making the same mistake right now.
If you've been there longer than 3 years, then yes, you're making the mistake.
At the company, or in a specific position?
I'd say continuity is fine, if the firm is large enough to offer a career path.
Re: Ask HN: What huge mistake did you make early in your career?
#157Joining a company out of college that I thought was good and staying with that company to this day (9 years later). I'm a midlevel making under $100k and was screwed over multiple times in contradiction to what the company promised and what the policies say.
Re: Ask HN: What huge mistake did you make early in your career?
#158Thinking the best course of action is to operate within the bounds of an existing paradigm, rather than lobbying for paradigm altering changes at the highest levels.
Buying into any zeitgeist at any level. Related: underappreciating the pervasiveness of financially-motivated thinking.
Re: Ask HN: What huge mistake did you make early in your career?
#159Earlier quoted context omitted.
I agree, but just a note: it doesn't do your career any good to hop a lot. I won't hire someone that looks flaky. If you find yourself at a bad job, sure, move on. But work on sussing out the good from the bad so you don't put yourself in a bad situation repeatedly.
Last I checked, nearly everyone in tech hops jobs frequently. In fact that’s common advice for comp advancement. In my personal experience that advice holds true, even though I change jobs much less frequently than most of my peers (which means my comp tends to lag behind theirs).
I've refused to hire people who job-hopped every year or two.
With a record like that, there's zero reason to expect they're going to stick around. Why invest in bringing them up to speed if they're just going to leave?
Re: Ask HN: What huge mistake did you make early in your career?
#160Earlier quoted context omitted.
Would you mind elaborating on how you went about learning the fundamentals? I think id benefit from the same.
“ Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software” by Charles Petzold and “The Elements of Computing Systems” by Noam Nisan and Shimon Shocken are both a great introduction.
I have both books but yet to finish
The latter book you recommend is Nand2Tetris I believe