a few highlights of my career

in the last 10 years, like most people, i've seen and done more than i can fit on a resume...most of which isn't directly relevant to the next job i want, so it's easy to leave off...

but here's my top 10 list of things i've seen/done. in no particular order.

1) Gone to a barbecue at bill gates house in mercer island. yes he was there. yes it was his real house. it's something he does with M$ interns. so yes, i was a M$ intern...way back when. I asked him how he knew leaving school and starting a company was the right choice. His answer is what KEPT me in school. I was not sitting on his opportunity, with his EXPERIENCE and his funding, personal and otherwise.

2) had a business reason to talk to execs at record labels. during my party days i was also doing a web consulting company. so i was able to go to some super swanky events and have something to say to oh, Jay Z when i ended up in the room with just him. Something that wasn't 'i like your music'

3) got to chat with Max Levchin about why he founded slide. how so? i interviewed there when it was early stage enough that the CEO would be involved in the hiring. when in the room with one of the founders of PayPal...of course I'm going to pick his brain about what he sees as an interesting business opportunity. Going to Y! over Slide was actually one of the hardest decisions, professionally, I've had to make. Two very different opportunities, both with major pluses.

4) Following Adam Blum around for a few years, doing whatever bitch work he asked me to. A lot of work, but a great career move because right out of school...you don't even know what you don't know yet. And I had someone willing to say, code this...trust me you need to know it. yes, big companies usually have some kind of engineering rotation that introduce you to this...but it'll take longer. Also, he has zero tolerance for bullshit engineers. zero. what's the benefit in that? the other devs he put me around, schooled me in something. i'm a much better dev today because of that.

5) Going to Berkeley. It's a CEO/Nobel Prize/Innovator/other kind of genius parade over there. get your head out of the lab and you have access to so many leaders in tech it's almost opportunity overload. Of the many people I talked to, I really appreciate Eric Brewer taking the time to discuss Inktomi and what was behind their success. Everyone sees the publicity and the press releases about successful companies and acquisitions, but being at Berkeley gives you the opportunity to dig a little deeper.

6) Taking Andrew Isaac's classes in Haas. I need to give him a call again to thank him. At 25, I was going thru career angst...which I'm really only working out now...I know where I want to end up...and I probably won't get there until around 40. But when you're young...and in the valley, that sounds like a death sentence. If you participate in his clases and his programs, you get your eyes opened to so many people that are where you want to be, including him. And in a non-hostile environment where they are receptive to answering your questions.

7) Shipped products that half the world uses at Y!. Really take the mystery out of it. I don't look at the web and think, i'm not yet ready...which makes me hard to interview. i'm like, you want to see if i can write stable code...here go to www.yahoo.com. there it is. next fucking question. and no, i can't recite to you exact fucking syntax for how to render an image in actionscript unless i just did it last week. so stop asking me questions an IDE will answer for you. </rant> if you can't tell, i despise sadistic tech interviews.

8) working in a culture of nice. nice only works, when it's balanced with extreme competence. nice + sub par engineers = failed execution. why is this a highlight? i've seen it firsthand. i know better than to be nice while the product fails in preventable ways.

9) bumping into the then CTO of intel while interning there. i didn't talk to him. it was the impression he left. his suit was not impressive. his head was down because he was in thought. in short, he was a tech geek. that's what you want in a CTO. CTOs that don't know and love and breathe tech are a total fail. save that for you CEO. winks. but i think that can be a fail too. depends on the rest of the team. and the VCs. i'm looking at you facebook. actually i won't be snarky. i've never met mark zuckenberg. he might be brilliant. and i might just be a hater. although i would have DEFINITELY sold for $1B. so i'm totally hating on not having the opportunity to consider a $1B offer.

and

10) seeing the silicon valley hustle first hand. if you think you've seen full of shit you should see some of these start ups 'value propositions'. but the difference is, they hustle for millions, and are smart enough not to brag about how they got one over. from a distance you think they really believe the bullshit they are selling. a few do, most don't. they just know the game. I had one tell he me how he positioned his company for an overvalued acquisition because he knew it was time to exit the market... Bravo. well played sir. well played.

So why did i subject you to this list? it's part of my continuing effort to count my blessings and remain in state of gratitude for the opportunities that life has presented me with.

that is all.