Dev Retro 2022 - The year I changed 2 jobs and left my dream company
Tags: dev, journey, 2022
Published: 2023-01-18 16:21:34

---
title: Dev Retro 2022 - The year I changed 2 jobs and left my dream company
published: true
date: 2023-01-05 18:35:00 UTC
tags: dev, journey, 2022
canonical_url: https://blog.rishabkumar.com/dev-retro-2022-the-year-i-changed-2-jobs-and-left-my-dream-company
---

## New Beginnings

Start of 2022 I finally left the company I had been working for since I started my tech career as Tech Support. It was hard to say farewell to the company where I had amazing teammates, peers and mentors who supported me throughout my journey from Tech Support to Cloud Engineer to DevOps Engineer.

I started working at Google as Technical Solutions Specialist in Jan 2022, and it was a dream for me to work for Google.

{% embed https://youtu.be/DY2gJhJaQfI %}

It was a hard decision for me to end my time at Google after 4 months, but it was better for my mental health! More on why I left Google:

{% embed https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9DvAms4klw&t %}

After quitting Google, I was on a job search and was looking forward to entering the DevRel space. And after a few interviews at different companies, I joined Twilio as a Staff Developer Evangelist.

Check out my intro blog post on Twilio's blog.

{% embed https://twilio.com/blog/introducing-rishab-kumar %}

## Working in DevRel

Now that my new job started, working in DevRel had its own challenges.

The first one was speaking at large events, which I hadn't done until now. My first event was Collision in Toronto after 4 weeks of joining Twilio, where I presented about Twilio's SMS API in Python.

![Me presenting at Collision, my first tech demo at in-person event](https://cdn.hashnode.com/res/hashnode/image/upload/v1672857288662/eb37ca0e-416a-4a01-b5c1-a7e2720d81a9.jpeg)

In total, I spoke at 5 different in-person events in the following cities:

- Toronto, ON

- Boston, MA

- Manhattan, NY

- Rock Hill, NY

Attending AWS re:Invent was on my list since 2018 and Twilio made it possible for me. I was able to attend the conference this year in vegas. Met so many amazing community members.

{% embed https://twitter.com/rishabk7/status/1598828702879846403?s=20 %}

## Learning and Teaching

This year I spent more time teaching than learning, which is the first time it has happened. Professionally mentored at 3 hackathons, provided 1-1 mentorship to various students and professionals as time permitted and also I think the biggest milestone for me this year was, teaching Cloud Computing at the college that I graduated from 4 years ago!

![My student ID and Staff badge at the same college, student in 2018 and staff in 2022](https://cdn.hashnode.com/res/hashnode/image/upload/v1672857352767/f4775739-a947-4983-876b-b8d980caabb4.jpeg)

Apart from this, also contributed to Learn to Cloud, which is a free open-source guide to help you get into the cloud. Talking about _learn to cloud_, I also did a cloud podcast with my friend Gwyn for Learn to Cloud.

{% embed https://youtu.be/y8J4fKRCnTU %}

## Community

As you can already tell this year I produced a good amount of content for the cloud and DevOps community. In total, I published 52 YouTube videos, 12 podcast episodes and 7 technical articles.

Hoping to keep this momentum and provide more value to the community!

All this hard work did pay off as some amazing people nominated me for the [Canada Developer 30 under 30 award.](https://betakit.com/canadas-2022-developer-30-under-30/)

![Me holding the Canada Developer 30 Under 30 award](https://cdn.hashnode.com/res/hashnode/image/upload/v1672857556678/20793216-81b6-444b-8b70-d18f88b90dc7.jpeg)

## 2023

I am looking forward to building some amazing connections in the community in 2023 and keep contributing.

If you enjoyed this article and want to stay up-to-date with the latest content, be sure to subscribe to [my newsletter](https://rishabkumar.substack.com). You'll receive updates about my latest articles, as well as helpful tips and resources to help you in your journey in tech.