by shaftway | 2025-07-29 16:27:47+00:00
Self-taught programmer here. Went to university in '97, but flunked out after two years.

The first couple years were easy. It was before the dot-com bubble burst and I lived in the bay area, so finding jobs was trivial. I worked at Adobe for a while, then Ask Jeeves (a household name from that era, for you young'uns).

After the bubble burst it was a bit harder. I moved cross-country to a rural area and took tech-related jobs to make ends meet. Eventually I started working remotely for a bottom-scraping company on Long Island.

There I started dating a coworker. Her father was the facilities manager for a major financial institution in Manhattan and got me an interview. I was 100% a nepotistic hire, but I worked hard and did skunkswork projects for the CTO. This was circa 2006, and once you've worked at one finance company it's easy to find related jobs. So I bounced around finance for a bit. Banks, hedge funds, etc. I worked right across the street from Lehman Brothers and watched their crash from the windows.

Eventually I got married and decided I didn't want NYC kids. We decided to move back to the bay area around 2010. I found a small company I could work for while I looked for something else. I was referred into Google and started at L4. Promo'd to L5 and stayed there for a bit.

In 2022 I left and did a bunch of odd stuff. The timing was really bad, and I got laid off twice, but I was lucky enough to be working again before severance ran out both times. On the whole it was probably better for me in terms of TC, but who knows. I just returned to Google last month. We'll see how this run does.

Not having a degree probably hurt me in the beginning. I had to tune and A/B test my resume to get past hiring managers. I list the years I went to colleges and what I studied. I had gone to a separate university for summer extension classes while in high school, so on paper it looks like I went for 4 years, but I'm cautious to say I don't have a degree. I'm honest about it, but not forthcoming.

I've had managers tell me that if they had realized, they wouldn't have hired me, but they're glad they did. I've had interviewers ask for transcripts and then take me over the coals about why I failed Intro to Viticulture and Enology 20 years ago. I've had hiring managers who needed to get creative about my title, because they didn't allow a title with "Engineer" in it without a degree. I've had managers throw it in my face and use it as a reason to cut me. But most of my managers never knew.

I'm 25 years into my career at this point, and nobody cares. I bring it up occasionally, but with many years at multiple FAANGs, it's just not a concern.

My kids know the full history and are in high school. I'm advocating for them to take a better path, but I'm aware it's their choice. The elder has severe ADHD, and my suggestion for him is to do a two year stint in the military between high school and college. I know he'll test high on the ASVAB, which means he probably won't be in a combat MOS. And I think the service will be good for him, and give him a leg up in a variety of areas. He's considering it, leaning towards air force.

My younger wants to be a teacher, but isn't certain and wants to do something more creative. She's good at STEM, so we're exploring alternatives like architecture, civil engineering.