Reader, This is a Senior Full Stack Engineer req I pulled from LPL Financial's careers page. REQ: https://career.lpl.com/job/R-047752/Engineer-II-Net-Full-Stack-Engineer screenshot just in case it gets taken down over the weekend lol So how do you vet candidates for this? For an Engineer II (senior), you are looking for the transition from "following instructions" to "owning outcomes." Years of experience are irrelevant if the candidate can prove they’re achieving at the appropriate level....
16 days ago • 3 min read
Reader,You struggle to vet technical requirements and position yourself to manage the decision maker well enough to move the deal forward. I’m not asking you. I’m telling you. I’m a boots on the ground full desk rep. I’ve had to think creatively to make matches work. I’ve also worked with hundreds of sales and recruiting leaders and sat in on their client conversations. When capable operators stall on true opportunities, it usually comes down to one thing: insufficient technical depth to spot...
20 days ago • 1 min read
Reader, Let's recap. In Part One, we saw how a vague, canned requisition left a sales rep struggling to do 2 things: align with the hiring manager define a clear candidate profile He'd send resume after resume to the hiring manager as the candidate profile was constantly changing. It became a fool's errand trying to get the right candidate for the role. The breakthrough came when an engineer joined the process. Their perspective didn’t just clarify technical requirements. It gave the rep the...
23 days ago • 5 min read
Reader, What is your strategy for filling AI engineering roles next year while managing clients and properly vetting technical talent? For the past six months, I’ve been partnering with two EU-based leaders on selling AI products and bespoke solutions. My role has been to vet small to mid sized businesses, run technical discovery, and help teams decide what to prioritize. The reality is messy. And misalignment rolls downhill. If that misalignment hasn’t hit your pipeline yet, it will within...
27 days ago • 2 min read
Hey newsletter friends, Social QA is officially shutting down for good. You probably saw this coming. I know I've been mulling it over for months now. The reality is, after I really dove into parkour coaching, I started to doubt that I'd ever return to QA education. I started to want nothing to do with QA outside of my 9-5. My energy and thoughts have been elsewhere since May or June. I haven't planned to seriously resume operations, especially since my parkour classes at the YMCA have been...
3 months ago • 4 min read
Hey there, I told you I'd let you know where I decided to document my parkour coaching journey. Here it is: >>> Door County Traceur blog I decided it would be a good excuse to try Beehiiv since they let you have a public blog and I always wondered how it compared to Kit. I'm only using it as a blog. No emails. Not sure how notifications work for it but if you want to know what's happening, check back for updates. Cheers, Steven
11 months ago • 1 min read
First off -- Happy Valentine's Day! 🫶 If you don't have someone to go on a date with, go get some seasonal treats and have some fun. My wife and I are heading up the peninsula to a hotel and trying a new Italian restaurant. It's gonna be fun, but that's not why you opened this email. For all I know, this might be my last email. And yes, I've said this before. Twice, actually. Maybe 3 times, I forget. But this time is different (really). You might be asking yourself: Why, of all times, would...
12 months ago • 2 min read
Do you ever feel like no job's ever quite the right fit for you? A couple months ago I was on a call with 2 friends I met on 𝕏 in my early days. While we caught up, some-crazy-how we ended up on the subject on my old YouTube channel. I was that guy who recklessly deleted social media accounts claiming, "I'll never go back!" The cloud is Facebook (and of course I always did) So I don't have any photos from old Facebook accounts. All the old parkour videos I recorded with my friends when we...
12 months ago • 3 min read
Yesterday I told you something NUTS happened to me. I also told you I'd tell you about it today. BUT FIRST.....obviously I have to derail the conversation to tell you a story 😜 You right now 2014 was a wild year. I had been in the parkour scene for 4 years. Did a crazy jump at Devil's Lake State Park that I'm never ever going to repeat. I was on top of the world, and I felt my Spidey Sense tingling, telling me the ol' Uncle Ben refrain: With great power comes great responsibility 🕷️ I felt a...
12 months ago • 4 min read
