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Unicorn Jobs

pgbovine.net

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Re: Unicorn Jobs

#31

Post by chops »

Whenever I give a talk about Erlang-related stuff, I almost inevitably get asked "do you do this for fun or for your job?" And I can genuinely answer "both, really".

While I'm the project lead for one of the more popular Erlang web frameworks (http://nitrogenproject.com), my main focus is on my sports league management system[1] (http://bracketpal.com), which runs on Nitrogen.

As a result, I can justify spending "free" time working on open source because at the end of the day, it improves my main products.

It's an interesting way to piggyback the so-called "unicorn" project onto a product (the design of which I get to control). Granted, it'd be nice to just get paid to work on Nitrogen all the time, since that work is generally more mentally stimulating, but I can't complain.

[1] I know the landing page is a total dog. It's the current project to fix that up to something not terrible.

Re: Unicorn Jobs

#32

Post by pgbovine »

serverascode wrote: post #3

I don't know if I believe that Guido Van Rossum has to spend 50% of his time on not making python better, but perhaps it's true. Isn't he at dropbox now as well?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guido_van_Rossum

"He was employed by Google from 2005 until December 7th 2012, where he spent half his time developing the Python language."

Re: Unicorn Jobs

#33

Post by tway9999 »

I think this is why some people go into Finance. Spend 10 years in some miserable high stress job, but hopefully gather enough wealth to retire in your early 30s and work on whatever you want.

Also why people work part time and spend their off time painting or playing music. Be poor but have time to work on what you care about.

Edit: Grammar

Re: Unicorn Jobs

#34

Post by abhiv »

This article might not be applicable to that many people. My guess is that many people are actually happiest working on things that are given to them. Working on your own projects requires that you think of an idea, and have the self-discipline to work on it in the absence of externally enforced constraints.

I think a better question for most people might be: how do I get a job where work on the job is itself interesting, rather than a job that allows me to do my own interesting stuff in my spare time.

Re: Unicorn Jobs

#35

Post by smoyer »

I think the question is completely wrong ... the question you should be asking is "how do I turn my current job into a unicorn job?". I've done this for almost 30 years and, with the exception of the times I was forced into management roles, I've loved engineering.

The key is that you have to be doing something your employer feels provides value, and ultimately you want to tailor the work towards something you're enthusiastic about. For me, I try to determine which up-and-coming technologies are worth including in future products. This means I get to play with lots of cool (and sometimes not so cool) technologies - and when my employer asks how something should be done, they "redeem" that knowledge with a list of concrete pros and cons.

Even the author's examples were projects that he was passionate about before he started the unicorn job. One point I definitely agree with is that you have to be a good communicator to first convince your boss you can provide value, and again to deliver that value.

I'll also agree that it might be easier to find a unicorn job in a university setting where things aren't quite so structured. In July of 2012 I landed a job at Penn State as an enterprise software architect/developer ... and it was music to my ears when I found out that my bosses' bosses' boss felt the university need to be more engaged with the open-source community and contribute to more projects.

Re: Unicorn Jobs

#36

Post by ianbicking »

serverascode wrote: post #3

I don't know if I believe that Guido Van Rossum has to spend 50% of his time on not making python better, but perhaps it's true. Isn't he at dropbox now as well?

It's not clear to me that Guido actually wants to spend more than 50% of his time on Python. Stuff like the async stuff he's bringing into Python come from his time spent developing things with Python during the other 50%.

Also, is Python necessarily his unicorn now? It's certainly not the same as a project that he conceives and creates - it was a long time ago, but success changes that.

Re: Unicorn Jobs

#37

Post by seivan »

I thought this post would be about jobs for 'unicorns' designer + developers positions conjoined.

That's what I want. A job where I won't be dictated by designers who can't implement their bullshit photoshop mockups.

I'm not an entrepreneur, but I like to create things. I am OK with a paycheck (where eating out on McDonalds is a luxury) with no equity, hell that's my current situation - sans creative freedom. Right now I'm a code monkey, and I kinda hate it, so I'm hoping that would change in the future. Just need a project without the photoshop-guy.

That being said, creating my own tech demos on my own free time helps keep my sanity in check

Re: Unicorn Jobs

#39

Post by pgbovine »

tway9999 wrote: post #33

I think this is why some people go into Finance. Spend 10 years in some miserable high stress job, but hopefully gather enough wealth to retire in your early 30s and work on whatever you want. Also why people work part time and spend their off time painting or playing music. Be poor but have time to work on what you care about. Edit: Grammar

I think this is why some people go into Finance. Spend 10 years in some miserable high stress job, but hopefully gather enough wealth to retire in your early 30s and work on whatever you want.

Some of my college classmates went down this route, and while the numbers can theoretically work out (these are uber-smart math/science/engineering folks), I've never seen a single person exit successfully from this game and then unicorn it. The main reason seems to be that they can't fight off the inevitable lifestyle inflation that comes with being in such a social circle. The last I heard from one guy, he was paying almost $10,000 a month to maintain two apartments in Manhattan ...

Re: Unicorn Jobs

#40

Post by loomio »

For those of us whose "core dream" is exactly the kind of logistical problem solving and organizational coordination the author describes as "overhead", starting your own company is a unicorn job. Feeling lucky, I suppose :)
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