Be Adaptable and Authentic

This is a guest post from Morgan Whaley, lightly edited. Enjoy.

Dear new developer,

Honestly my #1 piece of career or technical advice to new developers is:

Be adaptable and authentic.

I don’t think there is any one magic bullet to helping someone “break into” a job, or business, or new city. Humans are all different and the beauty of diversity in industry and environments is when everyone truly brings themselves and overrides the homogenization that we accuse modern cities and tech of becoming.

If something isn’t working, there’s “no harm, no foul” in changing approaches, or taking a break, or simply admitting something isn’t working.

I see a lot of people who treat that first job like it’s a task they gotta beat into submission and they tie so much self-worth to it. Which is completely understandable… but the more you resist a situation and don’t remain open to possibilities, the more you are going to run into brick walls.

Morgan

PS Also, LEAVE YOUR HOUSE AND GO TALK TO PEOPLE FACE TO FACE OH MY GOD PLEASE IT’LL BE OK.

Morgan Whaley is a Senior Prototype Architect at Charter Communications.