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I left academia in the UK as a postdoc in robotics, joined Firebase via H1B visa to San Fransisco, got aquired by Google, worked for 4 years. I found working fo
by tlarkworthy 8y ago
I left academia in the UK as a postdoc in robotics, joined Firebase via H1B visa to San Fransisco, got aquired by Google, worked for 4 years.
I found working for Google stressful, but lucrative and so it was the best decision i made. It totally change the course of my life for the better. I learnt so much about building teams, scaling impact, productionizing software, dealing with public. I missed academic problems, they are fun, but knowing your software has millions of users feels better and its nice having family vaguely recognize what you do.
The medical and financial stability let me start a family without fear, not having to stress about money is a huge weight off my shoulders. I feel very lucky.
Not sure how repetable that is. I was lucky to get a h1b, and i was lucky picking a winner like Firebase early stage, but i genuinely beleived it was the future of development. So great move, and i think i could go back into academia if i wanted, so its left me in a stronger position.
- samblr 8y agoFirebase is good platform and loved by many now. What was your reasoning to join firebase in its initial days ?
- tlarkworthy 8y agoI had failed to make a multiplayer computer game with traditional approach and realized firebase solved all my concurrency and push problems in a much neater way, and the security language didnt compromise too much expressivity unlike many other SaaS dbs. So i saw it solved a real problem in a simple way, way better with better ergonomics than i could do myself I found out about it just by reading hacknews and noticed it seemed to be posting a lot and well.
- throwawaybbqed 8y agoThanks. I missed one such opportunity in my life .. encountered guys at a YC event and thought they were brilliant. Managed to get an interview but it didn't work out (partially my fault, and partially because they had no idea how to deal with PhDs). Such opportunities are so rare in life. It is almost like winning the lottery.
- tlarkworthy 8y agoYeah i seized the oppertunity with both hands. I proposed and married my girlfreind in 2 days to get the visa jointly. I got a job offer becuase i wrote software to solve a particular issue with firebase at the time, and posted it to their user group, then they offered a guest blog post which i wrote here https://firebase.googleblog.com/2014/02/firesafe-add-complex-security-logic-to.html?m=1 https://firebase.googleblog.com/2014/02/firesafe-add-complex... then i think i got the offer!
- tinktank 8y agoWhy was working for Google stressful?
- tlarkworthy 8y agoPerformance reviews, being compared to peers all the time (and all peers are high acheivers). Feeling that to excel, i would have to work long hours.