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Ryan Burgess
Welcome to a new front end happy hour episode. This year. We've mentioned this earlier in another episode, but we're doing some special episodes covering each of the panelists backgrounds, by the way of interviews. We hope these episodes provide a little more insights into our backgrounds in our careers. Because you've been listening to us for a long time, we have a lot of longtime listeners. And we often get a lot of great questions about our careers or backgrounds. And so let's let's just go deep dive on an episode. This is the second in the series. In the first episode, Jem was so kind to interview me and hit me up with some really good questions. So now I'm going to reverse the table. And in this episode, I'm going to get to interview jam and we're all gonna get to learn about the glorious gem, that tall tall man with that amazing beard gem, like, man, you know, I've been friends for years. I love this, I get to interview you and just like ask I know a lot of things about you, but our listeners don't know everything. You know, they they know. Yes, you are tall guy. Nice, nice beard. You know, like I said, they they know this, but, you know, let's start from the start. Where did you grew up Jeb?

Jem Young
I was born in Garden Grove, in Southern California, which is in Orange County. When I tell people that they're they're always like, oh, Orange County, like the OC. And I'm like, No, that was where the rich people lived. I did not grow up wealthy. I am number three of four children. So I have two sisters and a younger brother. So I spent probably up until age 12. Living in Southern California. And then I lived in New York for several years. And then I went to college and high school down in Georgia.

Ryan Burgess
Nice. How do you how do you go from California to New York? Because that like a huge adjustment. I mean, you're going coast to coast but like, you got this nice, beautiful California sun. And then now you got to deal with a little bit of that New York cold weather.

Jem Young
It was a change. Certainly. I remember people in middle school commenting on Oh, that's, that's cool. Jen from California, because I just had the California laid back attitude. Whether or not that's true or not, I'm not sure. Maybe that's just like something I adopted, in my early years just trying to find my identity. But yeah, it was a big change. We moved because my grandmother fell ill and you know, the family had to come out and take care of her. And I ended up living a few places in in New York, we bounced around a few times. So it was an adventure, for sure. It's one of those you resent when you're doing it. But looking back it these things like make you a better person. I think just having that adventure. It was rough at times. Because when I ended up in Georgia, you know, I was going to high school with people who had lived in the town their whole life. So they, their friendship circles were set. They they've known each other since they're little, little children. And here I am from New York slash California, no friends had to make my own way in, I was resentful for a while about not being able to be settled and have a place to call home for any period of time. But in the end, I don't know, I think it's helped me become more outgoing. And the friendships I do develop are real and not a result of proximity or, or location, just their friends because I want them to be my friends. And they want me to be my friends. And that's something I still valued to this day.

Ryan Burgess
I love that. Like I love the positive spin on it too. Because yeah, it's tough being a teenager kid, any of that, like, where you have to leave your friends that you grew up with or like in trying to make new friends. I also feel like maybe it was from your young age, but I feel like you've totally held on to the chill by moving to New York, like New York is it's a different vibe. Like it totally is. And I feel like you must have just held on to that California vibe the whole entire time. Because you've lived in New York again, even as an adult and like, I don't think you've ever really carried that New York vibe.

Jem Young
By my wife says that, too. Sometimes. She's like, Yeah, you don't, you don't really seem to stress about anything. And of course, that's not true. I do like any, any adult and especially any parent, I stress, you know, three times as much. But I think what I've learned is worrying doesn't really solve anything. And honestly, how I solved most of my problems is a good night's sleep or even a bad night's sleep. But problems send us all themselves the next day, or you have a solution in your mind. So that's always my attitude when I come across a problem is yeah, let's just sit and think about it. And that's that's my ideal self. In reality, you know, the real Self is I get heated, I get angry. I make rash decisions. Sometimes. You know, someone cuts me off on the highway, you know, I grip the wheel and give them a give them a glare or maybe some other obscene gestures or something like that. But I recognize that's not a healthy way. So I think my, my ideal self, the ideal jam is that cool, calm collected person who has it all together. In fact, if you ask me my favorite genre of character in a movie or book or something like that, it's always that guy, you know, the guy who's like, things are going wrong. And then it turns out in the end, this is part of the plan the whole time. And I always want to be that guy, even if I'm not, I want people to think I'm that guy, where I had a plan the whole time. And this is all just part of it. I don't know, that's what I aspire to be is that type of person. So when I get angry when I get upset, when things aren't going well, I always think back to like, you know, who do I want to be? And try to be more of that person.

Ryan Burgess
I like that. They mean seriously, you know, I've been friends for a while. I always have like Gemma's, so just like relaxed, even keel, calm about situation, even tough situations. I see you just deal with it. Like I find that inspiring besides living in some flat means pretty cool cities. What did you do growing up? What were some fun things or things that you did as a kid?

Jem Young
Well, I had three siblings. So that was kind of what you did when you have three siblings is you have you have a friend circle built in right there. I definitely stayed out of trouble. I know, it's not everybody has their own reflections of their childhood. But I definitely was trouble averse. I think early on, it was built into being like, Hey, you're a young black man in society. If you get into trouble, it's done, you're done. Like you can't step over the line even a little bit, because you will end up in jail or worse. So I always took that to heart. And was I describe myself as a pretty cautious child, I wasn't out skateboarding or doing graffiti or anything like that, because I knew what would happen if, you know, I ended up on the wrong side of the law there. For things I did. I kept to myself a lot, I read a lot of books, I think I'm grateful for my for my parents for instilling that in all of all of our kids was read books, it's a good escape, it's good adventure, it's good way to understand other people's perspectives. So I read a lot of books. I don't do it as much these days, I feel like I don't have time, which is an excuse, of course. But I think having having access and being able to just get away and have my own time, where I can dive into these worlds helped me understand myself a little bit better. And help me get through being a teenager, which being a teenager is rough. Man, you couldn't pay me money to go back through puberty and being a teenager, it is a man, just trying to figure out who you are in the world. And I think ultimately, that's what led me into computers. Because, you know, I was kind of a loner just did my own thing, read books. Didn't like I said before, like, didn't have a lot of long standing friends, because I just moved a lot. So I got the computers in that way, which is I was like, people are complicated. People are dumb people are emotional. Computers are logical. Computers are rational. It is built on a set of rules and a set of systems that once I understand those systems, I can do whatever I want within the constraints of this. And that I really appreciated about growing up and getting the computers. My dad, he I think he understood me that he understood that like I needed my own alone time. And so it gave me a computer. It's let me play on the computer. And they never said like you're wasting your life or get outside or do anything. I mean, occasionally they did. They, both my parents, I think understood that each of their kids was a little bit different. And you know, Jem, Jem needed a Space Jam, like to do his own thing and eat come back around eventually. But it was that time on being able to have to myself to play around the computer, do my own thing that eventually led me into tech in my career of being in software was just like that curiosity.

Ryan Burgess
I love that. Okay, how old were you in this? Your dad got you this first computer?

Jem Young
Who? Maybe 10 or 12? Yeah, it was it was an apple. And I remember the first hack on on those old apples, if you hold down the shift key, it would let you double the RAM, which was not much but it essentially allocated some hard drive space, so you could have more memory. And I was like, Whoa, this is like a hack that not a lot of people knew about. And then from there is, you know, it was game on anything you can do and could do. I was all about it on the computers. Do you

Ryan Burgess
remember like what type of things you were doing on the computer? Was it like games? Or were you actually coding at the time?

Jem Young
No, no, just games coding wasn't even I didn't even know you can code a computer. I knew roughly how they worked. You know, I can move files around. I can use the command line but coding was it's a concept that I didn't understand. I didn't even know it was a thing. The first time I learned about even computer science and you can actually make a living doing it. peers was at this art fair. So my mom, she worked at the University at the time in Southern California. And she took me to an art fair. And you know, I was just, you know, I was a young kid, maybe 12, or 13, and just kind of dicking around, doing whatever. And I saw these kind of nerdy looking gentlemen. And I was like, hey, what do you what do you guys do you have like a giant computer. They're like, Oh, we're computer science majors. And I was like, what's that? Like, oh, you study computers. And I was like, what? And then from then on, I knew exactly what I wanted to do. There's never a question in my mind that this is the thing that I'm going to do. And honestly, I consider myself fortunate because I'm good at them. And I'm I say this as humbly as possible. But I'm good at computers. And having been able to find your passion with your skills is, I don't know, fortunate, honestly.

Ryan Burgess
I mean, that's so cool, too, because you also were introduced some fairly young like, 1012 computers at that age, that wasn't an easy thing to come by. So that's really cool that you were introduced to it, but then also, to just be so in love with them that you also find out like you can study computers and and that you knew that that's what you wanted to be at, like 13. That is so cool. Because like, I don't think there's a lot of people that are like, Yeah, I know exactly what I want to do. It's rare. So that's really cool. Going back to that, if you're 13, you know that computer science is a thing. You're playing games, you didn't really know much about coding. But what kind of sparked the like, I'm going to start programming,

Jem Young
I'd say it was probably 14 or 15. Maybe when I seriously got into programming. And my first programming experience was ti 83. Calculator. Do you remember those graphing calculators? Yeah, that you that I still think it's a scam, because they make you buy them and you never really use them in school. But someone had like, pointed out, you can make a very simple program on those TI graphing calculators. So I started doing that. And I learned about like, go to statements. And if and when I was like, Ha, this is pretty cool. I wish I could do more. I wish I could network to other other calculators and other things. And it turned out you could but that cost money, and I did not have a lot of money growing up. So I programmed the calculator for a bit. And then in high school, I joined like every computer thing there was, there's a graphics arts program. There's like a word processing program. I was there in the computer lab. Eventually, I started the computer club at my school. Just as an excuse to use the computers more after school. I felt kind of bad because I was kind of a terror in the high school. So these were the early days. Nobody really understood computers. If you understood computers, you were like the whiz kid. So I started, I think we're playing Doom. Now we're playing quake, like one of the early shooters. And it turned out like there's no firewall to school. Again, this is the early days of networking. So I can start a land program and we're playing quake over the land. So people across the school are playing quake on these like server that I started up. They eventually like got wise and shut that down. But then I switched to something else, I learned that the password to things is just admin. Like admin admin. So So I, you know, I messed around on the servers for a bit. And eventually they're like, jam you. You do whatever, just like don't break anything, which is good. I had I had people that support me. And that's kind of a theme that I still carry through my life is like, I look back at where I've come. And it's always because there's always someone there to give me a nudge or hand up in places. And that's something I believe in doing the same. Because like, It's all how we get there. But yeah, I caused enough trouble in high school, I got into 3d design. I got into 3d programming for a time. And it was so so cool. Like I was using this program called 3ds Max. My team went to state competition for 3d programming. We made a scene we came in second place, it was a bummer. And I always wonder, how do we won that competition went to Nationals? Would I do something different? Who knows? I don't know you, we all have unexplored paths in life that we don't know what'll happen. But from from high school, and just having a lot of different exposure to computers there and having the freedom to kind of run around and do whatever I wanted. I went to college for computer science. And, you know, I like to say like I Oh, I did really well, and professors were proud of me. But really, I failed out in a year. I failed out of college very quickly in a year because you know, I just wasn't ready. I had all that freedom and I didn't know what to do with it honestly. And you know, just had a good time or a bad time, depending on the weekend. But eventually I went back to school and I went to PT college for a time to get through the math classes because that was always that always scared me was the math part of computer science. But fortunately again, I had really good teachers and really good people to help me. So I finished my I got my part of my Associate's degree. And then I transferred to a four year university where I got my computer science degree, which we've definitely talked about enough on this podcast,

Ryan Burgess
which going back to even the math part of it, were you taking those math courses to still apply towards computer science? Like you're like, I'm doing this so I can be better at computer science?

Jem Young
No, I was doing it because I had to. This was always my problem with school was I couldn't apply it to anything. It was all theoretical. So I was always like, oh, yeah, I gotta take out three. What how does this apply to real life? And stuff like that? I always had a hard time dealing, like, I guess in some way. You and I are similar in that, which is like authority, which is like, you should do this, Jem. Why? Because I told you to that, like, that's not a good reason. And I still have a hard time with that, like, tell me why I'm doing this thing. But this kind of disconnect of the theoretical versus practical is what drove me to be a better engineer, because I would sit home. And I would code in my free time. Because I was always like, what can I do? Is this possible? What about this cool thing? And I think that's a lot of how I got where I am and acquired the skills I did was, I wanted more practical application and not just this theory. But yeah, I still don't know why we have to learn so much math and computer science like, I get it. But there's there's a certain level where like, you, I can I can program this, I don't need to know it,

Ryan Burgess
I think very similar. Like, why am I learning this? Oh, this makes sense why I'm learning this, but if it doesn't, it's really hard to attach to like reasoning behind it. Maybe looking back on some of the school, you know, whether it be university, but even high school like you, you've been so deep on computers, which is really cool. Is there a hard lesson that you learn through that time that maybe like made you better in your career,

Jem Young
I think a hard lesson, and it's what I'm still learning is knowing when to ask for help. Like there, there are definitely subjects in school that I did not know, I was not good at it. And people helped me they tutored me they took some extra time. Even professors, my final one of my final classes my senior year, I think I was getting a C in what was the course something? It was some like high it was like a master's level math class. But it wasn't. Was it applied math? I don't know if I said people, people in CS or math degrees be like, oh, yeah, we know that one. But the professor was like, Jem, What grade do you need to pass and I was like, I just need to be and he's like, okay, and like, I still appreciate that. And you can say that's unfair or not, but I think they saw potential now like, this is arbitrary that he's gonna do well. And this is just a grade. But it's just asking for help. Is is still a hard lesson to learn. And it takes humility and putting aside your ego. And again, it's not something I'm good at. But sometimes the like, you just got to do it. And you'll be surprised who comes out to help you and kind of gives you faith back in people.

Ryan Burgess
I love that. Like I love the like asking for help. That is a hard thing to do. Do you find that you do that easier now? Like even in your in your role now? Or just like asking questions like, Are you does it come more natural now?

Jem Young
No. I wish I can tell you it does. But it doesn't. And that one's still that one's still hard. I still struggled with that one. Because part of my identity is I can do things alone. Like I don't, I don't need anybody, I will figure it out on my own, I will figure out the solution on my own. But I still know that's not the most efficient way to get things done. So it's, it's something I'm aware of, and I try to be better at it. But I wish I can tell you like yes, I've got all things figured out at this stage of my life. But now, that is something I still still struggle with and still need to work on.

Ryan Burgess
So good. I mean, humility, you're also like recognizing vulnerability there that you're like, I need to get better at that and constantly work on that. So you got back into school, finish off your bachelor computer science. You quickly got a job right? Like that. That's what happens. You do computer science degree and you're good, right?

Jem Young
No. So I did in my in my final year, my roommate at the time was working at this small healthcare startup. And he's like, Hey, Jem, they're always looking for engineers. I was like, Okay, let me apply. So I applied there and worked there through my senior year until like a year out of college. It was a good humbling experience because I was like, Oh, I've got five years of college college learning. I've been doing computers my whole life I got this and you get there and you don't know crap. You don't know anything about systems or working with other people or their I remember those early days and they were hard because you realize how little you know about the thing you think you know, a lot of so again, I was only able to succeed because there are people who are took just pity on me, and would take a little bit extra time to explain things. And I think that's where I still get it. Get my, like joy of helping other people in the community. Because for me, it was like a big deal like these senior engineers taking the time to mentor and coach me and gently guide me in the in the right way. But for me is a big deal. But I think for them, it was like, Yeah, that's what we do. And that's the approach I still take today. And when, you know, people ask me for advice, and like, yeah, maybe this and this and try to guide them in the same way. And be like, Oh, that's so great. How do you how do you do that? I'm like, I don't know. It's just, it's not that big a deal, if you put it in that perspective. But yeah, those those early days were hard. But I'm so grateful just to have people along the way to pull me up. And that's, that's the theme throughout my entire life is like, there's always someone there to help me out. But part of that is like, no one's going to pull you up on your own, you have to stick your hand out first, and stick it meet them halfway. And I think if you meet people halfway, you'll find a lot of people want to help you. Because it's not a lot of effort on either of you just to pull yourself stuff together.

Ryan Burgess
Did you find that it was difficult in those moments to like, ask for the help, or were they coming to you to help? Were you seeking out people that you're like, I should lean on that person? How did you get that person that? They helped me out? Did it just kind of organically happen?

Jem Young
an underrated skill is I think being personable. And I'm not saying I'm personable. I'm not saying that at all. But I I'm not unfriendly. I think if you're just like, you approach something with humility, with understanding, you know, I'm stuck. I don't know this thing. Hey, will you help me out. But I've also put in the work already, I've spent two hours trying to solve this bug or trying to figure out this issue. When people see that they see you put in the work, and you're kind of humble about it. They'll they'll help you out. I've never had that in my life never not happen, or it's never not happened, where someone sees you. And they're like, yeah, yeah, he can. He's almost there. Did I seek people out as much as I could? Now? I feel like this, this is gonna turn into a long story of my career regrets or things I've done, but I don't know, reflecting back. I'm always like, you know, I could do things a little better. I don't regret anything. You don't regret things because that that would imply you don't like who you are today, if you spent all this time regretting decisions you've made but as far as lessons all pass on to other generations, yeah. Ask for help. Be humble about it. And people will help you

Ryan Burgess
Jem is very friendly. I don't by him saying he's not a friendly person. He's one of the most friendly people I know. So yeah, don't buy that. I guess it was the health, you're doing kind of like full stack work. But then then you moved into this like, weird thing called front end jam. How did that happen?

Jem Young
Again, you and I came up around the same time, front end was not a thing, like the cost of the front end back end wasn't a thing. There was a software engineer. That was it. So when I thought software engineering was a lot of UML, diagrams, and Java, and like, a lot of object oriented and class Class programming, and all these things, but I discovered this thing called JavaScript. And what I loved about it, is the freedom to kind of do whatever you want. I know today, people kind of, I don't know, they, they dunk on the language, because it's got a lot of flaws. And you know, it won't hold your hand. But I really love that about JavaScript didn't language in that it's just the freedom to do whatever you want. And you don't have to follow programming paradigms, which again, is that, that, uh, that kind of, not not dismissive authority, but I'm always like, Why? Why do I have to do that. And that's one thing I've always hated about, like, Java or something is like, it forces you to code a certain way. And that's true of a lot of languages, not JavaScript JavaScript does, it will work if it works, or it doesn't. Who cares about proving conventions or anything like that? So that that's what got me into JavaScript and the front end and building UIs. But also, not just the freedom of JavaScript, but the satisfaction of building something, like seeing it on the screen, not just, I built this colossal, amazing back end service, but no one knows about it. It was the fact that I can finally show off something that I've done that I've built, and that was really satisfying. And that's kind of what got me in the front end and has kept me there.

Ryan Burgess
So JavaScript is like the rebellious language. I love it. No wonder I like this language.

Jem Young
It kind it is, especially when compared to other languages like you can do a lot of you can do pretty much anything. You want to pass data around. You can just do it. People use other languages, I think don't even appreciate how how rigid it is and how much guardrails it puts in with JavaScript. Now it's the Wild West.

Ryan Burgess
Yeah. A lot of freedom. And I agree with you on that. I like that. So as a front end engineer, you worked in a few startups. What was that? Like? What were some of the startups like, what was that like in your career?

Jem Young
Yeah. So I was working at this healthcare startup in in Georgia, pretty small one. Doing well. And then one of the, one of the engineers there is like, Hey, I'm leaving. I'm moving to Silicon Valley, I'm going to go work for LinkedIn. That's like, what you like that what Silicon Valley? You know, that's like the promised land. That's, that's something new. I think a lot of engineers aspire to get to. But seeing someone who like when I went and did it, I was like, why don't I try interviewing to like, let me see what else is out there besides this small town in Georgia. So I interviewed at a few places. And it was really cool. Because the companies were like, hey, we'll fly you out to come interview. And I was like, what? I can't afford a plane ticket. Like, you know, I'm making $30,000, a software engineer in Georgia. Like, no, no, no, we pay for it. I was like, what? That's so cool. Tech is so cool. Oh, man, this is awesome. Like, it was exactly what I wanted. So a company called Chartbeat. In New York, they they flew me out. And you know, I interviewed with them. And then another company, I think it was at the time bills.com, they flew me out to San Francisco, and interviewed with them. And I got an offer from both companies. So that was one of those, I guess, pivotal moments in life where I can choose to go to New York or San Francisco in very different areas, very different vibes. I went with New York, that was a place I knew a little bit better. And I thought as a younger person, it'd be more exciting to work in New York, which is true. No offense to the barrier, where I live now. But you can't be in New York, you really can't. If you're young and ambitious,

Ryan Burgess
there's a ton of things to do see and do I mean, I get it. That's so it was that was the driver, you had these two great offers. It was mainly like, where do I want to live?

Jem Young
Yeah, there were similar in salary. The idea of like, scope of role wasn't something I'd even thought of, you know, when it's your second job, you kind of take what you can get. Fortunately, again, I landed at a good company and landed at a Chartbeat analytics company in New York. And, again, I knew nothing, I thought I knew a lot. And you go in there with like, real startups, like real people who've worked at other companies. And I'm like, Oh, crap, Jem, you have no idea what you're doing. Fortunately, I have people there to learn from people that I'm still friends with today, some of them. And Ryan, you know, some of the same people, they've been on the podcast, I am fortunate to have learned with them and gotten a taste for things. And they introduced me to a lot of things, they introduced me to this thing called react, which was pretty new at the time. Little revolutionary. Because before we had all been using Angular. And Angular was great. I think people declined on Angular. But it was like one of the first comprehensive all in one frameworks that just works with data binding, which is like magical at the time. But then we started using React, I was like, this is much simpler. This is so much simpler. Like this is the way we should be building UIs back back then. So I don't know I was always very interested in modern technology and how we can apply it to react and or apply it to the software we're using today. So I ended up giving a talk about the newest features in ACMA scripts. So I think it was called ESX and react or something like that. This is before ACMA, script six had even come out, I just, you know, was following it. Then seeing how to apply those patterns into reacts. And I gave that a conference called React Rally in Utah. And it turned out that in the audience, there was a young man named Ryan Burgess, who said, Hey, I like this guy. Let's buy him lunch. That is, uh, that is my weakness. If you're if you want to hang out with me, like a gem, you wanna get some food? The answer is always yes. I'm always there. And that's the story. I think the rest of that story. We've told many times on this podcast about how I ended up in Netflix and working for you and all that stuff.

Ryan Burgess
Well, I think there's a lot of like, interesting things you covered there, too. You know, even just what you'd said about talking about ESX and react. And ESX was this new thing? This is something that I want to call out, because clearly Yeah, you and I met then. But I've learned this after the fact too is that I've I've always been in awe of you that when you give conference talks, I always thought like you had to be an expert on the subject, right? And you've always taken the approach of like, I'm going to give a talk cuz I interested in this topic? I don't know anything about it. I'm sure you knew some about React and ACMA script, but you're like, I am going to go learn that to give the talk. It was almost like a forcing factor. And I've seen you do this many times. And it changed my perception. Like I always thought I had to be like the expert or and I shouldn't say that because nobody's an expert in anything. But like, I thought I had to know a subject really well, in order to give a talk. And you came out this like not knowing that this is one of your first conferences, right? Am I wrong? This is like one of the first conference talks that you've ever given.

Jem Young
Yeah, that was my first ever conference talk. I don't know how I did anything actually froze up. If anybody goes back and watch that video, there's a part where I forget what I rehearsed. And I freeze up. And I don't remember it was the person that went first and I don't remember her name now. But she was just like, sitting on the front naughty me. Like go on. You got it. And like I found my rhythm. I got it. But yeah, first first talk froze up in front of everybody. But yeah, I think it all worked out in the end.

Ryan Burgess
I mean, it wasn't obvious for to the audience, like I didn't know you froze, I wouldn't have known that was your first talk. funny fact to is your charisma and personality came out in that talk to like, there was there was jokes in it. That was like the gem classic that I've seen many times at conferences, but there was even a joke about tattoos for babies. I feel like you were speaking to me in some way there.

Jem Young
I forgot about that. That was just a, I don't know, a wonderful intersection. So like, it was tattoos for babies and Uber for cats.

Ryan Burgess
Oh, Uber for cats. Yeah, cuz you were you're coming up with startup ideas, which I don't think anyone stolen those yet. I'm surprised.

Jem Young
I their billion dollar ideas were just sitting on him. It's funny, you mentioned it, because I actually forgot this, that I do this, but not wanting to understand the subjects. So and then giving a talk about it is as a way of learning it. It's funny, I look at ways that I've done most a lot of things of significance, like a conference talk or a workshop or something like that. I tend to put myself in situations where I have no choice but to succeed. So I'll do that. I'll sign up for a conference on with some paragraph on I don't know, some some topic that I don't know anything about. And the conference is coming up and coming up. I have to become an expert, because like, I'm obviously not going to get up there and quit or not know what I'm talking about. And that's true of most things. That's true of like, how did I get the job in Netflix? Well, one you made me you constantly badgering me until I interviewed. But it's also like, final interview, and I'll put myself in the situation where I have to succeed. And versus Oh, I'm going to apply and manage your hope I can make it through and all these things. I don't know. That's, that's what motivates me is not failing. And making sure I know what I'm talking about. And that's true of everything, like workshops, conference talks, I always do it. And I'm like, pushing to the deadline. But I'm working late into the night trying to get it done. Because I have to and I don't have a choice. And that's kind of how I've gotten pretty much everywhere. Same thing with how I became an engineering manager at Netflix was I decided I want to be an engineering manager. And I interviewed to the point where like, well, I can't not succeed, I can't not do well, because that's not something I am going to do. So like I forced myself in the situation where I have to succeed. And I don't know, is that the the best way of success? Maybe? Maybe not. But it's worked for me pretty well.

Ryan Burgess
Do you feel like you need a forcing factor? Like what you've kind of presented there is your talks, right? I've signed up for this talk. I'm giving this conference talk. I'm doing this workshop at a set time. Do you think that you almost need some of those but some like date to hold you accountable?

Jem Young
Oh, yeah. Yeah, definitely. I think back on what motivates me and what, what helps me succeed. It's that external pressure. Honestly, it it does do a lot for me, like having to be a technical expert having to get up and talk in front of people. Having to be a leader and show up well, in front of a lot of other people. Makes me better than I think then like, just myself and just pushing myself independently. And I know this for myself. That's why I put myself in these situations where, you know, if I don't do well, like people are gonna be like that. Yeah, he doesn't know what he's talking about. Like, or he really let us down here. And like, I'm just not going to do that. So I kind of put myself in a corner and make my I make myself fight fight my way out by like just being good.

Ryan Burgess
That's awesome. I mean, it's like the sink or swim mentality and you just dive into that deep end and you're like, hopefully it works out, which is awesome. That's inspiring in itself. I feel like even when you were talking about engineering manager roles, I feel like you even tweeted like something that like, I'm going after being an engineering manager, which I was like, Man, that was ballsy. Like, I love it. He's putting himself out there. I mean, I knew right, like you and I talked about it. But like, I was like, yeah, man, that's really cool. Like he's putting it out there in the universe. But also like, yeah, it's kind of that like, I'm not going to fail. I'm diving. I'm all fall in those really cool.

Jem Young
Yeah. All right, you definitely gave me a lot of motivation there and nudged me, again, that the pathway, being a manager was very interesting, because I don't know if I could have done it independently, it was something that I thought about, but I wasn't really sold on because so much of my identity was tied up in being a good software engineer, being really good at code. And being a manager is a very, very different thing. But it was like you that pushed me into it. And other friends are like jam up a great manager. I was like, Nah, I don't think so. I still don't think so. But it again, it took like this external pressure. So it just to me, it's like, again, you got to surround yourself with good people that will pull you up when you need, and you pull them up, and then like you all rise together. And that that's so important to success.

Ryan Burgess
What was the final like thing that got you to be like, Yeah, I'm going to be an engineering manager,

Jem Young
someone just want to push me to interview for Microsoft's a good friend of mine, who was like, Jem, you should interview to be a manager here. I was like, manager, I'm, I'm an icy I have no manager experience. I don't know where you getting this from? They're like, No, no, I'm a manager, I recognize that you have some talents that would make you a good manager. So I was like, Okay, again, being forced into it, essentially, by someone else. So I'm going through this interview with Microsoft. And it's pretty, pretty rigorous. It's a lot of a lot of interviewing a lot of talking a lot of talking to like very senior people. And throughout the process. I don't know, I had the answers. I don't know if they're right or not. But I had some idea of what, what a manager should be what I think a good manager should be, and what I think a bad manager is. And doing that helped me realize like, hey, you know, I could be a manager. And that's, you know, and then the next role fell, fell across my lap was one for Netflix. So, of course, I'm gonna apply at that point, because I've already gone through it a little bit and understood some of the, the nuances and caveats and things like that. So, yeah, a lot of factors that and COVID work from home, like, you know, I could talk another hour on the path to being a manager,

Ryan Burgess
what's been one of the biggest challenges being, you know, because you've recently done this transition. So moving from engineer to a manager, what's the biggest challenge for you

Jem Young
no longer being an expert at things, admitting that you don't know something? And being comfortable with not knowing something and being comfortable with like, hey, yeah, I don't know, I can find out that that's tough. Because like I said, I so much of my identity was tied to being a software engineer, and being indispensable, like, you know, what you may not like me, you know, like, Color My Skin, you know, you don't like the way I talk, I don't care, but I have a skill set you need. And that makes me indispensable, that makes me really good at what I do, to leave all that behind and become a manager where my success is completely dictated by the people on my team. So all those reasons why I got into computers like not having to deal with people, the rigid structure of of code is gone. And it's now back to people. And that's still something that's difficult to do. Fortunately, I have a really good team there. They are amazing software engineering, some of the best I've ever worked with. But not being afraid to look like an idiot and ask like really basic questions like, What is suspense and react? I really don't understand that and have them explain it to me. And if you're like, okay so I guess you could sum it up is understanding the limits of my my own intelligence, my own knowledge and just like being comfortable with like, you know what, I'm never going to understand elm or I don't know, I'm probably not never going to create a an application interview. But I understand roughly how it works. But just like not being so wrapped up in in being a coder and focusing on like the output of people. All these are hard. You can you can tell I'm still early in my career, like trying to figure things out.

Ryan Burgess
Not it's awesome. I love it. I don't think you'll ever figure everything out. Like that's the thing is You're always constantly learning, maybe getting to that, too is like, what do you see in the future for your career? Like, what are things that you want to continue doing? Or, you know, is there a certain point you want to make it to?

Jem Young
I don't I don't know, I just like the last episode we did where you talked about, like, Hey, I don't want to be a CEO. I don't know if I want to be in a position where there's like all these decisions coming at you. I don't know I like to have impact. I like to help people, I like to be in a position where I can shape the architects, the architecture of big things, and be a decision maker. But I'm also aware of the trade offs that I'm making where the higher up you go, you become director or VP, or even a sea level, the more ambiguous your impact is, where to the point where like, you don't know if you're actually doing anything. And I'm feel I feel a little bit of that as a manager, definitely not not too bad. But I know that as I move up, what I feeling the impacts of what I do will be much, much more obscure. So I imagine there's a level where I'm like, You know what, I don't feel like I'm doing anything. I feel like I'm working hard, but I don't actually know what I'm doing. And I think that's the level where I'll be like, Okay, I think I'm good. No, I'm good at this level.

Ryan Burgess
Like you want to get to that level, or you just don't really know what you're doing anymore, or you want to like go lower than that and be at that level where you still know what you're doing.

Jem Young
No, no, like, like you said in the last episode, like being comfortable with discomfort and being okay with being unfamiliar. I think that's okay. And I want to get to that level where I am a little bit uncomfortable. And but I can still see the impact of what I'm doing. I don't know how far up that is, is that CEO CFO? Maybe it's lower? Maybe I decided to quit and just go do something else. Who knows? But yeah, I, I like you. I am ambitious. I don't believe in stopping before your time. But there will be a time there'll be a point where I'm like, okay, I'm good. Like, I don't need to go anymore.

Ryan Burgess
What do you do at that time? Jem, you're done in tech? What is it? What are you going to do?

Jem Young
Oh, that's hard. Mostly because I like money. And I like to things. It's not that I like to buy things really. It's more I like the freedom that money affords. And I like that I can make. I'm not constrained by my decisions. So like, you know, I want to go on vacation here. I want to go vacation there. I like the freedom that that money provides. And that's hard to give up. What would I do? Probably back to something more tangible. Can we talk about climbing the ladder, not understanding your impact anymore. So you're probably coming back down to like, I don't know, open a car shop started racing team. Something where like, the decisions you make have a real impact. And you can see them play out in front of you. And that's something I kind of already miss moving into management is having that tangible outcome or tangible output. So yeah, that's what I that's what I think I do if I love tech probably work in cars or something like that.

Ryan Burgess
I like that it comes back to the cars. I mean, you and I both have very fond love for cars. I'm surprised that you're not starring in fast and furious 23 You know, we're You're the star driving car, isn't it? Like how did that not like hit your mind to that that's the next career goal.

Jem Young
The older I get, the more the more familiar I am with the systems of the world. And this is something that's like kind of new now that become apparent I think more about how the world is shaped and why things are the way they are. I am aware enough to know that I will never be a Formula One racing driver. These people have been doing this since they were children. And their families have been doing it since they're since they're young, too. Like there's just some things that you got to knit. You'll never be good at. I'll never be Olympian. I always want to I did a lot of swimming. I was captain my swim team in high school. I was like I should be in the Olympics. Now I know that to actually get to the Olympics, you have to start at like age 10 And you're swimming every day like so. Yeah, I don't think I'll be driving fast and furious. I don't know if I have that skill level. It'd be nice to get to it somehow. But no, I do have a good fondness of Fast and Furious

Ryan Burgess
Yeah, I mean for I was gonna say like for context for like maybe newer listeners but like I feel like anyone who's listened to this show, or even seen you speak at a conference Fast and Furious creeps in there like and so I'm sure a lot of people want to know like, why Fast and Furious jam. Like what is so exciting about these movies?

Jem Young
That's a good question. Real really but like the the trick I can make a joke answer, but like the true honest answer is, I think those movies came out in a time where I was still trying to find my identity. And especially like late teens, early 20s, like trying to figure out who I am. And I was like car culture. Oh, wow, this is something like I can join and be a part of. And, yeah, it just gave me some sense of identity of like being a car person. And that's really important that like, being able to anchor yourself to something, even if it's silly as like, a car and racing Honda Civics or whatever it is. Whatever gets you through your teenage years, your early 20s. So that that's why they Fast and Furious movies, silver, like a special place in my heart, even though they've gotten increasingly ridiculous and detached from reality. And I know it's like, it's not like a joke, in and of itself to like, Fast and Furious. But yeah, I think it helped me in those early years of just trying to figure out who I am.

Ryan Burgess
I love that. No, I mean, I feel like I can relate to that, Jem. So that's, that's really cool. What's your favorite Fast and Furious car that's been in any of the movies. If you get one car,

Jem Young
I still love the r 34. skyline from Fast and Furious to like the the silver one with the blue stripes on the side is still man that that is a car that is still a car that holds up even today by today's design standards.

Ryan Burgess
That is a nice one. Yeah, I feel good choice. I'm with you on the other really good one. I have a question for you. As I feel like you're, you're just someone who's very thoughtful and has great opinions, you know, love to poke at things in tech. And like what, you know, that's, that's great. I've always appreciated that with you. I think it's like why we're such good friends is like, there's just a lot of honesty. I would love to know your thoughts. And I'm sure listeners would. What's the future of tech? Like, if you can think a little bit outside? Maybe it's like, maybe it's when your your son is an young adult? What's the future of tech look like?

Jem Young
Whew, that one's tough. Ryan, have you ever seen the movie Blade Runner?

Ryan Burgess
Yes. Which one? I mean, both. But they're both good.

Jem Young
Yeah, same same universe. You know how there's like this mega Corp. And I don't remember the name of it. But it's just like this massive corporation that owns everything. That's kind of what I think the future of tech is. And it's a little depressing. But increasingly, I see it as like, it's a winner take all, like you have your Fang companies. And they are huge. The reach of Facebook, the reach of Google, Microsoft are huge, like far more impactful than we probably think. I don't see that going away anytime soon. I see as I don't know, I, I poke fun at at Silicon Valley in tech. Because I think we all need to be aware of the influence that we all have. And that the power we have as engineers, you may not understand it. But sometimes a code you the code you write changes people's lives, you read a bug, people can't log in your service. Like that's real impactful. And I hope we remember that. So the future tech? Yeah, I think it's just, it's, it's just gonna keep getting bigger. We're, we're already to that point where tech is ubiquitous, like we think of tech, but what are in our lives isn't tech at this point. Like, who doesn't have a website who doesn't have an app who doesn't have some hardware device? It's already everywhere. So yeah, I try not to get too cynical, because if I think about it too long, I'll be like, this depressing man that we have the most power we've ever had in human history. And this is what we're choosing to do with it. But I don't know. Now if you ask her like hot takes on current tech trends, the metaverse, which is like not a real thing, it's just poorly defined. Marketing. It's going to happen. Like as much as I think it's kind of silly at this point. The fact that all these tech companies are investing billions of dollars into it means it's going to happen whether or not you agree with it or not. So understanding that it's better to try to shape that discourse into something positive rather than just argue against it saying how stupid it is until everybody's online in the Facebook meta, or the the meta metaverse. I really don't see. I'm still open ended on crypto. I'm not sure. I'm really not sure the value provides the humanity. And the people that I see most advocating for crypto are people that are invested in it. So like you're not neutral parties, like everybody has a stance is usually has some money on the line. I'm optimistic about it. But yeah, so far I haven't seen a lot of tangible output. Drones drones are drones to me are like the most frightening technology we have. I think it's vastly underrated. What drones can do now and their capabilities of, I don't know, someone could create a drone with facial recognition that comes and kills you, and would like completely hands off, and you never know who did it. Granted, that's, that's really bleak. But that is technology that exists today. And I think that's only going to get worse. We just haven't seen like a full scale war breakout, where it's drones fighting each other. But I don't know. Again, I don't want to be a downer. But I I'm very cautious about tech. Even though I work in the middle of it. I'm skeptical of people's intentions,

Ryan Burgess
even watching way too much black mirror gem, I feel like like the drones and everything. I'm like, Oh my God. But I like your thinking. I think sometimes I feel like you always put this like realist, not I mean, like just some bringing things back down to earth and thinking about things. What what could happen and like, you know what, you see some of this vision on it, I like always hearing your thoughts on it, like, I would have probably gone down like some completely different direction on that. And I love hearing your thoughts on it. So that was super interesting.

Jem Young
Just just on attack, it's more, you know, I'm cynical, I poke fun on the valley silicon and you know, the fact we all get paid too much money, etc. It's where I want to, I want everybody who works in tech as an engineer or related field, to remember the impact we have on real people's lives. And it's so easy to get divorced from that, where it's like, I'm just a coder, I'm just doing my job, or, you know, I didn't write a test for this thing. And the system goes down. But it turns out that system was, I don't know, the heart transplant list at a hospital, which is something like so far removed from your actual job. But at the end of the day, there's still real people using computer and that no matter how far tech goes, is always going to be the case. Regardless, there's still a human at the other end, who have real thoughts and concerns. And it's something I hope we take into consideration when we do our jobs every day.

Ryan Burgess
I love that. I mean, I think even if it wasn't as something as extreme as the heart transplant, we are so reliable on all the things right, like all the things Tech, I mean, even when some of the social media platforms go down, that actually can mess up people's days. So it's like this, these do every pressions I'd love your thinking. And so I'm glad I asked you that question. I think your answer was like spot on. Maybe one last question. You've you've been just like, plowing through great information. I love this story of just hearing gems background, but like words of advice gem like if he I feel like there's nuggets throughout this whole thing. But you know, what would you leave our listeners with if like, there's one lesson that you would want to instill from from your life lessons,

Jem Young
one lesson, and this is one I will I will pass down to my son is surround yourself with good people. Which is it's I know it's so mundane. And it's not a sexy, new take on anything, but you are who your friends are. You rise to the level of your friends. And I call it friends specifically because like those are friends or people you can choose to be in your life. And surround yourself with good, smart, ambitious people. And you'll find out you're also smart and ambitious too. And that's so critical is having like a good good friend circle, a good network of people that you can look up to and hold you accountable. If nothing else in life that will take you very very far. And the other piece of advice is recognize and acknowledge the role of luck. And recognize that some people have just been unlucky. And you know, when you pass on on the street who's homeless or Tony just not doing as well as you recognize that you at certain points in your life, you've been lucky. And take that empathy and pass it on to them and recognize like, Hey, you can make someone else lucky too. I don't think we do that enough. In Silicon Valley. It's always the the culture of hustle and hard work and self self built person. Which is true, you do have to work hard. That is absolutely true. But also acknowledge like, you know, I've been lucky, you've been lucky. We've all been lucky to be in the positions that we are and then take that that sense of privilege and then use that to do some good in the world for other people who don't have the luck and haven't been as fortunate as you.

Ryan Burgess
Great. Any Jem. That was good.

Jem Young
Thanks Ryan.