I've gone through a pretty non-standard path to get to where I am today. I dropped out of university in my second year and miraculously jumped straight to an IT Director position, then hopped my way through the corporate world into the realm of startups. My experience with the "real world" is grounded in experience that some people just don't ever get.
I've had people both younger and older than me (more often than not, younger) ask me for tips, tricks, and advice on how to succeed. I've decided to collect my learnings here so that I can hopefully be of help.
This may be randomly updated from time to time, I'll put the date of the most recent revision down below.
Last updated: 2025 November 22
Career
Most people don't end up going into the career they majored in.
Network, network, network. As you hop through your career, networking is the most sure-fire way to actually get where you want to go.
You don't need to go in to a job knowing 100%, as long as you can learn you will be fine.
Building on the above point, it will take a few months before you get to the point where you will be able to start contributing 100% autonomously.
Imposter syndrome never goes away. Everyone feels it. It's ok.
Age doesn't mean anything. I've outshined coworkers twice my age in technical knowledge.
Everyone has their strengths and weaknesses. If there is ever a point where your knowledge is lacking, feel free to ask a coworker. It's not the end of the world, and they won't think less of you—they've been in that position too.
It's entirely likely that your boss (or someone up the chain) is a fucking moron. It's just a fact of life.
If said moron gives you instructions that will interfere with your tasks, get those instructions in writing.
Actually, get everything in writing.
Make a big splash when you join a new team. People will recognize your abilities opening you up for greater opportunities.
Social
It's okay not to be professional. At the end of the day everyone you interact with is a person as well, and is probably just as sick of the corporate monotony and pleasantries as you are. Often times people will like the person who's friendlier and more relaxed than the person who speaks in HR-ese all day.
Building on the above point, I've found that being casual with third-party vendors and people in positions of power is a really good way to get shit done. People will often overlook the standard operating procedures for someone they like.
Network, network, network
Send that email. Don't fret about "oh will they reply or will this or that" just send it.
People are a lot more open than you'd think. You can email or message just about anyone and there is a likely chance they will reply.
Go drinking with your coworkers.
Be yourself. Most people tone themselves down for their jobs or adopt another personality. Just be yourself. People will spot you out and new doors will open for you.
Anecdote: My boss's boss's boss's boss casually knew my name. How, I don't know, but I ended up getting special responsibilities and tasks that some of my coworkers didn't get.
You live in a bubble. It wasn't until I got my first 9-5 that I realized just how much I was living in a bubble.
Seriously, some of my coworkers have held the most heinous opinions about the world.
Anecdote: I worked with a black guy who was a victim of police brutality AND an ardent defendant of Derek Chauvin. Not a viewpoint-background combination I'd ever expected to experience in my life.
Technical
This is more geared towards a tech-career, as, well, that is what I'm in.
Holy fuck, PLAN OUT what you want to do before you do it. Don't go in to a project with just an idea, make sure you run down all the minute details before you begin implementation. It will end up saving you so much time and relieve you of the inevitable headaches to come.
Ninety-nine percent of the time, you don't need MongoDB. Postgres has a JSONB data type. Utilize it.
Push for type-safety. It is a fucking pain in the ass to implement and work around, but you will be saving yourself so much time in debugging and writing future implementations.
Building on the above point, use AI to write your types if you don't feel like it. Often I will throw a Postgres table create script into Claude and tell it "create Typescript interfaces from this sql". Saves so much time.
Learn Rust in your free time. It has unironically helped me strengthen my programming abilities and develop new ways of thinking that I have implemented in my other work.