As many of you know by now, I’ve accepted a position at Pluralsight as Curriculum Director. I can say honestly that I’ve never been more excited about taking a new position, and I’m really looking forward to being able to make a positive contribution at a fantastic organization.
This represents yet another career shift for me. Instead of slinging code day-to-day, I’ll be working to help others teach how to do so effectively. As different as this will be, I feel like this position is the appropriate destination for my crooked and wandering career path. My professional background didn’t start in technology; rather, it was cognitive psychology – specifically researching human perception and learning. During that phase of my life, I came to love both learning and teaching.
As I entered a technology career, I carried this with me; the opportunities to mentor for someone with no experience were limited of course. It took years before I was comfortable sharing what I was doing with others, but I got there. I started speaking at user groups, publishing open-source software, and eventually, I reached out to Pluralsight to see if they would be interested in having be as an author.
I didn’t end up producing a lot of content – all said and done, I will have four courses in the library. And nothing terribly popular – but that’s not why I did it. I missed teaching. I wanted to get back into it somehow, the royalty model Pluralsight offers made that a reasonable avenue to follow, and frankly it was fun. Thing is, as I worked through my courses, I noticed that I really enjoyed working with everyone on the Pluralsight side. Every interaction with them was positive – even when they were turning down a course idea or pointing out my use of …. “sailor words.” They seemed to appreciate the effort I put in too – eventually they folded me in as one of their peer reviewers, and for about two years I’ve been providing feedback on other courses as my schedule will allow.
Making the change from working for myself to working for someone else is something I honestly thought I would never choose to do. I love the independent lifestyle, but there are some hard choices to make there. Code Owls exists, in a nutshell, to allow me to manage my own time. I want to be home for my kids to hear about their days, help with their schoolwork, and be their dad. This new job doesn’t take me away from that – I still work primarily from home, my schedule is very flexible, and the company has a strong cultural focus on living a balanced life. Moreover, growing a business by yourself is really hard. I believe I could keep paying myself through Code Owls indefinitely, but I don’t think I could ever expect a raise unless I hired on, which is a hassle I don’t want and, frankly, can’t find the financial gain in doing so in today’s climate. This shift represents a huge growth opportunity for me – one that would only be possible as part of an established organization. That said I’m not closing Code Owls – I still plan to do things through this entity…
So what does this mean for the dozen or so open source projects I’ve pushed out there? Honestly I think it means I will have more time and mental energy to devote to this area. With clients consuming my tolerance for code, the production you see on my github page represents what is left over. I fully expect to keep maintaining and growing StudioShell, and producing random PowerShell modules that only a few of you will actually use (wink-wink). I also plan to keep speaking, after all, my love of teaching landed me this new amazing new gig, so why mess with that?
My official start date is November 17, 2014. Until then, I’ll be putting bows on clients and projects in situ.
Oh, and before I forget – let me say THANK YOU to those of you who mentored me through this decision. You know who you are. And also a shout out to everyone for the well-wishes and kudos – the response to my initial announcement was overwhelming and I can’t respond to everyone individually. Y’all have humbled me once again…
