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Seek Out Satisfying Work and Strengthen Your Non-Technical Skills with Ed Finkler
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Ed Finkler
Ed Finkler is a software developer at DelMar Software Development. He is also co-host of the Development Hell podcast and he is currently raising mental health awareness in the tech community with his Open Sourcing Mental Illness speaking campaign.
In this episode, Phil and Ed Finkler begin by talking about how mental illness impacts tech professionals and why awareness of the issue needs to increase. They also talk about how Ed has successfully managed his own mental illness issues. Ed and Phil discuss the future of IT and the need to simplify both the creative process and what we build. They also cover the need to use dependable tech.
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Resources
Funkatron.com – Check out Ed Finkler’s website!
2 Top Career Tips
1) You need to develop your non-technical as well as your technical skills. These so-called soft skills are actually vital to success. Being a good communicator, the ability to work well in a team and having empathy are all essential.
2) Focus on the things that make you happy. You need to ensure that the things that make you feel satisfied are a part of the work that you do. In the podcast, Ed provides examples. He also explains that this does not necessarily mean working things that you find exciting.
Show Notes
Worst Career Moment
For Ed, that was being let go from a start-up position. At the time, he was working hard and felt that he was fully fulfilling the brief. It was hard for Ed to accept this change, especially because he had difficulties in other areas of his life. That was when his anxiety and depression really took hold and negatively impact everything. In the podcast, he explains how he managed to come out the other side.
Career Highlight
At one stage, Ed’s mental illness completely destroyed his confidence. So, being able to gradually come back from that and once again become a fully-functioning developer was understandably a career highlight for Ed. But, perhaps even more so is what came out of that struggle. He is really proud of founding Open Sourcing Mental Illness and the fact that it has now gained momentum and taken on a life of its own. It is nice to know that it will be there and continue to help others for many years to come.
The Future
Ed hopes to see the focus shifting from web development to creating tools that make things easier and more straightforward for developers. He feels that “complexity is the enemy” and believes that the more complex things are the more likely they are to screw up. Ed is excited about the fact that the community and open source are being embraced. He explains why in the podcast.
The Reveal
What first attracted you to a career in I.T.?
Ed has always loved computers. He kind of drifted into his IT career because he wanted to be able to build certain things.
What is the best career advice you’ve ever received?
Don’t have a loyalty to a specific technology, brand or company. Reserve your loyalty for people.
What is the worst career advice you’ve ever received?
It is a good idea to apply new and unproven technologies in production. It is not a good idea. This kind of fashion-driven development is extremely risky.
If you had to begin your career again in today’s world, what would you do?
Ed would start by learning Python.
What career objectives are you currently focusing on?
Being happy in his day to day life and at peace. Once you achieve that everything else, including work, becomes a lot easier.
What’s the number one non-technical skill that has helped you in your career so far?
The ability to speak in front of people and enjoy doing it.
What do you do to keep your own career energized?
Mixing things up, working in different languages on a range of projects.
What do you do in your spare time away from technology?
Ed loves music production. He has released an album and is about to release a 6 track EP.
Contact The Guest
Contact Ed Finkler through the following social media platforms:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/funkatron
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/edfinkler/
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