AOL is just a little part of the puzzle. I was completely lost. I cannot keep getting more certifications because I'm doing nothing at this point. But I felt I was wast wasting too much time, you know, because I was jumping from this video to this video and there were many repetitive information because imagine if I have started with Kubernetes with a YouTube channel and then I don't know Linux, I don't know G. It was like completely waste of time because when they learn I was switching was like quite shocking for them because what wow you're transitioning but how you did it 10 months I'm only 10 months into the B ro >> 7 months fully that's not even one year Alba spent over 10 years in telecom. She worked as a radio frequency engineer planning and optimizing 4G and 5G mobile networks for operators across Latin America, Europe, North America, and so on. She has a master's degree in mobile communications from Telecom, Paris. What she didn't have was an IT background. No Linux, no coding, no cloud, none of that. Today she is a DevOps cloud engineer deploying cloud infrastructure for mobile operators in the US and Canada. Her first move was certifications AWS cloud practitioner then solutions architect associate and then she got stuck. She knew the services but she had done everything by clicking through the console and something told her that's not how real projects work. So she knew and she felt that she was not job ready. So she went and read the job descriptions and she saw CI/CD pipelines, Kubernetes, Docker, Terraform, Enzible. In her words, she was completely lost. And that's when she realized AWS or cloud in general was just one small piece of the entire puzzle and how much she still had to learn. Her conclusion was that more certifications are not going to fix this because she thought, "I'm not actually doing anything or building anything with those certifications." What she did instead is what this whole video is about. She was working full-time, studying at 5 in the morning before work, and before she was even done studying, she went to her manager and asked for a role that did not exist yet in her company. In this conversation, she walks through all of it. Her entire path. Why she left a field that she was already good at. The two months she spent jumping between YouTube videos and random tutorials before she realized that wasn't going to get her to the goal. How she built a study routine around her 9 toive job. And how she got that routine back after an eye surgery forced her to stop. the exact conversation she had with her manager and what her first month in the new DevOps role actually felt like. If you're sitting in a nonIT role right now wondering if this is realistic for you and how this is the episode for you. Okay. So before we get into the your current role as a DevOps engineer, before we get into you know how you learned all this and your learning journey, um tell me about your background before you got into tech, before you got into it in general and before even heard about DevOps. >> So my name is Alva. I'm from Karakas, Venezuela. I have more than 10 years experience in the telco industry. I have worked as a array optimization engineer in mobile operators across Latin America, North America and Europe. So actually I start in Venezuela when I major in telecommunications engineering in Karacas. Then I started working right away for Huawei Technologies at the Salonica which is a big major operator in Venezuela. I worked there a year and then I decide to move to France to pursue my master's degree in mobile communications. So after completing my masters I started working as a RF optimization engineer for network solution factories. I was working for a telco company in Switzerland. Then in 2021 I decide to move to United States to Chicago and I started working at Fors which is a software development company oriented in the telecommunications industry. So here I spent four years working as RF optimization and design engineer and then last year I was able to break into the box and switch roles internally thanks to the boot camp your boot camp actually. >> Okay so tell me about so what was the transition like because I mean it sounds easy now that you just made a transition into deops but it was definitely a challenging one. So you did not have like any prior background or experience in DevOps. So what was the stage where you basically first of all made a decision to that you want to become a DevOps engineer but like what was leading up to that like what what was the environment where you became aware that this uh field does even exist and then made the decision to like why why did that happen? Yeah, actually everything I started when I was in France. I I noticed how the industry was moving towards machine learning, more automation, you know, and I started learning new things in there. So I was still working on RF. But I start this sparking me like I want to get more. I want to get more in the industry. I want to get more into it, you know. But I kept working as RF optimization. Then I moved to United States and this is keep going. I saw how the RF industry it's heavily depending on the mobile operators and the Telos as well as the vendors. So actually the run industry is pretty small and at the same time it depends a lot of mobile operators vendors to build your career you know and at some point right now we were now in a phase of the technology the 5G is already deployed we are expecting the 6G to come in the next coming years but for now it's a quiet period I was getting bored and even besides all of that also the telecommunications market is moving to the cloud solutions you know So a lot of work of the RF work was also being automated and I was like okay is the time now to start working on more about the cloud. I was very interested in cloud solutions. So at this point okay let me start let's see how I start. I start taking some crash courses here and there like some Python Linux but no more than that. I was a little bit lost. Then I decide okay let me just get my first certification. So I did the AWS practitioner. I was okay. getting like good foundations on AWS infrastructure. But let me deep dive in the next one. So I completed the associate architect certification in AWS. So when I passed that one, I was okay, I know the services, I know the infrastructure, but I have done everything through the console and I don't think that like real world projects works like this. You know, I was missing a piece, but at that point there, I didn't know what I was missing. So at this point I decide okay let me go and search like job offers online to see where I can use my current skills not AWS like my certifications in in the real world. So when I started researching online I was shocking because I said okay AW is just a little part of the puzzle and when I start reading all the qualifications I was like wow I have to see CI/CD pipelines what is this Kubernetes docker infrastructure terraform anible I was completely lost and then is when I really realized the huge gap that I had it was not only about taking my certifications and I said hold on I cannot keep getting more certifications because I'm doing nothing at this point. So then is when I decide, okay, I need to do something else. I need to fill in this gap. I need to learn and I start watching YouTube videos and is when I found your YouTube video was very interesting and I love the way that you explain like very difficult topics in an easy way. So that like click on me and I say, "Okay, this is nice, but I need an instructor, you know." And suddenly I found in one of the videos you mentioned about the boot camp and I say okay let me just check here and it's when I decide okay I need an structure path so I can move forward faster but I found before that one the IT fundamentals and I say let me take the IT fundamentals first so I have the full big picture of the software development but life cycle because I don't know that it's going to give me a good foundation then to transition to the bubs. So that's why first I took the IT fundamentals and then I enrolled in the DeOT boot camp. >> Mhm. Okay. So about your previous role RF optimizations engineer, what does it mean exactly? So what is the title? What was your day-to-day tasks? Basically what were you doing? >> Well actually um we designed and we plannify the 4G and 5G network for mobile operators. So we had in rolling out the new technology, selecting equipment, selecting like the best KPIs and reading all these KPIs for the mobile operators. So every person they have a good quality of service in their phones for example in your service. >> And what does it stand for? RF optimizations engineer. >> Radio frequency optimization engineer. >> Ah okay. Okay. And did you have anything to do with networking cloud? Did you do these things yourself? >> No. like it actually the path that I took in this radio access network is was more working with design tools which is actually force is the leading tool for designing the brand network in the telos companies so that that's usually no I was not related to Leninos at this point in life I saw some Linux and IT fundamentals like long time ago when I I was at university but I didn't years later so Yeah. And did you think uh okay this is my current role now you were also experienced in that field um but it had nothing to do with I don't know uh you know infrastructure configuration or cloud uh deployments did you not think okay this is a completely new area for me this would be a complete career switch for me and I should stay in this in this area because you were like still experienced then I'm sure you could have found a job or did you think like this is definitely where the future is going this is what I want to you so it's it's time to transition now. >> What was your decision making process? >> Yeah. No, actually was completely sure I wanted to change. It's been quite a long time that I wanted to make it happen but I didn't know how to do it. So I was really bored and tired how slow the RF world is moving and how we depend like heavy rely on the Telos company and vendors to chip the market. So I really was bored like I say no I need to make this switch happen. I know how the technology is leading. So all machine learning, all AI tools also is moving towards the cloud automation and like many positions like we're all already automated. So I think I need to do like big jump now before later like in 10 years. I don't see myself doing that job like way later. So >> okay, that's interesting. So it was actually driven more by your personal preference. It wasn't like oh my god this is what's going to get me a job in the future, but it was more like I'm bored actually. I don't want to do this for the next 10 years because I'm not evolving. I'm not personally growing. So I want to do something which is more challenging and exciting for me. But why DevOps? Like did you look into okay you know let me see what cloud engineers are doing. Let me see what software engineers are doing and DevOps. How did you make decision to to pick DevOps specifically? >> Well actually like DevOps it was working with the cloud industry. It was also like operation and dev it puts together the both words. So I I really was interested like in depths but I was not willing to start coding since the scratch you know all the time. So to me it was like middle ground between this and operations and I really involved in operations as well. So to me it was interesting to see how the all the processes and all the life cycle and in real world is implemented. So um and I found out as well during like in my job search when I found okay these are the positions they're actually working with infrastructure and the way to deploy things and the new technologies. So I was really very inspired and driven by that. >> All right. So you you were still working at your company at your role and you were you know doing this cloud certifications you were uh analyzing the job descriptions to see okay where can you match what can you do basically with the your learned skills and you saw these job descriptions >> did you did you not feel like this is like I've learned already a lot and it's like just one small piece of the thing and I have so many things to learn. Did you not feel like overwhelmed like how am I going to even learn all this? Like is it even worth it? >> No, it's all the time is overwhelming. I think I'm more in debs, but I think um learn um I really like to learn new things all the time and when I'm not actively learning, I get bored pretty fast. So I think it was a challenging war. I know I have a war like way more possibilities like comparing also the the Bob's work with RF word. I do have more possibility. I can grow my career faster and if I compare in the RF as I already told you I'm tied to big telos and vendors here what I love in it is the huge commodity that you have in the in the back you know you can search help you can always have like blogs videos discussions like open discussions where you can learn and grow so much and faster by yourself and not have only depending on the license or depending on the vendor or instructions so that's why really love the most. >> Okay, that's interesting because that's true. So, because it's fast moving, so it's not as slow as the traditional industries, you also have way more like dynamic movement in the community as well. Like you can literally just ask a question somewhere and someone in the community will answer or you have so many open- source projects and and things happening in DevOps space. >> Um so, okay. So you look at these job descriptions which is very very logical structured way to actually understand what you need to learn right so you see description of the things that you need to learn did you think >> okay I'm going to make a plan now I'm going to create my study schedule and I'm going to you know go and learn Kubernetes go and learn docker all these things that they require and then apply for a job like did you feel like you like you were just going to um self-study self-learn all these tools Yeah, I did feel that. And I when I started looking for the YouTube videos, but it was too overwhelming for me. Like there is a bunch of YouTube videos they explain here and there. But putting all the pieces to where together it was difficult to me. So I was like, "Oh no, I need a different path because like this is going to take me too much time and I don't have that time, you know? It's like not." >> And you were doing this while you had a full-time job, right? On the side. On my side, I always had my 9 to5 work and then on my free time is when I had time to study, organize myself and even weekends to move forward on on my Deops journey. >> Mhm. So, how how long did you I don't know how many weeks, how many months did you uh spend basically looking on YouTube to like which technologies did you learn? You probably watched a few Kubernetes or Docker videos on our channel. like how how long did that basically take you to to understand a little bit of okay these are the technologies that I need to learn and to understand that you need some structured learning >> well it took me like about a few months let's say like two months but I felt I was wast wasting too much time you know because I was jumping from this video to this video and there were many repetitive information and it was not diving like it was not like a deep dive into the videos and I'm not that type of person like many Some people cannot achieve their goals just with YouTube videos but I I need I really feel that I need an structured path. So that's when as soon as I found that I say no this is I start looking at the syllabus I say okay but all these tool is what I really need and what the market is demanding and that was it sparked the joy and I say okay I have to do this no matter what and I need to organize myself to achieve this and obtain it. >> Okay. So that that's uh understandable because even I tried to go deeper into the YouTube videos but there's just so much you can do even within three to four hours like it's still not enough for like deep dive >> and you're right like you can learn the concepts and it's like repeating but you need to get hands-on like you need to actually build the stuff so that you feel confident about your knowledge. Um so for example you could have put together different courses. So why why did you decide and you didn't know that how the boot camp would be structured. So what gave you the confidence that let's say our devos boot camp would give you exactly what you needed to save your time and dive deeper and learn exactly uh the things that you needed without wasting time. Well, first there was a clear path you we were starting with Linux and little by little we were moving forward learning more technologies and learning all these new tools we need in the DevOps team in the DevOps industry. On top of that we had the handon project. I think that that's incredible because it gives you real world projects and when I saw in the syllabus you were we were working as well with AWS and it was a way to put in practice what I learned the certification and I say okay this is going to help me to connect all the dots that I have and don't waste time. >> Oh so you looked at the curriculum like what's in there what am I going to learn? >> Yeah. So and this is actually a very important part for me and I see this in the most exceptional students engineers that we have in Devos boot camp. I see this common pattern which is they are all busy. They all have full-time work or a full-time responsibility but they make time to learn consistently and I see that as a regular pattern. They're like you know what yes it's six months but it's still temporary. I'm just going to put in the work. They're probably the the mo busiest people compared to everyone else and they just consistently put in the time like almost every day in order to do the deep dive in order to invest time in in learning. So how did your day look like? Because you go to work, you come back in the evening tired after work and then you sit and learn and do this end to end full project. How how was this for you? Well, actually before like enrolling in in the boot camp, I say no, I need to organize myself. I have my 9 to5 and you know there is nothing that I can do there. After work, I'm very tired, exhausted, stressed. I don't want to do anything. So I decide to put myself first and my goals at the beginning. So I woke up very early in the morning like at 5:00 a.m. every day working in my boot camp. And then on weekends is where I work the most because I had more time. So I live three four hours Saturdays and Sundays. So I had to sacrifice a lot of my time off. I have to commit to my schedule because it was the only time that I could squeeze and put time to myself. And the first energy it was to myself, not to my job, not to anything else, you know, to myself to be able to move forward into my goals. And then weekends, weekends were like the best as well because I could take advantage of everything that I learned during the week. >> Okay. So did you did you use the weekends to because some of the projects in the boot camp are uh really long which means you need to work on them for a few hours straight actually not to lose context because if you stop in the middle of configuring the the full release pipeline and then you get back to it the next day you need to kind of load all the information uh in your mind and kind of continue like did you structure your learning like this where on the weekends you were doing like this end to end projects. >> Well, actually it depends like mostly I try to finish my chapters in one day but if I couldn't like I had to go back you know there was no another choice but in weekends I have more time to review what I see during the week and put in practice and reinforce as well what I learned. >> So what gave you that motivation? This is something I found interesting that you said. So instead of doing it after the work, you basically said, "Let me start my day by investing first in myself, in my skills." So you did that learning session before work, not after the work because you knew that you would be kind of tired afterwards. >> And what gave you the motivation to do this to keep this kind of schedule for months? How how many months did you take to uh complete the boot camp? like eight months in total, but I took a break in between because I got like a nice surgery which took me out for a few months for a month and then I went on vacations as well. So, yeah. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. >> Oh, wow. That's that's that's a long commitment. So, what so in those weekend session, you know, when you were waking up at 5:00 a.m. and doing your learning session, what was your motivation point? Like what were you thinking about? >> Well, my goal was to switch careers. That was my ultimate goal. But on top of that, keep learning, you know, in a fast evolving industry to get the skills and to move forward faster. So that I think that was like my biggest motivation in there. >> Did you in terms of job like did you think about it like oh my god I'm going to have this super cool job which is going to be super exciting. I'm going to enjoy it. uh it's going to be high pay or what was what was the most attractive thing about you know thinking about this this transition >> when when you talk about also the salaries also are way more attractive in the IT domain they compared to RF domain so that for sure is one of in the list you know so also it's very dynamic and it's evolving so fast and it keeps me motivated keep me learning and I like to learn you know I need to be constant in learning because sometimes if I get bored I don't like it anymore And that's why >> I was suspecting that. And the follow-up question of mine would be you were not probably only motivated by the end goal. It was for sure like, yeah, I'm going to get paid better. I'm going to have a career that is like very highly demanded, very highly paid. I'm going to have a lot of opportunities. But surely for you specifically, since you enjoy learning, those learning sessions themselves were enjoyable. >> Would you agree with that? >> Yeah. Yeah, of course. And to me when I we start putting together all the Hanons project it was like magic you know it was like wow this is how your real productions environment is working and connecting all the technologies connecting all the tools it was amazing to me so it keeps me inspired and keep the motivation all the time going >> which is actually something I I personally resonate with because when I was uh start studying it and it was overwhelming I enjoyed doing the project so much that that itself was a motivation for me to keep going and to keep learning and and studying the next day because I was like, "Oh my god, this is what I just did. This is what I just created." So at the beginning of the boot camp the projects are not as advanced because you're kind of building the basics the foundation you know learning about Linux and the end toend projects the production grade projects actually come from like the second half or like after 30% of the boot camp. So did you find the first part also motivating and exciting or did you did you get to the Jenkins module and you're like okay now we're actually getting into the exciting part. No actually in my case because I'm coming from the telco background ar to me was exciting from the first day because I was working already with Linux I was not comfortable at Linux at all before I learned git as well that I had no idea about git in my previous so at the beginning was like okay what it g is what I have to do with it what's g rebase what's g merge I don't understand all this ripple how you handle all these files like that but it was quite challenging and learning little by little all these techn technology it start making sense to me because imagine if I could have started with Kubernetes with a YouTube channel and then I don't know Linux I don't know g it was like completely waste of time because actually I think that for the bops you need quite a structure because it's not an easy field you can get overwhelmed and you can throw on the towel pretty easy >> that is a good point actually because like you could learn Kubernetes right away but in order to understand Kubernetes really well you need to understand docker And if you want to understand Docker, you actually need to understand Linux. So it kind of goes like in layers. So if you start from the the bottom layer with like the the lowest one and you build on top of it, then it becomes way easier. Actually, it may take a little bit more time, but your knowledge becomes more high quality. Um, and before DevOs boot camp, you actually did it course. So why didn't you just jump into DevOps boot camp and be like, you know what, I I believe in myself. I'm going to uh save myself some time and just uh dive into the DevOps right away. Why why did you decide to do IT course first? >> Because I already was working for a software development company. So it was quite interesting to me understanding the software development life cycle and understanding how my colleagues like the position of my colleagues because I saw it at work. I saw the tester. I saw the bops. I saw my manager as well in the agile how they were working with all the concepts and I was like okay this is going to be nice because they're going to give me the big picture of the software development and then I could move to the boot camp so I will have like a stronger foundations to build on top. >> Do you think it paid off? >> Yes. Yes, I think it paid off so far. >> So and that that's also something I wanted to ask you about. So you were working at a software company. So you had all these engineers and developers uh and probably like DevOps engineers around you. Uh did you like at work did you try to understand like what were you doing? Did you go and ask them questions or did you did you decide you know what I'm going to go learn with this IT fundamentals course and then I'm going to go back to work and then basically validate or check my knowledge whether I understand what they do. >> Yeah. Actually it was the the second way like I learned like the both fundamentals I talked to them because actually here in the US branch we are only like 25 people is a small company the headquarters is basically in France so here we always exchange we talk so I also was learning from them all the time and it was interesting because after I complete my um AWS associate certification I got an opportunity to work more with the IT team working technical documentation for them. I told myself, well, I'm going to accept it. It's an extra task, but it's a way to get into it, see what they are doing, understand what they are deploying, how they're working and learning the vocabulary because even though it's English, you have a new vocabulary as well that you need to learn, you need to understand. So, it was like an also an easy way to getting in touch with with the ITIL war within the company. >> Yeah. which is I mean it is good because you have direct access to engineers so you can either ask them or you can do the tasks um in that field to learn but it could also be intimidating right because you are the only one who doesn't understand the technical terms so before you actually learned all this uh in the courses you it may have been intimidating for you because you were like I don't understand what you guys are talking about >> yeah indeed but well they were like very open-mind people so if I ask question they always explain to me and they were very accessible So I really like that. >> And as I know you So you went to your manager and explained to your manager the plan that you wanted to basically learn and do these trainings yourself. Did the company fund it uh eventually or did you want basically want to convince them to give you extra time or to finance your learning or what was your plan there? >> No, actually they didn't know anything about it. So I start doing all by myself and I didn't I was like I have p well completed the three first core models. I was missing just the advanced part and I knew there was a deos requirement in the team because it was pretty small team here in the US and I knew there was this requirement the need and I decide okay I'm not done yet with the boot camp but let me talk to my manager because there is nothing that I could lose you know to me it was like a win-win situation so I decide to step him step in and talk to him and say okay look this is what I have done the last year I have obtained my AWS certifications I'm enrolled in this boot camp this is my syllabus This is also the IT fundamentals. I I show him the syllabus and he was pretty impressed not only for all the hard work that I have done but for the initiative that I took to move forward just by myself. So he told me like of course Alva let me talk to headquarters. Let's see if we can give you the switch and but we need to get it approved from France. So I wait like a month and I finally received the the acceptance and actually they allow me to to switch roles to the DevOps teams. That is a first of all that is a very smart move. Uh so everyone everyone who watches this episode can actually take the inspiration as an idea because if you're working already at a company could be a completely nonIT role but you see they're looking for a DevOps engineer like it's your company you know the people you know the manager and as you said I think most of the managers will be impressed by the initiative when you were saying you know what I have been studying this is my track record I have done this course I have obtained all these certifications and I want to switch this role as you said, it is a win-win because they see the initiative. They already hired you obviously for a good reason uh as an employee. So, that is a really good idea, but it's also like probably not as easy because were you were they looking for a junior DevOps engineer or a a mid-level or what was the position like? Actually the opposition was not already open but I knew my colleague was overwhelmed with a lot of work he had to be because to have done because he was the only person in the deops team here in the US. So he was overwhelmed and I said you know there is nothing that I could lose actually. So I have I love to win. If I say no I will keep working as a rev optim optimization. I will see what I will do later. But actually it worked out to me. So I play the cards that I have available to me and it was interesting because I already know as you said I already know the team. I already know the company. They know me. They trust me and they know my hard work. So it was like a layer of friction that I remove you know since transitioning to a new company, new environment, new team, new tools like so in this way I think it was quite easier but at the time at the same time it's challenging because you need to change the perception of the people that works with you. They know you as RF not as a debop. So that takes time. It takes time to build confidence. It takes time to build trust, to build ownership. That is gradual. It doesn't happen in two months, three months. It takes a lot of time. And that's actually one of the things that happened to me. I switch. So okay, I made it. But then again, no, it takes really time. And when you are working and surrounded with very smart people who are working in the IT field, you feel like why way behind. But also it's a motivation to improve to keep learning to keep pushing up you know because I really admire all the knowledge that they have specialized in the field. So I have a many things to learn from them as well. >> Weren't weren't you afraid when you made the decision because did you did you not think what if I make the switch what if they approve me as a DevOps engineer and I cannot actually do the job I cannot actually perform the task. What if I fail? Did you not have that thought? >> No. Like there is was no way to go back to like no way to go back to ar like if I fail I will need to push and prove myself again. But I would do it and I will move forward. So I think everyone at some point all we were beginners we were juniors and they had to build they have to pass failures and fail and then recover from that and keep moving forward you know because actually you learn from your struggles. If it's everything so easy, it's too easy. Like you're nervous. [laughter] >> Wow. This is a really great mindset. I love it because when you made the switch, you were actually you probably in the first half of the DevOps boot camp, right? You haven't even like uh fully done the the program yet when you made the switch, right? >> No, exactly. I have completed only the first three models like the core models, but I was making only the advanced part. So I have all the pipelines fundamentals all these part Kubernetes developed infrastructure was already done. So I was missing all the graphana and >> observability model. >> Yeah. So you basically got approved and you joined or you transitioned as a DevOps engineer. So it was day one or the first week basically of what happened like did did you uh did they give you tasks already? Did you start seeing okay where can I help? Where can I be more most valuable? Did you try to see okay where can I map my knowledge from the boot camp to what's needed in the company or how was the first maybe two weeks for you in the job? >> Well actually the first three months let's say I was in a transition period I was working with my previous team helping my previous team and also getting trained from the deops team. So I was half and a half for up to let's say November December. So actually switch 100% debuffs. It was in December that I start getting more tasks and more activities. Usually the task of activities I was getting is were related to the point our cloud native services in the customers environments also working a lot with helm charts and little by little I'm getting more activities and I'm more confident. >> Mhm. And you know were you able to do the tasks right away? Did you need a lot of training? Did you feel overwhelmed in the in the work? No, actually actually when I start looking what what they were doing I say okay but I saw this I learned this in the boot camp you know it's exactly the same but maybe different tools that you just need to try translate the core concepts in maybe other technologies but at least like the pipelines were the worst like how you work with docker kubernetes it it's actually the same so when I was looking at this I was understanding I was like wow I understand it it it was it felt so good to be honest >> nice Nice. Uh did did you use many of the tools from the boot camp or did you have to work with other tools? >> Well uh the company we work with Terraform from the boot camp we also have anvil we have we at CD CICD pipelines but from aure is not like janis but you can translate it it's the same you know in in the end the concepts are the same but the advantage as well is when I'm working with customers they have a totally different environment. So expo I'm exposed to too many tools different cloud providers somewhere are working in Linux somewhere I'm working on powershell so I'm exposed to every type of environment uh it's very encouraging and like excited because I'm always learning different tools so >> and what do you think helped you to use also different tools even though you haven't worked with them specifically like did you feel like okay I understood I understand the concept so well that I don't like I'm I know what to look for in this new tool. I know what to ask about. Did you feel like still confident about okay sure like I know this is a new customer with new tools but I can figure it out. >> No actually confidence it takes time to build to me it's being gradual you know I also I need to be like very thankful to my colleague because he I have like the team leader and he have showed me as the path as well. So he helps me a lot to progress but it's not like I know I learn a lot but the confidence in the tools getting exposed to customers it takes time it takes I for me it takes time to build. Yeah, I 100% agree because um a lot of people say you know you cannot um replace the experience with knowledge or a lot of people say uh you you know you need knowledge and experience is not enough and actually you need both right because you can be an engineer who is you know hands-on and and working with stuff but you may have never built a Kubernetes cluster from scratch you may have just been working with an existing cluster right you may have built in scratch. So I think you need both as you said you need the foundational knowledge and understanding the concepts and then you need the practical work experience because when you combine those two then you can become a really experienced knowledgeable engineer that has like literally no knowledge gaps and then they can literally just tackle like you can uh confirm if this is true or not because you have been working now as a devos engineer for some time. At some point when you build that confidence and you know there's a new client with the set of tools you just know that you will figure it out because you have a track record because you have uh understood the concepts because you have that practical and theoretical knowledge. Do you feel that same way now as well after some practical devils experience? >> Well not 100% yet there. I know I will get there soon. But I'm start building. You know, it depends on the customer environment because there are too many configurations and change it a lot from customer to customer. But while I get more task and getting more involved with with them is like I feel more confident. I know what to do. I exactly what to apply. So yeah. >> How long have you been in this uh DevOps role now? >> Like 10 months. I'm only 10 months into the Bob's role, but 100% the Bobs because I had three months in transition. So, let's say like seven months. >> Seven months fully. That's not even one year. That's crazy. That's not even a year. Yeah. Would you say now looking backwards, looking back to your study sessions, you know, waking up at 5:00 a.m. in the morning. Is it how you imagined it would be when you uh would become a DevOps engineer? Was it all worth it? >> Yeah, to me it has been all worth it to be honest. I imagine like this way. No, I I never imagined I was going to step in and talk to my manager and I was going to get approved. You know, actually they were they were going to say no and I was maybe I will have to look upside but when they say yes and they were impressed it was oh okay >> it worked actually it worked. I I could get experience in the same company and I love that. >> So the the role itself did you also imagine it to be like that? Like is it as exciting as you you thought it would be? Yeah, I'm constantly learning all the time. So, yeah, I love it. I really love and to me it's like when I start working, I sometimes I don't even feel it's it's work. >> This is the best combination because you found a profession which is highly demanded, which is highly asked for. It's also uh well paid because of that because it's so valuable and you enjoy it. Like that is the best combin [laughter] combination that you could possibly ask for. Um you you also said that you had a few uh breaks in between the learning uh period. So was it eight months for deos boot camp or for IT course and deos boot camp together? >> Oh no the IT fundamentals I took it way before. So I did the IT fundamentals and it took me like two months three months to complete. I don't remember. Well then I had a break and then I I start the the boat boot camp which took me like seven seven eight months but I took vacations in between. I had the eye surgery. So, I was expecting it to work in a week and then soon I realized no. I could not even see the screen. So, I have to stop. >> Oh my god. Was it was it uh planned surgery or did it just uh was it kind of unexpected? >> No, no, it was planned. It was planned. So, yeah, I had like how you say like I couldn't see it from far. So, I I wanted to get that surgery from way like long time ago, but it was just in the middle of boot camp. it. Yeah. >> One thing that was hard, it was to take my routine back. That was hard because I had a huge break in between. I was like, "No." >> But how did you get back into routine? Because as you tell this story, like it all sounds like easy, you know, like very simple, but for a lot of people, this is actually extremely extremely hard to even uh to even have a routine where they at least consistently do a few hours a week, you know, we're not even talking about like every single day. So, how did you create that routine at the beginning? How did you come back to that routine after such a break? >> I don't know. I think commitment, commitment, consistency is key. So, and have your goals in your mind. It's hard. I'm not going to say it's easy. It was It's hard to wake up very early and start putting the hard work in the morning and you know that you need to work at least one person daily. Doesn't matter like that. It builds on top every single day. And sometimes when I'm doing nothing, I feel that something is missing to be honest. It's like, okay, I need to get back because I need to get productive. I need to keep learning. I need to keep building. So I think that at the beginning you have the motivation of the first few months but what keeps you in the road is consistency. You need to be consistent to your dreams to your goals to be able to make it because motivation disappears fast. You know you get tired something else come up uh but keep you there keep you working is consistency. >> Yeah. Yeah. And I'm sure that when you wake up at 5:00 a.m. uh for the 20th day in a row, you definitely don't feel motivation. Uh especially at the beginning, you probably feel like, "Oh my god, I have to do this." And then once you get into the once you open the lectures, when you start once you start doing the demos, then the motivation comes back again >> because then you start enjoying the thing. But at the like you always have to kind of push yourself. And I also agree that you you need to stay you need to keep consistent and you do that so you are consistent by creating a specific schedule because if you're like you know I'm going to be consistent I'm going to do something tomorrow but you said this is a time I'm going to wake up this is a time I'm going to do like you actually created a specific schedule in your life. You said I'm going to prioritize myself so I'm going to do it before work. So I think that's what helps you then be be consistent. >> Yeah. And to create the routine. Once you create your routine, you know that's the I think the most difficult is to create the routine and then you have that and you work on that like at least 30 days the four days then it becomes more natural for you. >> Yeah. And another thing that I think you would agree with me um is that when I was studying uh especially when I had the same goal of I want to transition into it and uh I transition as a software developer a lot of people would look at the study schedule or or study duration and say like oh my god I have to do this for six months but my perspective was more like you know today I learned I I spent half an hour or on something I don't care how much progress I made, I learned something new >> and that itself was a motivation for me. So I wasn't counting the days until the the studying was over. I was actually every single day I was happy. Oh my god, I learned something new. You know whether I spent 30 minutes for it, whether I made uh you know a large progress or a small progress, a progress itself made me feel good and that's motivated me to do 10 minutes or 30 minutes or 1 hour the next day. Do you have the same perspective? >> Yeah, I totally agree with you. I had the same feeling. So even a little progress, it feels progress, you know, and keeps you going. So I think that's important that you go back and you like you study, you research or you do something related. So you keep the motivation and going, you keep learning, you keep like >> the hunger. >> I want to slow down here because for a lot of you, this is the most useful part of the whole conversation. Alba did not wait until she was finished. She had done IT fundamentals, the core modules of the boot camp and both AWS certifications. So the advanced modules of the boot camp were still ahead for her. But she asked anyway and she didn't apply to an open position because there wasn't any in her company. What she had noticed was that the US office had 25 people and exactly one DevOps engineer and he was buried in work. So there was a real need and she immediately noticed. Now look at what she brought into that conversation. It wasn't I'm interested in DevOps role but rather she brought her AWS certificates, the IT fundamentals course and the boot camp syllabus. So her manager could see exactly which technologies she had already worked with and built real projects with. That's tangible evidence that you can have a conversation around. Now, it still wasn't instant. Approval had to come from the headquarters in France, and that took a month. Then, she spent three months split between her old team and the new one in a transition period before she was fully DevOps. As she just said, changing how people see you takes time. So, if you already work somewhere, even in a completely non-technical role, look at your own company before you look anywhere else. They already know your work and they already trust you. you have a lot of contextual knowledge of the company already. So that's a head start that you don't get as an outside applicant in a new company. So you can take advantage of that. Now let's put actual numbers on what Alba just described because be consistent is easy to say and it means nothing until you see the schedule. Right? So 5:00 a.m. every day before her 9 to5, she knew that after work she would be tired, stressed, exhausted, and wouldn't want to do anything or learn anything. And she wouldn't have the mental capacity to absorb new information. So she gave herself the first hours of the day before anyone else got any of her energy, then three to four hours on Saturday and Sunday, using the weekend to go back over what she'd learned during the week. And she kept that schedule going for around eight months, but not eight clean months because she had an eye surgery in the middle of it and couldn't even look at a screen. So, she had a vacation. She had to stop completely. And she says the hardest part was not the studying. It was getting the routine back after the break. Now, listen how she explains it because I think she's right. At the start, you have motivation and motivation runs out fast. it disappears very quickly. You get tired, something comes up, but what keeps you moving after the motivation is gone is consistency. And her rule for it is at least 1% a day, no matter how small, because it builds on top of the day before. So, if you're waiting to feel motivated before you start or waiting to finally have enough time, you will be waiting a long time. Pick the time, put it in your calendar, and give it 30 days. She says once the routine exists it stops being a fight and it just becomes effortless. So let me ask you what was the most challenging part in the DevOps boot camp? Like did you have a pro the project or a module where you're like okay this is too advanced this is too difficult too complex that kind of where you had to invest most of your time and and focus >> whereas I think like creating the pipelines it was like pretty difficult because involve more coding as well and I'm not yet used to it so the language learning a new language learning the new logic behind getting to know how all these work interconnects because actually the pipeline is what helps you to interconnect all all whatever is the development is done into production environment. So I think that was kind of hard and difficult to me. >> Yeah. But probably also enjoyable as as I'm now. >> No. Yes. Yes. like when you just click and everything is done and what that [laughter] >> did did you have did you have a feeling that your colleagues were impressed by your knowledge because first of all it's really difficult for nonIT background people to immediately start in DevOps positions because DevOps engineer role usually requires some previous experience in IT so you need to be either software engineer or have some CIS admin background um so you get into this role without any uh prior IT experience uh but you also kind of got up to speed really fast. Did you feel like your colleagues were impressed uh that you were productive so fast that you were actually you know you knew a lot of the concepts already? >> Well actually when they learned I was switching was like quite shocking for them because what you're transitioning but how you did it. So when I told them I did your boot camp, they were very impressed because like you are well known in the tech industry. They have watched your videos as well and say a if you learn from their videos, their videos are the best. So I I can imagine how much you have learned with the boot camp. So they give me really opportunity and they know you. >> Nice. Nice. Because I remember this also from my own experience where um you know I would go to work and we would have the task and it would be like super challenging technically and I would learn so much after work so at home in my free time and that not only doubles your speed of learning but maybe 10xes it because you try something at work it doesn't work nobody knows how to do it. You go back and you spend the whole evening all the weekends basically trying to figure it out. You come back on Monday at work and you basically have learned all these things, this whole new technology over the weekend, right? Which which can be impressive for the colleagues and and that also made me feel really good about my skills and gave me motivation to see the impressions of my senior colleagues, for example, who had way more experience than me. And I think that also paired with confidence of your knowledge, but also seeing your colleagues like what you're doing and being impressed. I think that also kind of helps >> uh helps with day-to-day work. >> Yeah. Yeah. It helps a lot and it keeps you motivated as well to keep learning, you know, and to keep doing things and investigating. So, yeah. Yeah. So when you switched to DevOps uh role because you said they didn't have like an official job post but you saw the need and you basically tell told them you guys need this need this skill set because uh this one guy who is doing all the DevOps work is overwhelmed so he needs help. Did you have a pay rise as well that was like corresponding to the DevOps engineer role or did you like how did you handle that? >> No, actually I didn't have any pay raise. So to me it was exactly the same. It was not much higher, no way lower. It was exactly the same. But to me like my first idea was not actually the salary. It was more to get my first debop job to get my skills to get into production and to build confidence more confidence in in real world you know that was my objective so I didn't really care at that point about the salary because I wanted to get the first experience and I said it's the most difficult to find >> also amazing mindset I love that and and also I want to reiterate on this because you know a lot of people will will be watching here and a lot of people will resonate with your story because we have uh so many people in the community who come from nonIT background and they find it scary to transition to DevOps. So I think you'll be inspiring for many people but that mindset of saying you know what I know that long term this is going to be beneficial for my career. So it's okay to take a few months to just dive in and maybe compromise your social life a little bit and just just work on your uh skills. It's okay to not have a pay rise right away because you are going to be learning so much that it's gonna pay off like hund times in the future, right? Because the the opportunity itself is where worth way more than a pay rise right now, right? So I want to reiterate on this mindset because it's so important to think long term in like 10 year views and compromise some of the things in short term because it's going to pay off uh in it like a official term would be delayed gratification actually and it is it is also a mindset of someone who is like a go-getter you know someone who >> plans their career and and life very um very successfully. Y again I had the same experience where I was an intern. Um so I started as an intern software developer and I was supposed to work officially 20 hours and I was doing 40 hours on the job 20 hours unpaid per week. I didn't even like I think I mentioned it after six months. I was like yeah what about those overpay [laughter] over overtime? Do do I get paid for them? And they were like no. And I was like, okay, I I don't mind because for me it was like I'm getting knowledge for free. That was my perspective. Like I'm actually learning. I'm using them to to learn on the job different tasks uh for free. So if they pay me for that, that's a bonus. So giving up something short term for the for the long-term goal is always a good is a winning strategy for sure. >> Yes. Yes. Exactly. I see like maybe I don't see well I do see it because I'm learning a lot but I'm learning from my same employer you know which is nice I didn't have to suffer like a very hard transition in a new environment so which is was nice but maybe in the future in a five years six years if I compare back to my salary the alpha from like two years ago I will say how much I have progressed how much I've learned how how much I've grown in all this journey you know because everything takes time it doesn't quick. It takes time. It takes time to build everything that you want. >> Yeah, 100%. And as I mentioned, instead of looking at the end goal like, oh, when is this boot camp finished? When when is my learning finished? Instead, focus on what did I learn today? Like, did I make progress today? Did I make am I going to make progress tomorrow? And that should basically keep you going. And that that brings me to the next question, which is so you get this job, you transitioned into this new role, and you still finished the advanced modules of the boot camp, right? You were not like, you know what, I'm I'm going to learn now at work. I'm I'm done. This is the advanced stuff. Maybe I don't need this anymore. You still like did everything. What What were the last modules that you you did after transitioning to DevOps? H the last one it was the graphana models all the observ observability models section. Yes. >> Did did you did you actually need that at work the monitor? >> Yeah actually yeah we we we need it we we actually we implement that in in our solutions as well. So it depends on the customer we need to deploy it or not but yes >> we do it but actually what I love is just at that period I felt a boost of motivation >> because what I was doing the morning I could just work in the afternoon and it was all working together you know was against me like before because before >> I was studying in the box but I was working totally different field so it was like okay it has nothing to do but just keep going because at some point I know I'm going to make That makes sense because now you were learning in the boot camp then you were learning a job the all the entire day and maybe like in on the weekend. So it was all uh towards the same goal of learning DevOps and and one thing that actually I wanted to bring up because we have this digital badge uh which is like a certificate that you get uh after DevOps boot camp but you have to submit your work. So you have to actually show us that you have built the knowledge, right? You haven't just passively watched the videos, but you actually did the projects. uh you've built those production grade end to-end projects and you have to it's like a mini exam uh with us >> and um I remember actually because my engineers were doing like uh validations of those uh uh submissions and I remember a note of one of my engineers that said that your submission was simply flawless. So the quote was simply flawless. Uh it was I think it was like one of the most impressive digital bench submissions that that our uh team has seen. So tell me about that like your git structure all the projects where like everything was in place, everything was working. Um and I mean again these are projects that you build not in on a weekend but over weeks, right? So these are like capstone projects that you need to like uh build over time with like CSC pipeline and Kubernetes manifest files. So how come how did you how did you manage to have a flawless application of digital batch? >> Oh well thank you for that like really appreciate it. Thank you for your words. But actually what happens like I took the boot camp a way to improve you know when we were talking about the submission it was not just applying for the boot camp and get the badge to me was more having my portfolio it was more like having a way to go back to my learning boot camp and what I did during the boot camp. So it was also to myself a way to remember and even though you know sometimes at work I go back to my repo I search things and it's easy way to get back there and maybe in the future is going to be also a way to show my portfolio what I have done like handon's experience in real project environment. So it was actually something that I built for myself and not only to be great on this >> amazing like I'm literally like impressed [laughter] by by almost everything that you were saying >> I mean that but that's so interesting right because your submission of the the projects was flawless because you didn't do it for the digital badge and you didn't do it for the uh in order to get this certificate but you did it with a different purpose which was to have uh uh a project portfolio right ready in case you needed to send someone your GitLab link to see okay these are the projects that I've done this is my knowledge >> and that as a side effect of that was that your projects were just flawless right and they they matched what we were looking for so that is another um another kind of mindset thing because and you didn't need to do that because you were not even looking for a job right you you kind of transitioned within the same company So it was again for the future, right? So long-term thinking instead of like short-term thinking. So you invested like enough time for that. Now let me ask you about your next goals like what what is where is your mind at? Like what are you thinking uh is your career trajectory from now on like do you want to continue with DevOps? Do you want to learn something specific in the future? What do you think your career progression will be for the next five years for example? >> Wow. That's long term but okay let's see um first I'm on the debops so I'm still getting more hangouts on the cub native certification I just passed the CK certification so now I'm going to start preparing for the CTA which is is valuable for my field um for my work because I lot work a lot with kubernetes and after that like when I have a strong foundation I would really like to translate my debuff knowledge maybe moving also towards AI as well infrastructure because I think it's going to be easier step to transfer the knowledge later. So maybe I will have like small gap but for now I'm going just start getting better on the foundations on the bus and later thing in the infrastructure for for AI. I think that will be like a very nice spot and challenging as well. So >> yeah when you think about like the next things to learn about how you how do you decide what to learn? >> Well, right now it's because I really need it at work. So I need to get better at Kubernetes and I know I'm using every single day. So I take one step at a time you know because otherwise I can freeze and I don't do anything. So I take one step at a time and then I analyze okay which is align with my goals. >> What about AI? Do you see the need at work or is it more like you know an analysis of the industry like do you search uh the trends like explicitly to see like what is going to be demanded in a few years or what is your approach there? >> Well, I know it's going to be very demanding. We also have very exciting projects coming with AI uh at my current company. So that's an extra motivation and I really love also AI how it can help you to most move faster optimize your time resolve issues faster and it helps you learn as well. So I think it's a great tool that you need to know how to use it and well in my case I would love to know how to deploy it and in the big infrastructure as well. So it's quite exciting. >> Yeah. So it sounds like the the way you make a decision about what to learn uh next is usually coming from your own personal excitement, right? Yes. >> Because you find the thing interesting. You find the tool interesting. You find the field interesting and it's not like this logical and analytical like oh let me see all the job descriptions and see like what they require and let me read some blog articles about the the news trends. Maybe it is also like influencing that but most of it comes from I want to learn new stuff. Let me see what's exciting. Oh, we're gonna get this project at work and that gives me like extra motivation. >> Uh which again something that I want to highlight because that makes it probably like more enjoyable to learn this stuff. But it also as a side effect makes you like in two three years you are the type of engineer who will never be behind when things evolve when technologies evolve right you will always be up to date not because you're not keeping up to technologies you are just so motivated to learn new stuff you're just doing it naturally >> and it just as a side project you always up to date basically and you >> Yeah and you always stay valuable for the companies also because of that. >> Yes. Yeah, exactly like that as you mentioned. >> Yeah. >> So, how important do you think it is where you work like which company or which projects you're exposed to as an engineer especially someone who wants to learn new things who wants to uh evolve and develop their their engineering skills? How important do you think that is? What do you mean like how I feel is it like my security environment is like >> uh because there are a lot of companies that do not use uh Kubernetes or the modern technologies they use like outdated stuff and all you know older versions of things they don't use infrastructure as code you know uh do you think it's it's a opportunity where you can introduce new concepts or do you think it's actually important for development to be in a company and project that uses this kind of tools. >> I think both actually because like so far haven't I exposed to big customers where they have like very good stack like githops operations like all stack well implemented well when you a small companies you check small companies they are deploying all with docker they don't even have kubernetes it's all in powershell it's like okay you have all these mixed environments and you can easily translate but why you don't apply this you can just do recommendations stack to And for example, while there was fun that happened, we had a session with a customer and we he was deploying the whole infrastructure with Python and we were wait. You're wasting too much time. It's not going to work. You could use it, but it's not the best approach that you can use, you know. So that was kind of shocking because he had a lot of experience, but he didn't know that Terraform exists and it makes your life way easier, for example, in just little examples. So you can easily translate what your knowledge is, learn, you can make recommendations as well and you need to be able to to translate and give to others as well. >> Yeah. >> And at the my current company the the good thing that I'm learning a lot. So we implement all the technologies. So it's everywhere where I'm exposed right now. >> Yeah. which I also find it uh important because you I mean you can learn like let's say you do devops boot camp you learn all these technologies but then you need the practical implementation like you need to apply them in order to get the confidence and I think you need to have an environment where you can actually apply them right because when you work with these tools every single day when you work with different projects different customers that's where the you know you train yourself the most so it's equally important to find a case where you can actually use these things uh every day. The goal here is again not to just get any job as a DevOps engineer but to actually get a job at a project that allows you to grow and learn uh every single day that allows you to try new tools that gives you enough time to basically be like okay let's try this new technology and see see how it works. All right. So, before I have I have two final wrap-up questions for you. But before that, I wanted to ask you one more thing specifically about certificates, which is uh something that's um you know, we we've had really impressive uh engineers in our boot camp who have done uh like lots of uh certificates. We have had engineers we have zero certificates. So before Devil's Boot Camp, you actually did AWS certificates, right? Uh and then you did the AWS module in the boot camp. So how would you compare studying for a certificate and do getting a certificate with the more like practical projectbased learning let's say in in AWS module in DevOps boot camp was it complimementaryary was it duplicate like did you not have to do like anything on the AWS because the the certification program already taught you or what was your um comparison >> no actually to me is they complement each other so I think you need the foundation ations of the certification to get know well the services but at the same time you need the boot camp the projects the hand-on practice how to put it in practice in real environments because in the certification they teach you through the console but in real life you don't work on it through the console you can do a few things on the console here and there but what you want is you want to automate you want to create your pipelines you want to it's actually how you deploy in in infrastructure in real production environments so I I think both are important. >> What do you think is the main value of certificates? >> I think they can prove that you know the topics you know I think it's a way to prove the word that you know and when you're coming from non like IT career it's way more difficult to prove that. So I think the certificate help to prove that you have the knowledge and they just building on top. So I think it's still valuable in the market and sometimes like depends on the region that you're working in. In some regions they take into consideration the certifications more in than other countries. So that really depends but I think it adds >> adds value. >> Yeah, I I actually agree. It's like a shortcut to prove your knowledge. >> Uh but of course once you get the job then you need to actually prove that you have the knowledge and you don't get that through certification programs but you get that with like practical uh projects. So it's kind of complimementary because you prove on one side I know this stuff and then you prove I actually know this stuff. >> Um >> all right so let me ask you some wrap-up questions. Um because as I said we know uh whenever we post this type of stories of our you know impressive engineers in our boot camps uh we see that it is extremely motivating and inspiration like it may literally there may be someone watching this video right now that right after they watch it they make a schedule they literally start waking up at 5:00 a.m. just like you like literally follow like some of the tips that you you mentioned because they get so inspired by by the story itself and and I know because this is like human thing, right? So uh so let me let me ask you uh two final or like wrap-up questions to share with the community. Um we have a lot of junior engineers or people just getting into it that have this imposter syndrome that are uh that have anxiety and they're they have a fear which is somewhat legitimate because junior engineers are the most affected by AI. So they fear you know what if uh what if I can perform at work you know it's really difficult to get in um to get my first job so I can even prove that I'm valuable. What would you tell them to focus on the most in order to get to the midlevel to senior level as fast as possible as efficiently as possible uh and kind of get rid of this anxiety and imposter syndrome as junior engineers >> I think it's like you need to step in and you start working on it you know you cannot be afraid all the time of doing the first step because otherwise you get paralyzed you don't do anything so first you need to apply you need to work with the tools that you have. You need to support yourself with AI. Don't go away from AI. It's not going to I don't think it's going to take all your jobs right now, but you need to use it to optimize your time to learn more to troubleshoot. Like for me has for troubleshooting has been amazing as well. So I think use AI in your favor. Don't be afraid. I think most people like even you have AI there, it's not 100% correct. You need someone behind to see okay this is not wrong here. you're doing something, you're just going off the path. So, you need that person, that specialized person in there. And don't be afraid to step in, to take the risk, to start studying because if you're paralyzed, you don't do anything. So, you need to keep moving. >> I think that that's and keep consistent. Keep consistent. I think that that's the key. think why do you think uh people are anxious or fearful instead of being excited you know like you are about learning new things and and transitioning to career >> well they can because if you see the news there are many layoff and it's it's true that juniors engineers are having hard time right now because the for the companies what I saying is they're going to optimize their revenues they're breaking the leather so if you don't if you don't have these junior engineers which are want to evol talk in the future to senior level how you're going to close that letter you know it's it's a phrase and I think that at this point the companies are not seeing this because that's a reality so many people are impacted by AI but I also believe that many job positions are going to be created around AI so you need to be able to learn to evolve and don't be afraid >> and something that I would add which is you are like a perfect example of that is that when you learn and develop your skills based on being excited about it versus being fearful. So when decisions that you make are not based on fear and anxiety, but rather you know what what is it that I'm excited to to learn about >> that is a way bigger indicator of how successful you're going to be in the career no matter what you're doing whether it's DevOps or something else. And another thing is that when you figure out how to get excited about learning new things and how to learn new things in general then there will like let's say if AI replaces software engineers there will be something else that will be created for humans right as long as you know how to learn and as long as you have the motivation to learn and excitement and not like fear-based anxiety you will always be able to have the skills that pe like companies pay for. So you will never be like let's say everyone uh like AI in in 10 years replaces DevOps engineers. We don't have a business, we don't have a job, you don't have a job. But when you're type of person that always that loves learning new things, you will just learn something which is the the new demanded thing, right? What's like what's the problem? Right? So I think it's a shift in the mindset where you think about it. Okay, then I'm just going to learn whatever the next required thing is on that followup. The final question is again there are a lot of people who you know they have this full-time commitment or uh a very classical example someone who has invested last 15 years in learning a job like uh network engineering right and now they see oh my god it's not valuable anymore they need to learn something new but they feel overwhelmed they're like I was going to retire now I was going to chill now you know I was I was I thought I was done learning um what would you tell them in terms of you know I have a full-time commitment or you know I I just want to take it easy but now I need to learn new things I need to you know learn DevOps or architecture what would you how would you motivate these people basically to be like you know no don't be lazy don't be complacent don't feel like it's so strenuous effort that now I have to learn all these things how would you motivate them basically >> well I I think first like you need to be honest with yourself like it really motivates you really you really like it. You you're not doing this because it's trending or because you see on Instagram LinkedIn so it's something that really excites you and you will you want to move forward. I think that that's key because it's the only way that you keep keep consistent you keep moving and you can do any change that you want. You just need to be willing to make the change you know because you are the only one who can make that happen at any age. It doesn't matter. As long as you're learning and you're motivating and you want, you can do it. It's not like, oh no, I'm too old or I don't have the skills. You need to have the mindset. I think what you need to change is internally. You have to switch your mindset. See that you can do it. You can make it. There is nothing that you can lose. If you don't like the switch, you can always go back to your previous career because you already have that experience. So what can you lose? like there is nothing and there is a >> like a big path ahead that you can learn, you can move and and transition. So don't be afraid and don't don't be afraid to take the the the first step and don't wait until everything is perfect because you will never know all the technologies. You will never be an expert on all the tools and be ready. So if you wait for the perfect moment, you won't do it. >> Yeah. Or if you wait to have enough time, >> Yeah. And you will never have >> time >> so much time to to learn new things. >> Life is busy. So everyone has different backgrounds, different responsibilities. So you need to try to squeeze some time for you for your goals, for your futures. Whatever you want to do, just do it and do it for you. Like I think at this point you need to be a little bit selfish if we want to say like that. >> Alba, this has been a pleasure. this I am so happy that we did this episode with you because uh as I said I'm I'm already excited that people are gonna find this inspiring. Uh thank you so much uh for doing this.
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