Latest / Black Box Theory Podcast / BBT #15 Snippet | Leaving Home for a T*** Job Changed Everything
Transcript
- Thomas: Leave home, get uncomfortable, get left behind. A LinkedIn post making us rounds. A black engineer from Maryland. shares that he almost didn't take his Microsoft internship in Seattle because he didn't want to leave home, want to be the only black person in the room and was comfortable where he was. He went anyway ⁓ his point in Seattle ⁓ the Pacific Northwest tech corridor, you are surrounded by people in tech. It's ⁓ a niche world. It's the default. He's saying the exposure, the network and the career acceleration he got would have happened if he stayed comfortable. The question here is, There's a few questions actually. Is staying comfortable versus knowing what you want for your life the same thing? Is breaking barriers, you want to call it, whatever that means. ⁓ And also LinkedIn, stuff people get on there and cap, a lot of it's just, what are your thoughts? Malcolm: I mean, don't know, bro. feel like... don't necessarily know. Well, I don't know. I feel like because now I think maybe that that advice would have been a bit more rigid and ⁓ of like applicable like some years ago, like five, 10, 15 years ago. But think now like this is just one of the most dynamic kind of like landscapes, especially ⁓ in tech space, right? Like that we've seen ever in large parts of kind of like this AI revolution that we're kind of going through. But I don't know. I wouldn't say, because I think that, with Microsoft, Microsoft is a very... Like it's a very like, like kind of like flexible and supportive company. And the fact that it's like, it's a global company, right? Like obviously we're headquartered and, you know, like said, we're headquartered in Redmond, Washington, but we have people that work everywhere, in every continent, in every country, right? Everywhere across the globe. Obviously for this, like being a new grad, someone's fresh out of college and like kind of like having that, you know, decision like, hey, staying home and. Thomas: Yeah. locations everywhere. Mm-hmm. Malcolm: or going out to like I I think that me and you are pretty good parallels. It's kind of like those two decisions. And it's like, I think it definitely has its benefits with, you know, kind of like having that, those kind of like in-person interactions that you just can't really replicate elsewhere. And obviously there is a level of comfort, I think, that comes with like staying at home and staying in the place that you're used to. However, I wouldn't necessarily attribute like moving out to a place that you're uncomfortable with like. directly tie that to a quicker career advancement path or like a quicker like, because feel like, and I feel like that's very specific to team, to company, ⁓ to as well because ⁓ I've people that stayed in their cities and stayed in their areas and have moved up the chain just as quickly as someone who moved across the country to work at a company. it's like, I think that's very team. ⁓ industry company and or like just just just very specific. I said, mean like like two things two things can be like like two things can be true in one try like leaving your comfort zone is you know like is something is oftentimes where a lot of like the real growth happens. And it is also kind of like, you know, something to also consider, like, you know, just some of these cities, there usually isn't a high concentration of people that look like us. So it's like, both of those things can be true at once. But I think that, I I think more importantly than anything, it's the quality and output of your work that I think that really moves the needle for a lot of this stuff. mean, I've seen both sides of it, bro. I've seen people that have moved out. across the country, left everything behind to go to the companies. I've seen people that went out there, stayed for a bit, made their mark, came back. I've seen people that have stayed out here for the whole time. I've seen kind of like every one of these kind of like options play out. And from what I've seen so far, like it doesn't seem like any one option is better than the other. you know, it's just like, think that, you know, your path is your path. And I don't think that anyone is in position to say like. going here, going here and making this decision will change your life in this way because everyone's different, everyone has a different path, everyone has a different circumstance as well, right? So, I mean, I think that as long as you're doing what you feel is right for you, whether you're comfortable or not, that's just how you kinda gotta play it and figure it out from there.