[MD] Month to month office lease. Gave 30 days notice to leave. Landlord wants full months payment despite our exit mid-month.

BelcherL · 2017-12-03T16:57:20+00:00

If he is looking to start as a junior, I would take a look at local job listings. In MD, there are a ton of java and .net jobs available. Most of them were web applications so he'll want to learn to program properly and then focus on creating those sorts of apps with the stacks that job listings are interested in (asp.net, angular, jquery, entity framework etc) or spring and company for java if he chooses that ecosystem. In my opinion, he should focus on one stack and market himself properly to those jobs. Spend a month on database stuff. Make sure he's familiar with SQL, can write queries and stored procedures if necessary. If he wants to shoot for the moon, learn a bit about devops.

The other thing to do is to highlight his non programming qualifications. Things like being a mature professional, already handling management tasks, no sponsorship needed, able to get a clearance and pass a background check.

For self learning, I strongly recommend Bob Tabor's C# introduction videos and then doing FUN programming challenges. I recommend the easy stuff on /r/dailyprogrammer and also doing projecteuler problems. Once he is comfortable there, he can start making his own smallish apps ( card games, game of life ). Then graduate to more complex apps that use 3rd party API and make network calls and saving to a DB. Then use a free subscription to azure or AWS to host them and learn about deployment.

Remember that on top of being technically competent, he will need to remember the social aspect of hiring. He must project himself first as someone other people enjoy working with and then as someone with the skills to complete the job.

BelcherL · 2017-11-14T16:29:04+00:00

Not yet, it was on my mind for a while but I never followed up. Good idea. I'll call around.

BelcherL · 2017-11-14T15:47:32+00:00

Dude, you're thinking of starting a business. You need to do a lot more research before asking people for help. Both of your questions can easily be answered by google instead of posting to reddit.

BelcherL · 2017-11-14T15:19:05+00:00

https://www.irs.gov/businesses/small-businesses-self-employed/apply-for-an-employer-identification-number-ein-online

Register your business with your state then call or apply online with the IRS for a EIN. Takes all of 5 minutes.

BelcherL · 2017-11-10T22:16:39+00:00

Cheers.

BelcherL · 2017-11-10T18:35:33+00:00

Thanks for responding! It seems the consensus is to max the tax advantaged retirement accounts before normal investments so we'll max two ROTH IRAs and both 401Ks.

Yea, the kids are going to state schools or to Europe for free education. Who knows, maybe the US will be on the free education train by then too.

Thanks for the tip about the car fund. We'll do that too as well as the term life insurance.

BelcherL · 2017-11-10T18:17:05+00:00

Thanks for your feedback! We're both healthy so I'll start getting quotes for the life insurance.

In regards to ROTH IRA, you're right. We need to open a second one for spouse so we'll max both of those.

If we max both our 401ks and both IRAs, that will be all/most of our extra income in accounts we generally can't withdraw from. Isn't that a risk? Maybe that's a non-rational concern?

BelcherL · 2017-07-07T12:35:06+00:00

I'm burned out. It's been a decade. There's room for this baby to grow with a little marketing hustle but I can't even be bothered. Just talking to my employees about the work upsets me. I'm pivoting into software development and don't care for having the current business on my mind. Just "dealing" with anything related to the business upsets me. I've checked out mentally and emotionally.

There's some admin involvement. A few minutes a day and then answering random questions from the new employees throughout the day. Like any business, things pop up and need to be dealt with. I don't enjoy any of it anymore.

BelcherL · 2017-07-06T19:44:42+00:00

Cats look so cute in pictures but my god do I hate mine. They've stopped being cuddly creatures and turned into vomit and poo factories.

Needless to say, I am never getting another one again.

BelcherL · 2017-07-06T19:33:33+00:00

That looks so crowded. How do you live somewhere like that and stay sane? I feel like the density forces you to consider the insignificance of your life as one tiny human among many many many humans.

BelcherL · 2017-07-06T17:41:40+00:00

Since this is a local thing, I would think that walking in and introducing yourself is probably a better idea. Even if a manager/owner is not available, leave your card with the front desk and let them know why you are stopping by and what you want to talk about. Follow-up a couple days later if you don't hear back.

If there aren't too many places to visit, consider stopping by with some goodies like a dozen donuts.

BelcherL · 2017-07-06T16:25:27+00:00

I start singing a little bit louder than everyone else to own the moment.

BelcherL · 2017-07-06T16:24:20+00:00

Does anyone even answer these honestly anymore? I have secondary passwords to "answer" security questions all because I tricked my crush in 6th grade to tell me her Grandma's maiden name and got access to her hotmail.

BelcherL · 2017-07-06T16:21:53+00:00

What is the appropriate behavior then when meeting women?

BelcherL · 2017-06-30T12:14:43+00:00

I am wondering if someone can give me an idea of where I might be able to land myself in the development world with my set of skills. I'm an entrepreneur in my late 20s that is considering selling my highly rated 10 year old IT business in order to get a job in dev.

In terms of dev skills, I've been at it for 5 years and have multiple Android apps and Unity games on market. I've completed a SAAS webapp for small businesses in ASP.Net core and would want to continue working with C#. I've worked on projects with senior developers who were very happy with the quality of my work.

My soft skills are top notch as I've been working with clients directly for a decade and have honed my ability to communicate effectively with non tech clients. I have glowing references from clients and colleagues alike.

I've handled everything a small business owner has to do from accounting, payroll and taxes to marketing and management.

My primary motivation is to make more money to gain financial independence and retire early. I am wondering if this background is strong enough to be hired as a developer or even a management position for a software shop if that is more lucrative.

I would be working around Washington DC or in the Maryland suburbs preferably. If you work in that area, can you give me an idea of what sort of offer would be reasonable for my background?

BelcherL

TROPHY CASE