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Advice for ambitious 19 year olds

blog.samaltman.com

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Re: Advice for ambitious 19 year olds

#51

Post by cosmc »

A lot of this feels like bad advice. Like playing penny stocks rather than index funds. I am 18, and saying that my most productive years are from 20-25 seems shortsighted and arrogant. The startup community, although cool and interesting, seems like a gold rush situation to me.

That's why I plan to get my CS degree, and get a stable job, such as one at MS (which the author seems to look down upon). I could see joining/starting a startup, if the opportunity popped up, but seeking a risky situation irks me.Maybe I am just risk adverse?

Re: Advice for ambitious 19 year olds

#52

Post by codegeek »

My suggestion to 19 year olds. Be careful with this blog post.

"working at an already-massively-successful company means you will learn much less, and probably work with less impressive people."

Seriously? Yes big companies have lots of bureaucratic crap and things take longer blah blah. However, you do not want to be giving this advice to an "ambitious" 19 year old. Big companies have a lot of smart and impressive people. Lots. They also can teach you a thing or 2 about the "real world".

"Incidentally, don’t let salary be a factor. I just watched someone turn down one of these breakout companies because Microsoft offered him $30k per year more in salary—that was a terrible decision."

Let me provide the other side of this. You are giving up $30K in salary today as a 19 year old. Now, lets imagine that you need to get a job soon again since that "awesome breakout" company actually failed, what do you think is going to happen ? Yes, you will not be able to negotiate as high a salary as you could have if you had that extra $30K. It is not just about $30K. It is about having the power to negotiate next time if you move which you probably will as a 19 year old.

Re: Advice for ambitious 19 year olds

#53

Post by jenius »

I don't think easily identifying companies that will "almost certainly be successful" is within the capabilities of any normal human being. Even the absolute best people at identifying successful companies get more wrong than they get right (the right ones just pay well enough to cover the wrongs).

Even if it was only that statement I took issue with, that would be enough to make me say that this is not actually good advice for a 19-year-old. Be realistic when giving advice...

Re: Advice for ambitious 19 year olds

#54

Post by mahyarm »

Selfcommit wrote: post #36
avolcano wrote: post #9

I'm 19, and just started as a software engineer at a startup in NYC. It's been absolutely incredible - I never thought I'd be here a year ago. I'll admit that my situation isn't universal - luckily, I could get my foot in the door with many startups by being in the last batch of Hacker School - but if you, like me, hate academia and want to get to work, don't let your age stop you. Sure, there's companies that care a…

Please understand that my intent here is not to begrudge you in any way - I think it's wonderful that you're working as an SE at such a young age - but.. I'm 10 years older than you. I code in the evenings, I spend my morning commute listing to any computer science online course I can find... I have over 5 years experience as a Systems Admin... I've interviewed with a number of big companies and startups but I don't…

Write some self sufficient applications. It can be as simple as an app that shows you movie times in your local area in a nice way, scraped from movies.google.com by some quick web-service you written. Try writing the app in some in demand underserved platform.

Teach yourself a couple of algorithms courses and some basic multi-threading problems like producer-consumer and so on so you can get through the interview gauntlet. All of my interview questions can be derived from 5 courses: Algorithms & Data Structures, Discrete Math, Operating Systems, Compilers and AI/Machine Learning (optional).

Go interview, be willing to move.

If you feel like you've already done the equivalent, then your prepared.

Re: Advice for ambitious 19 year olds

#55

Post by Selfcommit »

Jabbles wrote: post #43
Selfcommit wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please understand that my intent here is not to begrudge you in any way - I think it's wonderful that you're working as an SE at such a young age - but.. I'm 10 years older than you. I code in the evenings, I spend my morning commute listing to any computer science online course I can find... I have over 5 years experience as a Systems Admin... I've interviewed with a number of big companies and startups but I don't…

Tell us what you think is missing. You don't "feel nearly prepared". Have you prepared? These interviews (for better or worse) tend to be algorithm based. How are you on those?

Example scenario: If you ask me to solve a problem, I can intelligently talk to you about what a program that solves that problem is expected to do, and happily whiteboard a big picture idea. If I don't know the language required for implementation, that's ok because I'm pretty confident I can work out the basics and what I need to code.

To meet your points: A) I haven't really put myself out there in a while(over a year), I've been 'prepping' B) My algorithm's are poor. While I understand the concept of Big O notation, I can't readily look at something and say "oh that's a _______ sort"

Re: Advice for ambitious 19 year olds

#56

Post by bdcravens »

susi22 wrote: post #16

This is awful advice. I'm sorry but when you're 19 you should go out into the _world_ (not the US) and discover it. Go book a cheap flight to South America and go backpacking for a few months. Live on $300 a month, meet interesting people. Techies, nerds and entrepreneurs aren't _that_ interesting. But sure, if all that you care about is success and you happen to define success like most other Americans (i.e. by maki…

I think there are windows of opportunity that a person who wishes to capitalize has to jump on. I'll guess there's millions of $ floating around in our industry that originated from 19 year olds who took opportunities in 1998 or 1999 that would have never materialized had they waited a year or 2.

Re: Advice for ambitious 19 year olds

#57

Post by Selfcommit »

mahyarm wrote: post #54
Selfcommit wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please understand that my intent here is not to begrudge you in any way - I think it's wonderful that you're working as an SE at such a young age - but.. I'm 10 years older than you. I code in the evenings, I spend my morning commute listing to any computer science online course I can find... I have over 5 years experience as a Systems Admin... I've interviewed with a number of big companies and startups but I don't…

Write some self sufficient applications. It can be as simple as an app that shows you movie times in your local area in a nice way, scraped from movies.google.com by some quick web-service you written. Try writing the app in some in demand underserved platform. Teach yourself a couple of algorithms courses and some basic multi-threading problems like producer-consumer and so on so you can get through the interview ga…

I have done much of that - except for the putting myself out there part.

Willing to move is no problem.

Thanks for the advice. I'm working my way through a Data structures course now, I'll look for the others soon.

Re: Advice for ambitious 19 year olds

#58

Post by rgbrenner »

sama wrote: post #21
kayoone wrote: post #14

"Incidentally, don’t let salary be a factor. I just watched someone turn down one of these breakout companies because Microsoft offered him $30k per year more in salary—that was a terrible decision. He will not build interesting things and may not work with smart people." That quote drips so much of elitism its disgusting. MS still has many brilliant engineers and is building alot of really complex stuff, probably mo…

I agree with that--for example, I think Microsoft Research has some of the smartest hackers I've met. However, other divisions of MSFT (and where this person was going) have some of the worst people I've met.

Microsoft has 100,000 employees (42k in WA).. of course SOME of them are bad.

http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/inside_ms.aspx

Re: Advice for ambitious 19 year olds

#59

Post by Jabbles »

Selfcommit wrote: post #55
Jabbles wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tell us what you think is missing. You don't "feel nearly prepared". Have you prepared? These interviews (for better or worse) tend to be algorithm based. How are you on those?

Example scenario: If you ask me to solve a problem, I can intelligently talk to you about what a program that solves that problem is expected to do, and happily whiteboard a big picture idea. If I don't know the language required for implementation, that's ok because I'm pretty confident I can work out the basics and what I need to code. To meet your points: A) I haven't really put myself out there in a while(over a…

Algorithms aren't really about recognising standard implementations - although in preparation you'll certainly learn that. It's about having a deep understanding of programs' flow, and being able to recreate and combine patterns when needed to solve a problem.

You should "prep" your algorithms knowledge - it plays a big role in a lot of interviews.

Re: Advice for ambitious 19 year olds

#60

Post by jtbigwoo »

adriancooney wrote: post #17

I have this exact dilemma of whether to stay in college and build projects on the side or leave college and get a job at a start up or create my own. I'd love to be able to choose the latter but the one thing that's holding me back is that I'm in Ireland and it's not exactly Silicon Valley when it comes to the start-up scene. It's extremely frustrating because I have the talent and skills but companies feel it's too…

Your clock isn't running out to the extent that you think it is. At the rate most of us go these days, you've got forty more working years, with at least 10 to fifteen childless years if you continue to be drawn to entrepreneurship.

I'd suggest making the choice that moves you toward your goal while still leaving as many doors open as possible.

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