Oddbean

i wish. i remain to believe i would do a beautiful job in the customer success side of block or cashapp, but i don’t see that happening without college experience i think. @jack any way you can help a fellow nostrich 💜?

I had a dream company/job that I wanted to get into about 5yrs ago. It takes time and patience, but I was able to make it happen. Keep your focus. Find things that you can do that will add to your value to the company. Keep trying to make connections with people at that company. I only made it to the job because of someone I knew that started there, and I had met about 8yrs prior.

You absolutely would! Here's a few openings at Block I found (I'm sure you searched as well). Maybe there's a position that can be created @jack? https://block.xyz/careers?roles=Customer%20Success|Marketing|Writing%20%26%20Editing|Sales

IT helpdesk. Ezpz, no degree required. If you felt the need, you could get CompTIA certs, which are cheaper and more applicable too (they’re still a racket too; don’t bother certifying, just learn the material imo)

Retail is brutal in the US. Probably the only thing worse is the service (restaurant industry) so much respect for people in the restaurant industry. I did retail through college and for about a year after graduation.

i mean i’ve been looking in my area for almost a month and there’s not a ton of options my dude lol… even if there is, they usually go for ppl who apply that have degrees anyways. just how it goes in the usa

Roya, avoid going down that path! Trust me, I hold a Master's degree in Law from one of the top colleges in the USA. It's just sitting on my shelf gathering dust. Despite having four years of experience, the job offers I receive are only $40k annually. It's a trap and not worth it!

No! It’s bull shit ! If you don’t have a license you will be working as a law clerk, paralegal, legal assistant and basically surviving with the low salary. If you go and pass bar exam the situation will be better but everyone whom I know with license make $80-100k maximum and they have years of experience! P.S. Grateful that I got scholarship and didn’t pay too much.

I mean I still gotta figure out what I need to do to get bitcoin inflow and stop spending what I hard earned during 7 years 😁 So, gotta hustle. But yeah my advice is just stick with your principles and try to find a good match

A difficult decision. Do you need a university degree? I don't know. There are arguments for and against it. I have resolved to always remain curious and to learn. But sometimes that's not enough for potential employers. Find your way, Roya 🫂

Do you know what you want to study? That much debt is a huge risk to take. I went to college to study what my dad wanted me to and shocker I couldn’t stay motivated so I failed out. Now I work at the local manufacturing plant after a couple of years stocking shelves and putting in a new application every six months. If I had it to do over I’d do that right out of high school.

If they really cared about it they’d cut out all the electives and extras like the 50 bucks a semester every student at the college I went to was charged for the gym whether they went to it or not.

just not something that is respectful in my culture. i’d rather not deteriorate my relationship with my father over a job that isn’t what i ever wanted to do. hvac is not my interest, it was something i had to do to live. working for another hvac company is not what i want to do, and frankly as i said to tanel, i deserve better for myself. i feel as if it’s been presumed that hvac is the only thing i can do, when it’s not?

First step: know what you want to do after. Then you’re able to take some time to reach out to recruiters and employers to see what they look for in the degree. Do they prefer private/elite schools or is public or community college ok? You can save a lot of money by doing your basics in community college and transferring to a state school, for example. Back up their answers with what employee’s resumes at the time of their entry looked like on linkedin. Once that is determined, strategize how to minimize your debt: Aggressively look for scholarships and grants, doesn’t matter how small, money is money and many applications take 20 minutes to do. Plan to work at least part time during school— and make sure they can accommodate your schedule. On campus is a lot better even if it pays less because you don’t spend time driving from school to work and back or spend money on gas. Usually you can find something that lets you partially study during the time. Figure out housing, live off campus if possible (dorms are usually way overpriced) with responsible or rich roommates so that if issues come up it doesn’t wipe your bank account out. Seriously, choose good roommates, $800 fees for party puke stains on the carpet are stupid. It’s also very important to think about skills employers want beyond the degree and think about how you can demonstrate that you captured that outside of class during your time in school. Eg if networking is important, try starting a class at your school (or something unofficial like a podcast) where you invite current industry professionals to give panels or talks. Finally, try to finish in 4 years or less (not hard if you take a few classes every summer). I’ve seen a lot of people try to juggle life and other jobs by taking a semester off here and a year off there, who end up taking 6 or 7 years to finish. That’s 2-3 years they missed out on having a higher salary to pay off their debt, and 2-3 years they accumulated more debt (not to mention school gets more expensive every year). Be laser focused on knocking it out as quickly as possible!

Employers don't really care about a degree. They care about accomplishments - even the beginnings of accomplishments. Even 40 years ago, no employer ever even glanced at my diploma. Even when I stuck it in front of their face (I worked hard on that thing - what a waste). What they did care about: * used small language model to generate buzzword compliant sociology papers garnering B+ * used QR factorization to model dN/dR for particle size distribution in the atmosphere for my dad * wrote a popular multi-player game in college * etc .. you may or may not be a math geek. But the key is to DO things, not sit in lectures (most of which I did not attend - unless they were actually useful). I had the opportunity to try farm work with an innovative farmer. He avoided minimum wage nonsense by exchanging our initially unskilled labor for a discount on the organic veggies we helped plant, weed, harvest. (I was too thorough and slow for harvest - so was put on weeding duty, where that trait is helpful.) I wish I had started learning about (real, organic) farming earlier! I'm 65 and just getting started. As you do things, you may discover enough market for your output that you don't actually need to work for someone. Of course, then you have the navigate the maze of government interference with workers actually owning a "means of production." You might have to hire an expert to deal with it ... From your other comment, you tried hvac - good! You discovered why the dirty and dangerous jobs are more often taken by males. I would note that plumbing is similar. All the plumbers I have hired have had massive upper body strength from hauling steel bathtubs, water heaters, etc. This does not bode well for most female practitioners. In the 19th century, women would often manage a farm, researching the science, what to plant where and when, and hire men to actually wrangle a horse drawn plow, or harvest grain. The women would work in a kitchen garden, which required more brains and less brawn.

This may sound old fashioned, but a lot of the tradesmen I have hired have worked for themselves, and their wives, who had also worked the trade and understood it, did the invoicing, accounting, customer calls, etc. Teamwork for the win! One of my projects is open source (and more importantly, self custodial - not SAS) accounting tailored to the tradesmen who have told me their troubles in that vein. E.g. printing invoices in the field is a win. Not all customers are happy with email, and you need a signed paper. And if you hand write the invoice, then your wife/accountant has to double enter it.

Nope. Only hired them. I'm the skinny math geek. I do my own electrical work for 110V. I hire a pro for 220V. I do my own minor plumbing repairs. I used to do my own car repairs, including rebuilding the engine. But I got rid of my car (wife still has one) in 2005 and got a bicycle. Car was too expensive for commuting, and I actually got a little bit of muscle. Our family was officially below the Virginia "poverty" line. I could have had more effective income by working part time in retail and taking the "earned income credit" and sending our girls to government schools. That last was the deal breaker. (I would also likely have been fired from retail as I don't have much patience for fools and "Karens".) I'm in a similar position. Was laid off in 2020, and only making a few thousand a year on hourly jobs. All the jobs here in the Shadow of Mordor are things like "building the CBDC", "vaccine passports", "correlating phone GPS with political orientation based on social media posts", "new weapons for defense industry", etc. That last is actually Constitutional, but not for me. I can't keep secrets and don't like modern weapons. And the "military industrial complex" is currently VERY addicted to escalating cash flows from endless wars. I lived with roommates to be able to pay for college while working without debt. We were the "Five Guys". Too bad we didn't trademark it. We also cooked and catered parties. These were all Christian guys. It was the tail end of the Jesus Revolution in the 70s. Check out the excellent movie of the same name. It is very accurate. I often visited Calvary Chapel while living in CA. Today, the price of college is ridiculously inflated. If you don't have the cash, don't do it. Even if you do have the cash, it is usually a bad investment today because it is so overpriced. Do an alternative (online classes) to actually learn stuff. And keep a portfolio of accomplishments - much more persuasive than a degree.

I would only do college if I'd be applying for jobs outside. For example wanting to get a work visa in Europ or Gulf countries, UAE, Qatar for whatever reason. If you have a slight interest in either art or technology, I recommend pursuing a digital form of either. With help of Pro AI subscription, teach yourself how to either use drawing softwares or build automation scripts. Something that just came up to me is technical writing, or writing in general. While learning, not only write a diary, convert your learning to a blog, vlog, or whatever digital form you like, maybe habla.news articles or flare.pub videos. It will be a long journey, but you can do it. Good luck

Expanding your education is a good idea... But it may put you further in debt. I still have to pay money I can't for classes. If you go to a community college, they usually don't even care of you learn or not. They just need the paycheck. And idk about STL, but here, it's all military and people that don't even have a teaching degree. Getting a cert from a trade school facility is cheaper, but people look at you like you're less competent, even if that's not true.

You might be able to do your masters degree directly based on experience. If it's expensive in the US, you can try other countries with recognised degrees. Might be a great 1-2 years global travel experience as well. Another option is to explore a consulting niche in cooling solutions for bitcoin miners. Reach out to experienced miners like Derek or Daniel to understand the challenges miners face. This knowledge can help you create effective solutions. You can try by serving 1-2 real customers, crafting solutions to their cooling problems. Set up simple ways to book your services online, and gather reviews. As you get sharper, you can create your own specialization "bitcoin mining cooling doctor." Another option is to work within the hvac industry - find big players and apply for other roles within sales, marketing, customer support. You already come with hands-on experience so it would be a plus factor. Every experience will add up to your knowledge and skills. The final bit is how you write your resume. You can say 6 years in hvac repair. Or you can elaborate - worked with 200 F&B businesses on industrial repairs, including both hardware and software components (X, Y, Z). This approach helps potential employers quickly grasp the extent and diversity of your experience. Tailoring your resume to highlight relevant details can make a significant impact, based on what would attract the person you engage. Setbacks sometimes can be an opportunity for something greater, one you may not have tried, if life was the same day in day out. You got this.