My Dream Job

July 03, 2014

I have some idea of what my “dream job” would be like. I love software so it would have something to do with that. I also like working with smart, talented people so there would have to be some of those. Oh yeah, also I don’t like being micro-managed so there should be none of that. Then it hits me… I think I’m pretty close to my dream job now!

I work at a little company called Key Ingredient where we make a recipe web site. But calling Key Ingredient a recipe web site company is like calling Amazon a book store. We’re doing a ton of other interesting things.

So I’m just going to finish it out and make this my dream job. Here’s the plan:

  1. Software
    • The company will fund training and conferences for the developers including me. All good devs love to learn about new cool stuff so we’re going to make that happen.
    • Meetups and knowledge sharing - devs are encouraged to attend meetups and give talks about what they’re learned.
  2. Smart, talented people. It’s pretty simple here… hire smart people that can get things done.
  3. No micro-management. I don’t want to work in a micro-managed environment so I refuse to micro-manage my folks. I’ve had the great privilege of working for some incredible managers who I barely saw because they stayed out of the way and let me do my thing. Here’s how we’re rolling:
    • Languages, libraries, and tools - each development team picks their own. No mandates here.
    • Developers get to pick what they work on. If you’re a Javascript expert who wants to try their hand at Python, go for it. If you’re a backend dev who wants to do a little Android, have at it.

Anyway, I’m just 9 months into this journey but it seems to be going well so far. I’ll keep you posted on how my dream job is going.