10 Best Pieces of Career Advice I’ve Received from a Summer Full of Informational Interviews
Hey Everyone!
Back at it with another blog that’s a little more general than Web 3.0, so hopefully, more of my LinkedIn, Insta, and Twitter followers will actually click it instead of seeing the post and telling themselves, “Not the crypto nerd again.”
Over the last few months, I’ve sent tons of cold emails for informational interviews and job openings (I lost count after 10). While I haven’t had the most success on the job front (some interviews, but still jobless, lol), I’ve learned a lot from conducting random informational interviews with people I think are doing some pretty cool stuff. In these calls, the advice ranges from working specifically in Web 3.0 to general career advice, and overall life advice as well.
I figured some of this 🔥 would be helpful to my few faithful readers, so I thought I may as well share it with y’all! (This is a much better way of saying I didn’t have an idea for this week's blog compared to the last month of blogs I wrote). Without further ado, as my favorite Black Eyed Peas song goes…
Quick note: if any of the people I mention in this blog are reading this…first, thanks for doing so…second, since I’ll be paraphrasing this advice, I am sorry in advance if I mischaracterize something you said. Don’t mean to insult you in any way shape or form.
1. Take everything with a grain of salt
Almost all of the people I spoke to prefaced the advice they gave with something along the lines of this. Whether it be your teacher, mentor, or even parent, you should always have some skepticism about the advice or suggestion they give as it may be misleading or untrue. This is because your current situation may not be the exact same as theirs when they utilized the advice to solve an issue or problem they were having. However, when someone does acknowledge to take their advice with some skepticism, it usually means they are self-aware, honest, and genuine in their help. It also goes hand-in-hand with this tweet.
Before we get too thick into the weeds with the rest of the career advice, I will display the same sentiment. As someone who does not have a full-time job, yet is giving career advice (quite ironic, lol), take everything that follows with a grain of salt!
2. Everyone agreed that reaching out cold is a good idea
During every informational interview I conducted, every person agreed that cold contacting is a great method and many of them even admitted to doing the same thing when they were younger. They love paying it forward and giving time to those who are “on the grind”, particularly those who frequently cold contacted in their hay day.
The potential upside of a cold email is massive, especially if you hit it off with the person (i.e. potential job, mentor, etc). The maximum potential downside, on the other hand, is the opportunity cost of losing a few minutes writing an email that is never responded to (even though instead of spending that time writing the email, you probably would’ve just binged Netflix). Although I’m not a big hockey person (but I wish I grew up around it) the GOAT himself put it best when he said:
Before you go write a cookie-cutter email and blast it to 1,000 people, I would recommend personalizing them. If you personalize each email and display why the recipient should take time out of their day to talk with you (ex: went to the same college, have a mutual friend, etc.), you will significantly increase your odds of getting in front of the person to gain the valuable insights, knowledge, and suggestions you are looking for.
3. Do stuff that you can talk about at cocktail parties for the rest of your life
Porter Smith, a16z Crypto
Although this advice is very unconventional and unique, it has been one of my favorite & the most impactful for my thought process at the early stage of my career. When you are young you don’t have too much real stuff to worry about (I’m talking kids & mortgages, not drama & people you talk to on Hinge). This means you have much less to lose, thus your risk/reward ratio is much higher when you’re young. Here’s a graph to help visualize it:
Porter backed up this advice by saying how everyone he knows doing big things in VC or business takes a leap and bets on themselves when they are young because even if you fail, you learn so much in the process. He mentioned a friend of his who is an ultramarathon runner (you thought a regular marathon was hard…) who talks more about running in job interviews than the job itself. Point is, go do some cool shit: it has a good chance of helping out in your career at some point.
4. Keep in touch with mentors
Jim Esposito, COO MoonPay
Mentors are instrumental in helping you take that next step in your career whether it be through the connections, advice, and more that they bring. Thus, it is crucial to find a few good ones to guide you along the way. However, it is almost as important to stay in touch with these mentors and keep them updated on everything you are doing. If you completely ignore them and only contact them when you need something, you will become a burden, and the mentor will feel that they are being used.
The best tip to keep close contact with your mentor and form an even stronger bond with them is to execute the advice they give. If a mentor advises you to listen to this podcast, read this book, take this action, etc., do it and report back to them with your result. Even if their suggestion doesn’t work out well, they will see that you took them seriously and you value the relationship. Also, don’t be afraid to simply check in every once in a while and make sure everything is going well with them.
Note: Jim, if you are reading this, I made a spreadsheet of all my mentors (yourself included) and added the date of the last contact so I make sure to stay in touch with them regularly. Hope we can talk again soon!
5. If companies have an opportunity, they will take a chance on someone even if they are “underqualified”
Recruiter at a Web 3.0 Company
During my job application process, there have been many opportunities I didn’t get that I was clearly “unqualified” for, especially in terms of job experience (although I argue I did enough in college to qualify for at least 1 year's worth of experience, people don’t seem to buy it, lol). However, even positions that didn’t reference any amount of job experience were still looking for people who had some years under their belt. As a college grad, this clearly doesn’t bode too well for me. One job interview I had where this was the case was with a Web 3.0 recruiter. They empathized with me noting that everyone is looking for an entry-level job even though there are no entry-level jobs available.
On the flip side, they gave me some pretty valuable insight from a recruiter’s perspective. There are times when a company is not in a position to “take a chance” on a candidate (Ex: market conditions). However, if a company is in the right position, they will choose candidates who look less qualified, but are unique and believe have greater potential in the role than other, more standard, candidates.
Their suggestion was instead of going down a peg and applying for lesser roles, keep believing in yourself and eventually, one of the chances will eventually come to fruition.
Note: To the recruiter who wished to stay anonymous, if you’re reading this, I’m still shooting my shot and hoping I’ll hit a target soon!
6. Want to be in learning mode while you are young and meet as many people as possible
Scott Kupor, a16z
Still shocked and thankful I was able to talk with Scott Kupor, who was the first employee at a16z and author of Secrets of Sand Hill Road (if you want to learn everything you need to know about VC, read this book). Scott had lots of great insights, but the one mentioned above was the most impactful to me.
The more you focus on meeting new people, the more potential opportunities you will open up later down the road. This expanded network creates a larger potential butterfly effect for your career and can open doors you couldn’t even think of previously. For example, Jim Esposito, who I mentioned earlier, realized if he stayed in Miami, he would work laterally for the rest of his life. Thus, for 8 months, he started talking to a ton of people who worked in tech on the west coast simply asking for advice. Eventually, through meeting these new people, he got a job at Cash App which eventually led to being COO at a Web 3.0 company.
The same goes for learning. If you learn a lot early in your career, you can provide more value to an organization later down the road. The more knowledge and tools you have in your arsenal, the more valuable you will be to a company or the more sought after you’ll be in the job market. Although money is important (don’t get me wrong, money can do a lot of great things) I would choose meeting people and learning 10 times out of 10 over money early for a career to create an exponential career trajectory instead of a linear one.
Scott’s best tip was to try and find a growing company to work for where the people care about you and how you develop as a leader, worker, person, and more. This typically trends more towards startups (especially ones with serious funding) than well-established corporate firms, but some large hyper-growth companies would fit these criteria as well.
7. Learn to read, write, communicate effectively, & think creatively
My Uncle Kev
I mentioned this piece of advice in my first blog (shameless shill), but my uncle told me if you hone in on these four skills, you’ll end up alright in your career, regardless of what you do (part of the reason I write these blogs that get little to no feedback, lol). I’ll try to explain why with some simple quotes, but I attached some articles for each if you want to dive deeper:
Reading: “The more you read, the more things you know. The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go.” — Dr. Suess
Writing: “Learning to write is learning to think. You don’t know anything clearly unless you can state it in writing.” S.I. Hayakawa
Communicating Effectively: “You can have brilliant ideas, but if you can’t get them across, your ideas won’t get you anywhere.” — Lee Iacocca
Thinking Creatively: “Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited to all we now know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there ever will be to know and understand” — Albert Einstein
These ideas are also extremely interconnected with one another, so the better you become at one, the more skilled you will become at the others:
Note: Just from researching this point, found a great study showing how writing and reading make you more creative. Worth a look.
8. Change your info diet and create content yourself
Jack Soslow, a16z
If you had a fitness goal to lose 10 pounds over the next two months, do you think you would continue to eat the same things you’ve been eating? You would probably change your diet, right? The same goes for the information you consume. If you are looking to pursue a career in biomedical engineering (and are looking to be part of the cream of the crop in that field), it wouldn't make sense for all your podcasts, newsletters, books, and other info sources to focus on fashion. Don’t get me wrong, I think if you have other interests, you should still keep up with them (although I want to work in Web 3.0, I still watch copious amounts of football and coach as well). However, surrounding & immersing yourself in content that is meaningful for your career aspirations will keep you up to speed on industry developments, increase your understanding of the subject matter, and potentially spark new ideas.
The second point that Jack made is that it’s important to put yourself out there and create content for others to consume as well. They say teachers are the best students, as in order to correctly teach others some subject material, you need to have a deep understanding of it. Here’s a clip from my favorite road trip movie growing up to illustrate the point.
Creating content can also help show that you are knowledgeable in your field, especially if you create really good content. Although you may not see any monetary benefit from an article or blog you write (God knows I haven’t), putting yourself out there will create more potential leads for work, grow your brand and presence, and build trust with readers that you are highly skilled in your field.
9. Develop a passion for your industry, and try to find a subsector that catches your eye
Sam Feintech, Coinbase
This is simple, but if you want to be successful at anything, you need to develop a passion for it. To be in the top 1% of any field, it is crucial to put in more work than the other 99%. To truly do this, however, your work can’t feel like a chore and should instead be something that brings you joy and happiness. Passion makes those long, hard hours much easier to push through day after day versus motivation, which can come from any Youtube video (recommend ending of Episode 7 of The Last Dance) and only lasts one or two days tops.
To take it one step further, Sam recommended finding a specific sub-sector of your overall industry. This can help you stand out not just for roles in that specific sub-sector, but others roles as well as it displays your willingness and ability to go super deep into a single subject area. For example, if you are very interested in art (my sister Adele for example), instead of trying to obtain a good amount of art knowledge overall, try to have a decent amount of general knowledge but an expert-level understanding of impressionism.
10. Don’t be afraid to look for a job elsewhere
Don’t want this person getting fired, so I won’t include their name
Although this advice goes completely against everything I grew up learning and doing from playing & coaching sports (being dedicated and committed to a team), I 100% agree. Although you may have some great friends or like the free snacks at your current company, at the end of the day, the company you work for doesn’t owe you anything that they aren’t contractually obligated to (pay, healthcare, etc.), so don’t think a company will necessarily do things for you outside of that scope.
The first rule they mentioned was to never compromise yourself for your company. For example, if you’re on your paternal/maternal leave and your boss is telling you to help them out with something in the office, you have not just the right, but the obligation to say no (family is def more important). Secondly, if you feel like something fishy is going on, it’s ok to walk away. The person I talked to previously worked at Voyager (a crypto bank basically) but thankfully got out before the whole firm collapsed since he saw some shady stuff going on. Stay true to yourself and your values, not to your company.
Conclusion
Wow…that turned out to be much longer than I anticipated (almost 3,000 words! Never was forced to write anything close to that in school) but was fun to write nonetheless. If you got this far, I commend you, and honestly thank you for putting up with my humor. I hope this advice helped you think about your career as much as it has for me. However, don’t forget the first rule I mentioned: take this with a grain of salt!
Don’t know what I’ll be writing about next week, but I do have a crazy idea that I’ll have to share at some point in the future (probably as we approach 2023). If you have any ideas for a blog or something you want to learn more about let me know. Have a great weekend!
Here are my links if you feel inclined: