On this week's episode of the podcast, freeCodeCamp founder Quincy Larson interviews James Q Quick. He's a developer, speaker, and teacher.
James grew up in Memphis. He was an athlete who played violin, and knew nothing about computer science but chose it as his college major. Since then, he's not only worked as a dev at Microsoft, FedEx and many tech startups. And he's given more than 100 talks at conferences about technical topics.
Support for this podcast comes from a grant from Wix Studio. Wix Studio provides developers tools to rapidly build websites with everything out-of-the-box, then extend, replace, and break boundaries with code. Learn more at https://wixstudio.com.
Support also comes from the 11,043 kind folks who support freeCodeCamp through a monthly donation. Join these kind folks and help our mission by going to https://www.freecodecamp.org/donate
We talk about:
- How coding a Harry Potter Trivia app launched James' developer career
- Getting laid off then getting back onto the bike
- How to go about getting a first developer job
- How to make a name for yourself through conference talks and creating tutorials
What song do you want to hear in the next intro?
Links we talk about during our conversation:
James's website: https://www.jamesqquick.com/
Jevon's Paradox: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox
Chapters
0:00:00 Teaser
0:00:41 Musical intro – Shinobi theme (1987)
0:02:07 Interview starts
0:05:08 Current Job Market Challenges
0:08:12 The Importance of Networking
0:11:03 Overcoming Introversion in Networking
0:14:13 The Long-Term Investment in Learning to Code
0:17:20 Balancing Passion and Financial Goals in Tech
0:20:00 The Benefits of Working in Tech
0:26:01 Climbing New Hills: Career Growth and Opportunities
0:32:11 Navigating Challenges in the Tech Industry
0:37:55 The Role of AI in Development
0:43:54 Building a Network and Community
0:50:01 Transitioning from Layoff to Content Creation
0:55:57 Sponsorships and Developer Advocacy
1:01:47 The Importance of Building Projects
1:11:40 Job Searching in Today's Market
1:21:40 Learning in Public: The Power of Feedback
1:29:08 Dealing with Negativity in Public Spaces