AMA: I was a military sniper before I was a software engineer
Solomon Bush
7 replies
I served in the military for 6 years active duty, did 3 deployments, and then taught myself how to code - got a degree online - and have been working in tech ever since :) AMA!
Also just launched Log Harvestor today - I'd really appreciate it if you'd check it out!
https://www.producthunt.com/posts/log-harvestor-0cfb4c7e-d7ab-413e-910e-80095164885f
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Julien Zmiro@zmiro
Intercom
Top Product
Wow dude what an impressive journey! I'm curious, are there any things you learned in your military experience that you think are useful in your tech career? Maybe even give you a unique perspective or unfair advantage over others?
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Log Harvestor
@zmiro Lmao, this is going to sound weird, but being able to stay awake for long periods is super helpful. I wasn't able to do that prior to joining. But I think I just have a tenacious mentality. I definitely did not have that before the military. I was kind of a bum and flunked out of a community college. Spent time working in kitchens and doing landscaping. The military definitely gave me a second chance, and help me learn discipline - maybe that second chance is a unique perspective? lol Idk :)
Wow that's impressive! I know a friend of mine who has a similar path and often tells me that he misses his duty time. Would you go back?
2 questions:
1) How have your experiences as a sniper, where I can guess trust and collaboration are vital, influenced your approach to working within a development team
2) Did your training make you better at COD?
Well, that's interesting.
And everything OK? Like any PTSD stuff an so? I can imagine that things can go sideways under extreme circumstances.
Log Harvestor
@jan_zavesky Oh yeah! I was really blessed to not have any serious issues. Unfortunately I knew a lot of young guys that struggled with PTSD. It's really sad, but it kind of seemed random who would be affected and who wouldn't.
But my wife said that I had a little bit of PTSD when I came home from deployments. She said I would just get nervous in crowded public places. But I guess that wore off after a couple of weeks.
The only real issues I had after the military were physical injuries. But nothing horrible - it's just carrying all that weight for really long distances really wears on your joints.