How Content Can Land You a Job w/Chantastic

All righty, good morning. Uh, so man, how do you start this? I, you know what, I, I've almost, I've almost lost like my kind of cadence, right? Good morning everybody. And when I say everybody, I mean nobody because no one's here yet. It's snowing in Nashville. No, it is supposed to snow 8 inches in Nashville today.

That's insane.

I don't know, like Kelly Vaughn posted they got snow. They're getting snow in Atlanta, which is crazy that Atlanta got snow before us the way the way the map is, the way the system is, but not a meteorologist. But yeah, so we're getting snow kind of crazy. So everybody who is, uh, tuning in from Nashville, comment how many inches you got.

We got— How many inches you got in the chat?

Yeah, maybe not. How many snow inches that you— yeah, uh, I think we— well, I think we're— we got about an inch and a half right now. Um, it's not even covered like the driveways and stuff. But it is coming down pretty hard though. It's coming down pretty hard. All right. Excited for this. Happy New Year, everybody. Happy New Year. Happy 2025. Chan's sick. There's fires in LA and there's snow in Nashville.

So what is this world right now?

It's crazy, right?

Yeah. Crazy everywhere.

It's crazy everywhere. So excited about this. Obviously thoughts and prayers go out to folks in LA. Chan and I were talking about it before we went live. Um, I don't know anybody specifically in my network that's been affected yet, but man, for— I just can't imagine. Um, you know, we've dealt with tornadoes in Nashville, um, and, you know, we, we had a tornado 4 or 5 years ago hit about a mile from the crow flies from our house. That was an EF4.

Mm-hmm.

Um, so that was kind of nerve— unnerving. And so I, I can't imagine what the folks going through with LA right now. So, so prayers and thoughts for them. But excited to be with y'all this morning, 2025, first live of the first Guidance Counselor 2.0 live of the year.

So pumped about this.

Pumped to have Chan for this and excited to dive in today. Chan is operating at half capacity. Bless his heart. He's willing to do this live when he's not feeling good. So, but Chan brings the noise anytime, any day, whether he's sick or not. We're excited about this.

Hell yeah.

Before we dive in, first and foremost, I wanna give a shout out as always to Appwrite. Listen, I'm an Appwrite hero, Jason Torres, Appwrite hero. It's funny, like, Torque's got 2 Appwrite heroes on the team. Product's great, highly recommend checking them out. The people are even better. And so if you're looking to start up something on the side, check out Appwrite. I think it's pretty cool. Of course, I don't code, but I've been told it's cool. So there you go. I'm probably the only hero ambassador at a tech company that's non-technical. Right? You gotta love it. You gotta love it.

So, uh, like, someone would tell him if it sucked, so, uh, we trust him.

Yeah, if it sucks, somebody tell me. Um, but from what I've heard, it does not suck. So try Appwrite. That should be— that should be my thing. If— tell— I don't know if it sucks, but if it does, please tell me. Uh, so please go check out Appwrite. There you go. Um, uh, next thing, wanting to give a shout out to Torque, right? Want to give— listen, I put out a newsletter this morning. I'm not going to talk about it right now. We're doing some amazing things. We're going through a rebrand, redesign. We hired the design agency that did Uber, The Athletic, Patreon, Calvin Klein. I mean, they're incredible. So I had a great 3 or 4 days. I will tell you this, only thing I'll just say this, if we can pull off everything that we said in the brainstorming meeting, we're going to transform the industry. I firmly believe that. I firmly believe that. So excited for the growth of Torque. If you have not joined our Discord, please do that. Jason, drop the Discord in the chat. I see him in here. And obviously join our platform, jobs platform, to get access to jobs. All right, enough of me running my mouth. It's good to see y'all this morning. We got, we got a full house. Ricardo, Jason, Taya, Robert. Flu game, flu game.

Yeah, I'm actually not sure yet. I don't know, it's like, dude, it started on Monday.

If you're upright, it's not the flu. Yeah, I don't think so. I don't have a—

I don't have a fever or anything. Um, yeah. Yeah, we're good. We're good. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Chris, good to see y'all. All right, um, Chan, let's give the people what they want, man. Quick background just about you, maybe just who you are, what do you do. We'll go from there.

Yeah, uh, my name is Michael Chan. I go by Chantastic on the places, and I work with a company right now called WorkOS. We provide auth and identity services for people who want to get enterprise ready with their applications. Super fun. It's, it's all stuff that I didn't know that I would be excited about last year at this time.

Oh, really?

We can talk more about that. But, yeah, it's like— it's fun. I think I spent most of my career in the frontend of things. You know, a lot of React stuff, a lot of design systems. And there are so many gaps in my knowledge in terms of like full-stack web development. And I think right around the turn of 2024, I was kind of feeling like You know, if I wanted to build something, like if I wanted to make a product and put it out into the world, I don't think I would— like I would have to learn a shit ton of stuff to be able to do that.

Yeah.

And not just the development side of things. Like the, you know, like how to give— how to sell something. How to give people something they bought. You know, all that kind of stuff. So, yeah. So, this is kind of, you know, it was a really exciting opportunity to get connected with WorkOS and learn the auth and identity side. Learn how complicated it is. How many challenges there are. are, how hard it is to protect your customers and keep their identity and their information safe. And so, it's been a lot of fun. And I think, you know, for me, it's all about learning. You know, I just love— I have an avarice for, like, learning new shit.

That's a word.

That's a word.

Avarice. I got to start working that into my vocabulary. So, yeah.

So, that's me. Yeah. Worked in the past with React team, with the Storybook team. You know, All kinds of fun stuff in the back catalog. So yeah.

Are you still working? You know, I am curious, right? As a— I'm not a developer. As a developer, you get into what you're doing now, video editing, obviously kind of in a different type of— just a different type of kind of ecosystem with the OS stuff, you know?

Yeah.

All that stuff you just said.

Yeah.

Do you still code? Like, do you still get your hands dirty with React at all? Or like, what does that look like?

Yeah, that's so funny. Um, less. Yeah, but like, that's actually, you know, it's so funny. My happy place is— this is so stupid. This is so stupid. But like my—

No, it's not stupid. Yeah, it's not stupid.

My happy place is writing guides, right?

Really?

I fucking—

okay, that's weird.

Love it, right? Yeah, it is weird. It is. It's super weird.

Um, you like writing instruction manuals?

I do. Like, I do, like, you know, and everything kind of like comes from that. Like, I, I enjoy giving a talk, fine, but like, it's really the like preparation of a guide of like, okay, I got 30 minutes to tell someone how this thing works, right?

Yeah.

And in that 30 minutes, what are the, what are the most important things that they need to know? And then they can kind of figure out the rest, right? But like, what gets them to like a finished product in that 30 minutes? Yeah. And then we can, you know, They can Google from there. So, yeah, no, like, yeah, docs boy. That's right. No, it's true.

You're funny sometimes.

Yeah, man, over the holiday, it's like, oh, yeah, React 19 came out with some stuff. I think I'm just gonna write up some docs about the new context APIs so I can understand it better.

That's some nerd shit, dude.

I love it. It's some total nerd shit.

Total nerd shit.

Yeah.

All right. All right. So you and I can yap it up for like probably like 9 hours. But, um, so I want to get into, and I know we talked about this, uh, you know, I think 6 months ago when I brought you on, but I want to talk about your last job search, right? So going to WorkOS, I think you put, you put out kind of a first like YouTube series and I fell in love with it. Like, I still get goosebumps talking, and like, I'm not trying to gas you up, right? Like, I mean, I truly mean it. I think you're one of the most genuine dudes I know. Oh, thank you. I think you're one of the most creative guys I know. Um, uh, and, and, and you start to put this like YouTube series out, right? And, and obviously shout out, we have a video together, highly recommend going to check it out.

Yeah, it's a good one.

It's actually very tactical. Like, I would highly actually recommend it.

Yeah. Um, But that's one of my favorite ones in that series, actually.

You're supposed to say that you're on live with me.

Yeah, yeah, I'm pulling it up right now. I'm going to share it with, uh, with everyone in the chat. But, um, yeah, so I got a playlist of all those videos, but yours is one of my favorite ones because it was just like, hey, I'm in, I'm in a mess right now, right? Like, I'm in a hole, help me get out of it.

Yeah.

And, uh, dude, uh, okay, so I just put that— I think I put it in the right place.

I just put it in the YouTube one. That's okay, uh, I'll get Jason. Jason, Go copy the—

I'm so stupid at streaming here.

I'm gonna put our private chat. No, no, no, it's not you. It's actually this program. You can only post comments as the speaker in YouTube, not LinkedIn or not Twitter.

It's crazy.

I think it's an API thing.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I don't know.

Fucking APIs.

Am I saying that right? Anyways, yeah, highly recommend go to Chantastic YouTube. So what was kind of the— what was the start? Like you got laid off, you got laid off, right?

Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So it was January, I think, 22nd. Uh, I got laid off, um, from a job that I was feeling like pretty good about. Um, you know, it's funny, like, I, I like, there's a lot of people who do content that are like, you know, narcissists. Like they, they really need the world to know how great they are.

Yeah.

Uh, I, I like really—

You're the antithesis of that.

Yeah.

Like I, in my mind, like I think Chance, like Chance is trying to help people. Like I don't really give a fuck about followers or anything.

Oh, I do not. Like, I, like, I would do the same shit. And that's why I don't like launch a lot of shit too, is because like I would do the same shit. Like if it was, if, if there was nobody there, like I just, I, you know, if, if I can help one person, like I'm so happy to put all of the stupid effort into, uh, to, to help with that one person. And so, um, it is kind of hard for me to like, you know, to actually like get into like a content flow sometimes because like just doing it is satisfying enough for me. But, yeah, this was kind of this moment where, like, I was doing a lot of Storybook. I was working for Chromatic doing Storybook content. And I thought we were doing a great job. Like, our videos were doing well. People were super excited about it. People were getting excited about the content. If you look at the sentiment in the State of JS for that year, like, Storybook was not doing well. And the year that we were working— or the 2 years that we were working together, things were starting to turn around. And so, I felt like we were ultimately doing really good work. But, um, I guess it just didn't fit into their, their, their plan, uh, for the direction they wanted to go. And, um, uh, yeah, so laid me off at the beginning of the year and I, I kind of didn't know what to do. Um, but in those moments, it's just kind of like, just be as loud and as helpful as possible. And I think in retrospect, It's, it's kind of easy to see that like I was on a little bit of a wave. You know, like I think a lot of people were getting laid off, but specifically in the DevRel space, there were a lot of people who were getting laid off. A lot of companies were getting rid of their, their like DevRel, DevEd type people. And so I think something that I'm able to look back on in retrospect is that it's like, yeah, I was laid off and I was talking about that experience for me, which was independently helpful, but it got boosted by the fact that by the industry that I was in. and kind of what was happening, the changes there and questions that people were asking about how relevant that space is still. So it was really, I don't know, I think it was a good time to do it because I think that if it was just about like, oh, I got laid off, let's talk about it, I would've lost energy for it. But there was enough in there for me to kind of like be excited about it until, you know, I eventually found something else.

So I mean, how did, like, you know, I think people look at you and, you know, I think people look at creators and they're like, they don't think, were humans and they're like, they're superheroes and they don't, they're invincible and they don't go through feelings and they can figure out themselves. How did you feel when you got laid off?

Oh dude, it sucks. Yeah.

Like, you know, I, uh, you know, I don't think we talk, we don't talk enough about this.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I, I mean, I work for money, you know, like, like, you know, I would just be a nerd writing, you know, docs for myself if, if that wasn't the case. But I work for money.

By the way, that's doc comment, by the way, sidebar. Love that nerd shit. I love writing docs too. Docs are important. Docs are overrated. I think we need to have an entire, uh, we need to have an entire live. Jason, add this to something you do, uh, around docs, 'cause I'm not nerdy enough to understand docs. So, uh, I think that needs to be its own thing. We should just do a webinar panel on docs. How fun.

We should. Let's do it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'd love to hop on that. Um, actually, you know, it's so funny. You know those career assessments that you take in high school?

It's nuts.

Oh, it's great. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Career assessment, go. Yeah.

I remember, dude, this, this stood out to me. I think about it all the time. Um, mine came back and it said I should be a dictionary editor, and I, I was the only person—

Dictionary editor?

A dictionary editor. I didn't even know that was a fucking thing.

And, uh, career assessment, and it said you should be— that I— you need to have a t-shirt that all it says is dictionary editor. That is wild. That is dope. Wild.

It's so true.

And like, but like, you're the guy that then the career assessment goes, who's taking this? Yeah. Like, like, like the mind of the career assessment's like, who is taking this?

Yeah. Then it just rolls the dice and it's like, I don't know, anal retentive, uh, you know, like write to, likes to write docs, like, uh, dictionary editor, I guess. I love it.

So obviously it sucked, right? Going back to getting laid off. I mean, like, you know, because, because I think, because, you know, I mean, I, I know people have messaged me and they're like, Did you feel anything? Like, you're fine, you can get a job. I, I posted, uh, that like I felt bad when I got laid off and somebody literally tweeted me and go, it doesn't matter, you found a job in 4 weeks. I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, like I'm allowed to have feelings. Sure. Yeah, yeah, I—

yeah, you still had 4 weeks of that feeling.

Exactly.

Yeah, yeah, which like any amount of time— now I understand that like, uh, sitting with that feeling for an exceptionally long amount of time is exhausting. Like, no, no doubt that, that the sustaining that for a long time is, um, uh, is, you know, an amount of torment, uh, that is different, right? But, you know, it still sucks. I mean, I, I still think the worst part of it is like just finding out and your whole, like, your whole attention kind of like shifting to, uh, like, what do I do?

Yeah.

Yeah, I think it, yeah, I mean, I guess to answer your like specific question, like there's this thing that you kind of have your head down and work a lot of times and like this is one thing that's really challenging. I think, you know, this ties back to like one of the reasons that I don't like being a consultant or, you know, like a, you know, freelance or whatnot.

Yeah.

Is because it's so hard for me to focus on both getting work and doing work.

It's so hard. People don't understand. Like, I wanna be freelance. Like, are you a content creator? I basically tell people, are you a content creator? They're like, what do you mean? I'm like, yeah, you essentially have to be a content creator and a business. Like, you, you need to develop and do content.

Yeah, that's, that's actually a really great point. Like, now it's like probably 3, right? Because like, if you're not, like, someone who's doing content is gonna out— like, is gonna win you.

If there's a recruiter, I mean, in full transparency, if there's a marketing consultant, I don't know what I am anymore, to be totally honest with you. But let's just say there's a— You're just Taylor, man. You do your thing. Let's just say there's a marketing consultant out there who doesn't post, and then there's me. Like, who are you gonna— who are you probably gonna look at first?

Totally. 100%.

Which, which kind of leads into our conversation as we're 16 minutes in and quite happy. Yeah. Uh, create. I mean, just create. Put it out.

Yeah. Yeah. And so I think that's the— like, I think there is, um, it sucks And like, man, I, there were, there were days where I was like, I'm making the wrong fucking choice, like doing this instead of something else, like instead of like grinding resumes or, or whatever, or like, you know, getting in touch with more people in my network. Because, you know, like, you know, I have a family, right?

Yeah.

And, you know, even though like I'm like financially responsible and had like, you know, 3 to 5 months or whatever of runway, you know, in the bank, you know, plus the, you know, Which, shout out to you in California. Oh dude, I, I will admit I'm like lucky as hell. We, we bought at the right time. And so yeah, we did too. We did very fortunate timeline-wise, um, which I have no control over. I just am grateful to have been lucky. Um, and so it, it was, was possible, which I, I tell you now, it would not be possible. I'd be, I'd be running zeros like at the on my bank account at the end of every month.

Um, yeah.

And I think that like there's this, there's this kind of like shame in it too that you're feeling of like, oh, shame around getting laid off. Shame around getting laid off of like, oh, I guess I couldn't hack it.

Yeah.

Or like whatever, you know, you're feeling a lot of those things and it really does become like kind of, um, you know, content is kind of hard in those modes, right? Like the times that I haven't posted stuff, it's times that I've been like the most ashamed. And so like kind of pulling myself out of that is, um, or pulling yourself or like whoever, like, out of your, out of your head to do that is like a really impossible thing. And obviously, again, like, I've been fortunate like to have come off of the back of having like a pretty successful React podcast.

Yeah.

Um, for a bit, and to have like a little bit of an audience, you know. If you're starting that stuff up from scratch, like, it— like, nobody gives a shit. It's, um—

And I'm— and actually, I mean that And I want to preface that, I said no one gives a shit, meaning that that's great. You can literally create and iterate on stuff. I mean, it took me 6 months talking to the void. Listen guys, I'm— this is my 5th year of Guidance Counselor 2.0. This is 5 years. Yeah, nobody— like, the comments, like, these comments, like, y'all are amazing. The comment section has been through the roof on this thing. I don't take that for granted because I did 6 months of this where nobody commented.

Totally.

Yeah, yeah, nobody.

I know that, you know, and like, I feel like you have to earn it, right? Like, yeah, that, that builds up like a steel in you that is so important, and you take with you, uh, everything. Because it really makes you question, like, am I doing this for likes and comments and, you know, follows and all that kind of stuff, or am I doing it because I like it? And I wanna help people. Yep.

Um, so going back, going back to the YouTube thing. So yeah, so you got laid off, felt awful obviously, and then you just like, I wanna help people, I wanna document my job search. Like where, where did that kind of, like where did that click for you?

Yeah, like, so I'm like, I am an insanely curious, uh, person. I think that that kind of like ties into the like liking to write docs. Like there's always some kind of hidden magic, some type of hidden something inside of you know, an API or a design decision that you can, like, you know, learn from and it actually, like, changes— you know, it's like XP farming, right? But for, you know, real life.

Right.

Yes. And, you know, this felt like an opportunity. I had been laid off in the past. But didn't have kind of the tools necessary to, like, talk about it out loud, I guess. And so this was like, uh, this was a time I think I wanted to, like, my goals for the time were to like learn something about like where our industry was at. 'Cause again, like, you know, I, I had been heads down for, you know, just kind of like getting work out, uh, learn something about where our industry was at, where we were trending. Um, just talk with friends. You know, I think that, you know, there's this idea of like content, uh, where, you know, you're, you're, you're producing something, you know, and yeah, it's, you know, it's all for something else. But like at the end of the day, it's like, you know, you and I get to hang out for like 30 minutes, uh, in the middle of the week, right? Every 6 months doing this, right? Uh, and like part of it is just like hanging out with your friends and like kind of learning, learning what's up.

I think it's guys. I think it's guys too. And, and I'm not a female, so like, I— females watching this, chime in. Sure. But like, I'm married, you know, to a female. Like, I understand kind of the, the maybe the, the kind of the nuance of it. Like, I feel like females are so much better. Like, oh, let's just go like get a matcha and like journal and hang out, right? Guys, it's like, no, I'm gonna be at my desk and just like typing away all day.

Yeah, yeah.

So like one of the things, one of the— and, and, you know, I've thought about, I literally have, I was like, should I hang up Guidance Counselor 2.0 for a bit? Like, should I like— yeah, I'm like, this is my, this is my only way to keep hanging out with people in the industry who I love.

Yeah.

Like, like my boy Anthony Mays out in California. Actually, I need to text him.

He's in LA.

I didn't even think about that. Anthony, like I love that dude to death. He's in LA every time we see each other. It's like we're like we're like brothers from another mother. But like like I don't get to hang out with him unless I do this.

Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah. It's like it's just I honestly like that is a huge part of a huge motivator. I think one of the things that keeps like sustaining you for the long time, right? Being able to like hang out with your friends and and just kind of see what's up, see what they're. see how their thinking has changed from, you know, quarter to quarter or year to year or whatnot.

That's why I'm so bullish on streaming.

Yeah.

Because I feel like, actually it was in my newsletter I just put out this morning, but like, I'm so, because like, I think people view content and like to be a content creator. No, no, no. Just go live and hang with people.

Yeah.

Yeah. I think we've like, now your YouTube stuff's really good. I mean, shout out to you. You're an amazing editor.

I love your stuff.

Oh my God. It's very engaging. Like, so if you watch your stuff, I would get intimidated. I was like, well, Chan can like edit. But that's why I like— guys, I don't edit. I just go live and I just post stuff on my YouTube. Now I do have editors. I have the funding from Torque, which shout out Torque for obviously supporting me. But like, I did phone— I mean, literally most of my photos from Boston that I've posted the last 3 or 4 days, if you follow me, are on my phone, edit on my phone.

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

So it's like, you don't need a lot. But I, I think, I think everybody should stream. And everybody should have excuse to hang out with people. Yeah, that's it. Yeah.

I, you know, also it's like, man, that's like when you're having fun with people, like that's such engaging content. So much fun. Right. It's so much fun. I mean, like I still have like videos locked away in my brain, uh, from you and you had like a videographer with you, like going through Atlanta.

Yeah.

And like just, just getting shots of you like hanging out, having fun with people. And man, that stuff is so sticky. Like, We're so like, our brains are tuned to see the advertisement, I guess, of people just having fun with other people. That's it.

It's vibes. And I, hey, listen, I know there are some people in business that I deal with that I drive them nuts when I talk about vibes all the time. What I've come to realize is all vibes.

It's all vibes.

It's vibes with your team. It's vibes with your career. It's vibes with your wife. It's How does things feel? Do things feel right or do things feel wrong?

Yeah, yeah. And that's— I mean, you know, it's so funny. It's like, that is— I think in American culture, we're so, uh, we're so up here and we don't trust the— like, so many— like, all of the— all of our ancestors, like, really trusted what was going on in their— in their body and their nervous system.

And there was no— you had to, like, roll up on people and they're like, do they have guns out or not? Like, you know what I'm saying?

Like, yeah, yeah.

Spidey senses were big back then.

100%. And we still have all of that, right? But we train ourselves like to, we, we let the brain tell like every other part of our body like, oh no, like that's, that's not a thing. Like we're all about like trying to control everything from the top down. And, um, you know, I, in, in, you know, this, uh, production of, you know, kind of like that short series of like layoff videos. Part of what was attractive to the team that hired me at WorkOS, you know, Michael Greenwich, I remember feeling like he really got it when we had, you know, an interview. He reached out and he was like, you know, trust is like the most important thing when building a brand, building a company, you know, just making content. And you know, you are a person that people trust because you open up and you talk honestly about a thing. And, you know, that is, uh, that's something that we wanna, you know, invest in and partner with. And, uh, that really stuck with me because I think that, you know, it's like vibes is a little bit of like a meme way to describe it. Like, oh yeah, it's all vibes. It's all vibes. But like when you think about content as a machine for building trust with people, like what, you know, what you're doing here.

Mm-hmm.

Is like you're creating a space where you're like, hey, we're gonna have an honest conversation about what it looks like to, you know, find work and, uh, you know, continue to market yourself as a professional. Um, you know, and have those honest conversations. Like every time you're building trust and like, yeah, it's like, it's like vibes in the abstract. But, um, that trust, you know, that's, that is what, you know, brought me to ask you first and foremost, like, hey, what do I do? Like, I haven't been in this place since before I knew you, but now that I know you, I know that you're the person that I need to talk with about this thing.

Yeah.

And so, yeah, I think, you know, trust is probably— you know, trust is such a, like, I don't know, gold-plated word, I guess. But I think that's the way that I think about it is, like, are you a person who is continually investing in being trustworthy and known for Um, you know, like not, not taking shortcuts, but like being honest with people, um, you know, all the time, even when it sucks.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Talk, talk about how— sorry, so, so people start watching this, you're like, all right, we're talking about content, we talked about trust, we talked about giving back, we talked about being friends, we talked about hanging out with people, but how did— how does it land a job?

Yeah, yeah. So, um, you know, I think that You, you can't, uh, can't over— uh, undervalue, uh, just doing the work too, you know?

Sure.

I mean, like, you know, you gotta, you know, I, I went through, um, you know, I, I went through and I did like kind of those, uh, you know, LinkedIn, you know, profile checks and like try to make, you know, make all that stuff good. I have another video in there, um, as well where we talk about kind of like getting your LinkedIn, uh, Up to, up to ship, shipshape. With Danny Thomas just has a LinkedIn course. Like you literally just go through that and like just your, your LinkedIn goes from like 0 to 100 like overnight. And yeah, I think, you know, doing that, sending the resumes out, man, I, you know what, I, I should send a couple links. I still have them on my site. I have a couple applications.

Send in private chat. Because what I'll do is I'll take all these links and post on our LinkedIn, on my LinkedIn where we're streaming and tag everything.

Okay.

Yeah.

I'll find them and I'll get them to you. I don't know exactly where they are on my site right now. But I had them all public. So I applied to both a handful of places. So, like, Netflix and then Syntax was hiring at the time. And, uh, yeah, so I made both of those applications like public to show the work that I did on those. Um, but those are just, you know, like, you know, you're just grinding on, uh, on, on problems and, and, uh, you know, in the traditional way, traditional applications. Uh, there was a lot of that as well as the, uh, you know, the more like content side of things.

Right, right.

You know, I, I think I would have been happy either way, but I am really glad to be continuing to learn about Uh, you know, the art of video production, uh, being able to continue to do that instead of just having like a—

But like, how did WorkOS find you? I want to make sure we highlight that. How did WorkOS find you?

Oh yeah, through the, through the content, through the, through the interviews. And like, I think my first video I posted, uh, you know, uh, about getting—

Did you make a video like for them, like almost kind of like a spec ad almost, or—

No, no, no. I, um, Yeah, for that, you know, they, um, honestly, so that's, I mean, that's the nice thing about like doing content is, is that like effectively I was just like, they were seeing, they saw my original post about getting laid off and then saw some of the interviews that I was producing, some of the, you know, whatever. And were like, oh, like homie can just like take this ball and roll with it. We know we need some more video stuff at this stage in our company. Uh, this is a person who can just do it like A to Z. Like, no-brainer. Like, and we're seeing them do it in real time.

Um, so I'm curious, how is the interview set? Because like, typically— I think I know where this is going— did they just like see you be like, we like you, we hire you? Like, I'm sure, I'm sure the tone is different.

Oh, oh yeah, the tone is way different. The tone—

I mean, not an interview.

Yeah, the tone was different for all of the interviews that I took. Like, even, even Netflix, which I ended up Funny story. So I made a video, I will share it so that anyone can see it. I made a video for Netflix saying, hey, I've identified this team. I think I'd be a really good fit for it, whatnot. Turns out I wasn't a good fit. And that came up in the interview process.

Narrator. He was not a good fit.

Yeah, I was not a good fit. But I actually let him know. I was like, you know what? This sounds like it's probably not the ideal fit for me. I think I'm a strong candidate, but I'm not the exact person that you're looking for. And, uh, I, I, I don't wanna ruin a good chance on, um, on the wrong role. And the guy was like, it took him a second to recover. He's like, no one's ever said that to me as a Netflix recruiter, ever.

That's great.

Which was kind of a fun little, uh, a fun little thing. But it, it, it was very, um, kind of like personally satisfying to be like, oh man, you know what? I'm at a point in my life where I know what I'm good at and I know what I'm not good at. And I can, I can, I can close doors that I know are gonna be a bad fit and like are gonna grind both of us. Um, and so that was really exciting. But I mean, I would not have gotten that interview. Like, just, I would not have gotten that interview if I did not, uh, make a video, uh, for them and like just put, and just put it out into the world. Uh, cuz it just got, you know, it, it got a lot of attention and, uh, you know, people started sharing it and like, what the fuck is this? No one's ever made a video for a, you know, like, and you think like Netflix.

Yeah. Right?

Like, people are gonna— like, everything's already been done. But like, no, like, there's— it's so easy to get attention just by, just by being willing to stand out.

And 100%, I want to be real quick. I want to be respectful because I have another question. I see Jason's question. We're technically at time. What's your availability? Can we go a little over, or—

Oh yeah, I'm, I'm good for probably another like 15 minutes.

Okay, cool. All right, sweet. We'll go 15 more minutes. Um, I do want to go to Jason's thing real quick. Can you elaborate on why it wasn't a fit or is that in the video?

Oh, yeah, yeah. No, I never like kind of followed up on that publicly. Most of the work that I do is like extremely deliberate. You know, I worked in like design systems and like I didn't get there by accident. Like I got there by being like an extremely slow, like parallel thinking type of person. Like not like, hey, you got this component. You get a ticket and you got to make a component for this thing. Like, it would take me 10 times longer to do it because I was thinking, you know, down the road of like, well, how does this apply to all of our components? And how can we like, you know, universalize this and, you know, make it work for, you know, our growing team, you know, long term and like get better patterns around that?

Yeah.

And like, not everybody thinks like that. And like, that's just the way that my brain works. And it makes me really good at a certain type of development. Um, but the team, you know, despite the way that the, you know, and, and you know this, Delta, very well, despite the way that the, the, uh, uh, job was written up, which kind of talked a lot about the, like, you know, design thinking, you know, front-end architecture, you know, you know, all that stuff. They really just needed someone to like grind out as fast as possible. And that's just not me. I, uh, I, I just can't, right? It's just not a mode that I got, like, I have slow twitch muscles when it comes to development, not fast twitch.

And so that's true. You're a marathon runner, you're not a sprinter. I mean, that's absolutely a thing.

Absolutely.

And like, yeah, I mean, and again, and I want to reiterate what Chan's saying. I think if you can get to the point in your career where you can turn down Netflix, like, I don't want that to go like under the radar here. Like, Chan was like, nah, I'm good. It's not a fit. Like, do you understand where you have to be at in your confidence of who you are as a developer? the awareness of who you are as a developer, and the balls to just say to Netflix, nah, I'm good. So shout out to you because, but I truly think, and this is where I have finally gotten to, I have experienced, I put out a newsletter 2 weeks ago about dealing with imposter syndrome. The last 4 years of my career has been heavy, heavy imposter syndrome.

Why?

Because I was moving from a traditional recruiting role to this like developer, dev rel, marketing.

Yeah.

Whatever I do, right? People ask me like, what do I do for a job? I'm like, I have no idea. So like the fact of the matter is like, I, like, I felt so much imposter syndrome, but now like when I interviewed at Torque, I was like, this is what I can do. This is what I will do. This is what I will not do.

Yeah. Yeah. Oh man. It's so hard to say that, right? Because like once you've said it, you can't go back and be like, oh yeah, I guess I'm willing to do that. Like, no, like they know now, they know. You're like, oh yeah, this guy's bad at that.

Yeah. And Jasmine, I appreciate the kind words. Appreciate it. Appreciate it. Yeah. It's just like, and I want to encourage people, I think if you can get to that point, even if you're junior, I think you're actually going to probably turn some heads more than you being wishy-washy. That's just my hot take. Let me ask you this, Chance. I only got you about for 14 minutes. And again, thank you for Thank you for hanging out. This has been—

yeah.

Oh, thank you. Conversation's been great. The views are through the, through the roof. So I think people resonate with this. Um, I, so there, there's a conversation right now, and, and again, this is a little bit of a hot take, a little bit of a hot topic, but I feel like in today's world right now, it's very hard to get started as a junior developer.

Yeah.

It's very hard to get started as a developer. I feel like the end to this, and this could just, this, you could just tell me I'm wrong and we can move on. I feel like if you could pick up video editing, oh man, everything is moving to content. Like literally, and I've posted about this in my, I'm, I, again, my newsletter is kind of like Torque updates and like industry trends. And like, I think like hiring a developer for engineering content is like the next wave of marketing.

Yeah.

And so for the people who couldn't necessarily hack it in the dev side, which is totally fine. I feel like if you can become a decent— and not even like you, I'm talking about like open up CapCut web or desktop and just do some clipping. I feel like that's like the next hot thing. But I'm curious to hear your thoughts on this.

Yeah, man, I'm so cautious right now.

I know. Listen, This is a safe space. We got a good community here. It's a safe space. So you can—

I know. Uh, I think that like yes and no, and I'm gonna qualify those to be like, like totally, uh, I'm gonna come back to the no. Uh, first emphatically yes. Like if you have any interest in video editing at all, push into that 100%. I agree with that sentiment entirely. Um, So much of like, you know, so the CEO of WorkOS, Michael Granich, is constantly talking about product market fit and like finding it, whether it's enough, you know, et cetera. And like one of the ways that you know that you have product market fit is that your like customers keep pulling you into like various directions, right? They're like, they're just begging you for features. And so, you know, I am— you know, I've been doing web development for the last, you know, what, 15-plus years, right? Like the majority of my adult career is in web development. However, I went to school for like multimedia production. And so, like back in my history, I have like a lot of audio production, a lot of like video production, like back there. And I can say for a fact right now, like my job is like 90% editing right now. Like, and I am like, I'm a developer educator, but it's like so much of it is editing. Now the no part is like, if you don't want to do that, like, you know, you gotta trust your gut.

Like, don't—

Yeah.

I'm not saying you have to.

Yeah. But if you have any interest in that shit at all, Man, being able to look, cuz I think of editing right now as being able to tell a story. Correct. And man, like everybody needs that. Everybody needs that.

Like Emre comes here, there are way more. Yeah, yeah. Listen, what I'm saying is, is I think if you are having problems finding a job, but you are also artistic and like the editing and like content, I think if you could pick that up, I think you could potentially find a job faster in developer marketing than you can being a developer. Yeah, 100%. Yeah. Because what I'm seeing right now, when I was on my last job search, I talked to 2 to 3 companies who have fired their entire marketing division because traditional marketing does not work. Yep. My words, their words, not mine, which is what I'm obviously very passionate about. I am like, traditional marketing sucks for the most part. Brianna, if you hear this, you're wonderful. Brianna Holmes, my right-hand woman from Render. who does all the renders marketing works with me. She's wonderful. She's insane. For the most part, traditional marketing doesn't work. So it's like, all right, well then what does that look like? That goes into more content style marketing, which to do content well, you need to be able to do some video editing potentially, or at least know your way around it. Prime example, there's this girl, Paul. It's actually the sister of a guy on my team, Luca. Luca's sister is an incredible product marketing content person. She works for a company called Chameleon. I think it's some payment something or other, right? First off, I would've never heard about this company to begin with if it wasn't for her. Second off, I watch every single one of her videos because it's like, it's not even about a product that I— that's even necessary to me. I just watch it because she's really good at what she does.

Yeah.

Yeah. I think more of that, and that's something I'm really considering too. If you wanna go on a marketing sprint here, Like, that's my thing. Like creating meaningful, impactful content that people will watch no matter your industry. That's when you tap into the next level. So if you're a developer and are able to bring those video skills, that's that next level shit, which is what you got.

Yeah, no, I, and I 100% agree with that. I think that every, you know, as markets collapse, like everything ends in individuals and like this goes back to that thing that I hate doing. So if we— this is kind of like linking back to the, like, why I never wanted to be freelance or a consultant.

That's actually what comedians do. That's a really good comedian.

Every— when we identify, like, a skill that we have that we like that we want to grow in, we want to try to— we try really hard to protect only doing that one thing.

Right?

Especially developers like, oh, I'm just a frontend guy, right? Like, or I'm just a backend guy. You wanna like niche. Everyone's trying to niche down. The people who have the best sustained careers are the people who think like entrepreneurs, no matter what field you're in. And so you have to look at the landscape, look at where, like, look at where things are going. As much as over the last 15 years, I've wanted to be able to just put my, like, put my head down and just crank out like really excellent, like frontend components that work for, like, multiple applications and design systems, et cetera. That has never been true for me, right? Like, I always get— end up getting, like, pushed around. And you have to be someone who thinks entrepreneurially no matter what job that you do. And I think that, you know, in that way, if— you know, I completely agree. If you have an inkling about, like, Hey, I wanna get into content. I wanna write more. I want to, you know, you know, produce some little videos around things that I learned. I think that that is an incredible skill to develop, that, that, that's kind of like that. And like, you know, maybe you're like, you know, you're—

Yeah.

This is the value add because man, I tell you what, like, you know, being on the marketing team or having been on multiple marketing teams, People don't know how to communicate the thing that they've built. Right? And so like, you'll get like a first draft, like, hey, you know, I spent the last like 3 months building this thing and you'll get a draft trying to talk about it, like communicating that to the world.

And it's not good. Yeah.

And so I think that, man, like just being able to tell a story, communicate like however that resonates with you, like writing, you know, it doesn't have to be like video editing, but like—

Sure, you could be a great writer. I mean, I do think there is like, when it comes to social and con— and again, I know we're kind of blurring the lines here, like Taylor's at the marketing podcast, or— but I think like with Chan coming on, Chan is like a unicorn too and kind of sits in the middle, like I've kind of sat in the middle with recruiting and staffing and marketing, to where we're— we can, we can see in and out. So that's why I'm bringing this up, and that I just think like, if you love writing, you don't have to do video. If you love writing, There's a huge need writing blogs, writing social content. I even want to go to the nth degree on Torque where we just have a TikTok person that just creates TikTok, right? Because TikTok content's different than Twitter content, then it's different from LinkedIn content. I mean, there's so many nuances. And so I think if you are technical and understand technical jargon but can still communicate, I think that's huge. And I think that new lane is gonna be through content creation.

Yeah. Yeah. And, and I mean, to, to, to bring it back, it's like, it's all about, it's all about story, right? And like that will, developing that skill will never, will, will always serve you.

Like it's always gonna help you in the interview process.

Oh my gosh. Yeah. I mean, like, if, if you can't, like, if you can't sell like some feature that you built, there's no way you're gonna be able to like sit in an interview and like sell yourself, right? Like it's so scary to be like, hey, this is the shit that I'm good at. This is what I've done. This is how awesome I am. It's so unnatural for a developer. Like, I don't know. Like, I've been trying, I guess, to some extent still sell, you know, myself for various things. Like, for the past— like, my entire career.

Yeah.

And, like, it's still fucking awkward, right? Like, you know, some people are natural at it because they think they're the center of the universe. But for those of us who are kind of maybe more like traditional nerds, doc nerds, you know, if you will. It's not easy. And it's a skill that you have to develop. And kind of asking yourself every time you do anything, what's the story in this? Like, what's the story in this? And I think that's, you know, that's, you know, what you've learned through content. I think people can, like, in a very small way, just say, like, hey, I built this really cool thing. You know what? I'm gonna talk about You know, what's, what's the thing that I'm allowed to talk about? You know, because that's the thing too, you know, sometimes people, you know, are under some type of, uh, you know, sure, it's closed source, they can't talk about it. But you learned something through that process that is yours to talk about, right? And, um, being able to, to harness that, talk about it, find a lane where it's easy for you to introduce that into your process, man, that's the difference. That is the difference. And it changes everything.

100%. All right. Last 4 minutes, rapid fire here. Again, Chan, thanks for coming on. Y'all, I'll post some links and whatnot. But I guess the first question real quick, any technical things, any frameworks, trends, something that you're nerding out about right now that you wanna share? Yeah.

So Theo posted a video, I think maybe yesterday, maybe a couple days ago, but it was talking about I'll find it. How like just sentiment around JavaScript is bad. Just in general across the board. I found that to be a very interesting— a very interesting take. I think that it's— it makes sense kind of given the time that we're in. I don't think JavaScript became like the rails of productivity that everybody wanted it— or a lot of people wanted it to become. And so—

Yeah.

I think there's kind of like a shifting vibe on, like, you know, how we, you know, build applications. I think that there's just a general trend towards thinking more full stack, thinking more in terms of product than there has been. As our industry kind of like goes through that lull, we have to take on more roles, put on more hats. And so, I find that to be like an interesting thing of like, how do we tell stories that help people build build the products that they're interested in, whether for someone else or for themselves. That's something that I'm interested in right now. I love it.

I love it.

All right.

Last piece of advice before we hop off here. When it comes to people in their careers right now and they're struggling with, right, the biggest thing is like, you know, biggest piece of advice you would tell yourself or just biggest piece of advice you tell somebody right now on the job search.

Uh, yeah, find a way to figure out how to tell stories like throughout your whole career. I mean, that's really—

and like, it's everything.

It's everything. It's everything. Story is everything. And it is a, it's a way to connect with people. Um, you know, as, as, as we've talked about this whole time, right? Like at the end of the day, like we've been talking about like creating connections through storytelling. Um, that is like just— that's how you make good friends. That's how you make good industry connections. Like, being able to get raises. Yeah.

I mean, when you go and you, you, and, and you want to raise, you got to say what you've done. You got to spin it a little bit.

Oh man. Yeah, 100%. Yeah, you got to get good at saying like what you've done because, uh, you know, to another thing that we've said, like, nobody gives a shit. Like, people aren't out there looking for like, hey, How can I give a shit about the thing that you're doing? Like, that's not how we're wired. Everyone's trying to like survive and figure out their own shit.

Yep.

And so you have to figure out how to tell a story that helps you, helps other people. Um, cuz that's how you get, that's how you get attention. That's how you build trust. Those vibes we're talking about, that's how you build vibes.

How you— all comes back. It all comes back.

All comes back.

All right, y'all. Well, uh, Chance, stay on so I can say bye to you backstage, but y'all, Have a great one. Have a great Friday. For those of you in Nashville, stay warm. Um, and, uh, and again, we appreciate you. Next week we are back. Um, I'm not traveling next week, so we are back with a full week of Guidance Counselor 2.0. Y'all have a great one. We appreciate you. See y'all next week. Peace.