Prologue
Call the fire department! Only they can put out the fire under his backside.
The year 1996
America is celebrating Independence Day. In honor of this, Will Smith saves the planet from an alien attack using a computer virus. I, however, save the planet by coordinating fighters armed with laser guns. Unfortunately, the saving is not in the movie, but in the game UFO: Enemy Unknown. At that moment, I realize that I want to work in IT. But not because of an interest in how a laser gun works or the coolness of computer viruses. It's all because of another computer game — Leisure Suit Larry. This game also has cartoons and boobs! What more does a normal boy need to grow up? Just one thing — for Mom not to find the game. And to keep her from finding it — it needs to be hidden. That's how I learned about MS-DOS and Windows.
The year 1999
The Wachowski brothers told us about the matrix, and the group Bomfunk MC’s released the single Freestyler. The whole city walks around in dark glasses humming "raka maka fo" and dreaming of escaping the matrix. I, however, didn't want to escape the matrix. I wanted to set up a computer network to the next house and understand how the magical letters IPX/SPX differ from TCP/IP. That's how I learned Linux and network stack.
The year 2004
Will Smith again saves humanity, but this time from robots. I enroll in an institute for power engineering. There are no robots, no computer networks, and definitely no boobs in power engineering. Motivation is at zero. I'm not a robot; I have dreams. Expulsion. That's how I learned how easy it is to disappoint your family.
The year 2005
We were lied to! Bruce Wayne is not a millionaire and Batman. Batman is Christian Bale. It's decided. I will be the Batman for the IT of our city. I will help everyone who lights the Bat-Signal in the form of a "blue screen of death." That's how I learned about outsourcing.
The year 2007
Optimus Prime and Megatron have landed on Earth. The planet is in danger! Where the hell is Will Smith? Who will save humanity from extinction? Definitely not me. How can you go save the world when you have a real Cisco switch in your hands and a real HP server sitting in a box next to you? That's how I learned about professional career growth.
The year 2009
The internet is filled with jokes about blue giants. Many males stalk females in clubs to secure their own little piece. But I'm not focusing on that now. I'm an engineer. That's how I learned about my family's dreams for me to become an engineer. After all, they grew up in the USSR, and in the Soviet Union, the word 'Engineer' carried a sense of pride.
Year 2011
The first interview was directly with the IT director. They say it started with just him and his great program, and from that, a business emerged. I wish I had an NZT pill now to understand all the dark areas without fear. And then we met — two ordinary people with the same set of limbs. His first question was whether I knew C+? My first question was what their RTO was. Our answers were similar to the mooing of cows. I got accepted. But why was everything so simple? Soon I realized — any IT screw-up equals my screw-up. It didn’t matter that the programmers were updating the back-end from their laptops via Wi-Fi. The programmer can’t be wrong, and the program is perfect. It’s all the stupid admin’s fault; he knows nothing about life. The admin's appendages (those from the shoulders) needed to grow into the pelvic area. That’s how I learned about greyness.
Year 2013
This is all because I’m in the commercial trade business. In serious companies, everyone respects each other. And what could be more serious than Banks? Not the Wall-Street banks (where there are many wolves), but local small banks. And here I am, already wearing a suit. They address me formally. My opinions are valued, but why is it so dull? There’s a lot of bureaucracy, no changes, no innovations. I’m suffocating. That’s how I learned about burnout.
Year 2014
The line of the future is blurred. I spend half the day drinking tea and the other half looking for another job. Bingo! It's another bank, but a federal one with cool tasks on merging branches. I pass the interview and get an offer. From the very first week, I’m overwhelmed with project work. Checkmate routine! A strong commitment is taking its toll — I'm almost living at work (with a difference from Moscow +7). Projects are completed, but the reward is a letter about reducing my position. That’s how I learned how a girl feels when you break up with her via SMS.
Year 2015
Broken and defeated. Back in retail again. There's no team, everyone for themselves. The leader can't tell a flash drive from an SFP. Accidents are happening non-stop. I'm taking everything into my own hands. There's a lot of informal communication with the team, a lot of sharing experiences. The game of pretending to be a team lead has been won. I am the new infrastructure manager. Now I will teach everyone how to live and take revenge on everyone. On the annoying marketers who can't create website layouts, on the developers who love to optimize their code with phrases like "the server needs more CPUs, memory, and SSD disks," and on the accountants with their clumsy accounting of IT assets in 1C. My enthusiasm was quickly dampened by a call to the IT director's office. I've never experienced such passionate brain stimulation before. I learned a lot of new things, like marketers are good at making money, developers are the lights of our company, and the director was a programmer himself (déjà vu perhaps), and there are very smart people in accounting, while the clumsy accounting is because I haven't been able to organize it properly.
Alright. Challenge accepted. Change of wardrobe. Change of library. Earning a red profile diploma in higher education. More conferences and meetings — less communication with the team. More mentoring and consultations — less hands-on technical work. The team is cohesive and trained. All projects and tasks were completed on time. Thus, I became a manager.
The year 2018
My venom is hungry. It could cost data centers in fields where there are only ground squirrels. It wants to dive into digital transformation. It demands digital for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. So I went to Saint Petersburg.
The year 1915
D. W. Griffith releases the film 'Birth of a Nation.' Many left the hall during the viewing. The film makes such a strong impression on the audience that protests begin from both 'black' and 'white' populations.
And I too have a very strong impression after moving, except that I can't leave the hall.
Why can't I leave the hall? Because I am so confident in my abilities that I sold everything in my previous city, took out a mortgage, and bought a home in Petersburg. And I am still confident.
But I have not been able to find a job for 5 months 🙂
The flame of the fire appeared during the search — they only need programmers here.
I went through several interviews (both technical and managerial), and everywhere they were interested in my programming skills. When I asked why the head of the division responsible for the data center needed to know 1C programming or GO, they looked at me like an owl.
After this interview, the campfire allowed me to cook eggs with bacon on it.
I won't focus on HR in general. Perhaps someday I will decide to write another article, and it will be dedicated to HR. Right now, it's about something else. I submitted my CV in November and was invited in January. Good interviews. The position is a 'player-coach.' The feedback was that I was liked, but they are looking at other candidates until the end of January. They've extended it until the end of February. Now it’s until the end of March.
I wrote to a friend. I asked him to send his CV to this company. Within a week he went through the interviews, received an offer, and earned the achievement of 'I'm a cool guy.' Guess what he does? A programmer.
I turned off the heating – the whole family is warming up by the campfire.
A distinctive feature of job postings in the West for me has been the requirement for conversational English. It doesn’t matter what the company or profession is. I can’t understand whether it’s a trend or a necessity. I decided to check. I made a 'fake' CV for a technical specialist and sent it to similar companies. I went through a phone interview, and when it came to speaking in English, I honestly admitted that my level was poor. The outcome - a rejection. Then I created a 'fake' CV for a programmer and sent it to the same companies I sent the tech CV to. Results – I received more responses. The lack of conversational English doesn’t seem to bother many.
We are living at the neighbors' – the campfire burned a hole in their ceiling.
I feel like I’m on the right track. This is already the fourth interview, and it’s with the owners. Before this, I had interviews with the CFO and HR director, as well as a conversation with a former police colonel (oh, what am I saying – there are no former ones). We talked for 3 hours, discussing everything from spaceships to staff reduction. We're already on a first-name basis. And then this phrase came up: 'So, how's your programming going?'
Here’s my Lynch trial. They never called me back.
The energy from the campfire is enough to heat the entire house and underground parking.
When did the birth of the nation happen? The nation of programmers. I thought, and still think, that in the city where I grew up, programmers were more valuable because there was nothing at all. But that was in the past; now I went online and found solutions to any problem. Now any monkey can compile a piece of code or install an operating system. And before you throw the monkey's poop at me, think about the fact that I took the simplest examples. Not every monkey will write an application or a decent program, and not every monkey will build you a proper infrastructure for the back-end of that application. Only experienced primates can handle these tasks.
The template is still tearing. Why would a manager or engineer need to program? Well, if you are a manager of programmers or a DevOps in an IT startup, then of course it's necessary. But if you are a pure integrator, why do you need this kung-fu?
There is not a single article about someone who gave up programming and became a 'master of machines.'
There is not a single course on 'how to become a Cisco engineer.' All podcasts are for developers. Instagram suggested I become a blockchain programmer in 5 days. Come on! The world was created in 7 days, but you can become a programmer in 5. What?
Surveys about employers are only taken by developers.
Hundreds of articles on how to teach a child programming, and none on how to make a child an engineer. After all, in the Soviet Union, the word Engineer sounded proud...
Epilogue
Year 2019. The Wachowski brothers became sisters. A remake of Freestyler was made. The fire truck never arrived. Outside, the snow melts, whether from spring or from the fire beneath his backside.
Acknowledgments
This may sound strange, but it was your articles that became the catalyst for publishing this article.
Source: habr.com
