Foojay Podcast #65: Boost Your Career in 2025!

Transcript

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[0:00] What are your personal goals for 2025 do you want to take the next step in your career in this podcast we will tell you how to achieve that welcome to the FJ podcast all your news about OpenJDK welcome to the first Foojay podcast of 2025 by now you’ve likely had your year-end performance review with your manager and set some goals to advance this year are you ready to take your career growth into your own hands I invited three fantastic guests who are eager to share their experiences and help you elevate your professional Journey I’m Rafael Dono Java champion and I have more than 15 years of experience as software developer and currently I’m focused on mentoring Java developers toing their careers hi everyone my name is Al Mor I’m living here in Brazil and my main target my mission and my life to help Java developers to build and deliver back end application a lot of good availability and good also performance so they can work on the best projects in the world and I’ve been doing it both by doing developer advocacy and also mentoring individuals around the world hey hello everyone so good to be

[1:19] Here with you and I think we all here to help you grow your career and Advance The Next Step I’ve been doing this for you know almost 30 years now and you know I’ve been doing a lot of things in terms of java I’m part of the JCP I’ve builded the Java group’s community and I’m also heavily involved with open source and I’m here to help you out all three of you really spend a lot of time on helping other people to evolve your career what is the motivation of doing this at some point in my life I realized that I spent too much time by try and failure try and failure try and failure so I spent time I spent money I missed a lot of opportunities that I could have taken before so at some point I decided to help others to not spend that much time just by failing and trying failing trying so that’s why I start Ming people so that I can help them to just that’s growing on their careers so that’s why I started doing that well for me you know a little story here I try to do it short but you know many many years ago I had a big fight with my dad right so I wanted

[2:40] To you know my dad wanted me to focus on University and you know get a degree and then you know and do all that and I start working on like you know actually with my dad was I was working since I’m a kid and when I went to University I started working like in the first month and my dad was totally against that and so at some point we had a big fight and you know ugly fight and all that you know we know how teenagers are right so it’s was very stupid at the time and so in the middle of the fight the phone rang right and you know the guy on the other side said Bruno some mro is looking for a trainee and they said that if you want the position it’s yours and so at that moment right it’s still really mad at me my father sat down his computer to help me write my resume and so a month later I was at Sun and you know and then one week after I joined Sun the first public demonstration of java came about and you know fast forward 30 years later you have the Java Man focus on Java and doing lots of things of java and when I look back I see that my father at that moment he had all the power to just say

[3:53] No you know if you go work for son if you get this job you know I’m I’m not going to help you anymore and he did right he actually helped me to do what I wanted although it was against what he wanted and by the way he was right right you know lots of things that he said is going to happen all the problems he said is going to happen it did happen and so very very early on I realize that you know my job is to help other people achieve what they want and make sure that they can get to their dreams and they can achieve their dreams and so I do everything I can to make that happen Rafel you have a story like that yeah in my case back in the days when I was an intermediate developer I was focusing a lot on technical on Technologies in general I was studying a lot of them and I noticed that people with similar technical skills than me they were earning the double the triple the quadruple of my salary and then I notice okay there’s definitely something wrong here and like back in the days I had the fixed mindset which I thought I couldn’t grow in other skills I thought I would

[5:07] Be good technically but I would never excel in other areas of my life because that was my personality and there was nothing I could do like it was like living in a prison right and but then I noticed that I could improve my other skills I could improve my communication skills I could improve I could improve any other skill I wanted any other soft skill I wanted and I noticed that what I was lacking was those soft skills from my colleagues like they were a lot better than me on those skills of communicating better negotiating better they were better on sharing their knowledge as well not publicly within the company and that Mak them a reference and they grew a lot faster than me they got promotions and naturally they were earning a lot more than me and then I Noti okay I can do something to improve those skills and then I say okay if I was stuck in this thing here and I was in this prison and I had no idea I could grow I could go to the next level now I want to help other developers to work on their soft skills so that they can advance their careers yeah I heard from Java or

[6:28] Other software Developers that they started doing software development because they didn’t want to speak to people they just wanted to work which is in my opinion really bad ID because as you mentioned it’s not the tech your technical knowledge that will get you evolved in your career there’s more than just your technical knowledge how important is it to learn other skills and to maintain other skills many of us got trick head with the idea that oh you know you go into software development you go deal with machine right and then we all forgot that software is developed by people for people it’s Market by people he’s used it by people and you know and so it’s people all the way down right and so at some point we all had to learn that okay so we have to talk with people we have to deal with that and you know some people learn how to do it like how I was talking about you know you learn the skills you learn how to do it and some people just kind of put their hands down the sand and thinking that oh no no I’m just going to talk to the machines and then they end up stuck some point

[7:38] Yeah if I look at all three of you so you help people with evolving their career how do you do that do you help them with a call do you have an interview do you write blogs I know you like you Rafa you have a lot of videos that you publish on your YouTube channel what are the concrete things that people can do to get into contact with you and others who do mentoring to get this kind of help in my case I shared knowledge on YouTube I’m writing in average one article a month for info world and so all my content is focused on Java career so I talk about the pain points of java developer where they are making a mistake and I also talk about their main aspirations on what they really want in their careers so I basically Focus my content on that so for example the series you participated Java Rockstar career so it’s a way to show top Java developers how to get there how to be a reference or how to advance in their careers so I share content content on YouTube and I also do the mentoring and the mentoring is basically a three months program so I do the mentoring on

[9:19] Zoom and so a mentorship is different than a course because it’s a conversation with them so I go deep into their career challenges understand what is going on what is preventing them to go to the next level and there could be many things could be maybe fear of talking to their bosses fear of losing their jobs fear of trying to do interviews because they might get rejected they might think oh I’m not good enough you know when you get rejected in interviews you have this feeling that you’re not good enough it’s a horrible feeling and also consistency consistency is the biggest key for success in anything we do obviously you need consistency and strategy right that’s the first thing I do a mentorship I help them to find Clarity on what are the next career steps because once they know where they are going then it’s just a matter of being consistent obviously to be consistent to need a lot of things under the hood you need to have also a good mindset because you’re going to fail you’re going to face obstacles there will be days you won’t feel like it doing what you planned and that’s normal like

[10:48] Motivation take you so far but after that it’s discipline if you don’t have discipline is very difficult to achieve what you want I talk a lot about that about consistency my mentorship so it’s a lot about accountability overcoming their fears overcoming their career challenges and I also have my cars like if they want to get started and learning the foundation of how to advin in their Joba career they can start with the course and then they can go with a more advanced mentorship program Bruno how what’s your approach of to mentoring yeah so a lot of it you know it’s about listening right so kind of answering your two last questions a big mistake that I make a lot and it’s to make to this day is thinking that I can do things Al right and you know when I used to give Korea talks with edaga many years ago and we had a slide in our talk that like this famous I think it’s an African saying that says if you want to go fast go Al but if you want to go far go together right and career is a long run right career is a far thing career is not a short thing and so

[12:09] And for me many times I think I can just you I can just go and do things myself and just kind of focus on me working and many many times I forget to that talking with other people discussing with other people is such an amazing thing right so you know for example me and Elder me and haa we talk a lot right especially with elder because we have this group that we talk almost every day and so doing things together makes a big difference right and you know just that just happened to me this week I was struggling with something here that I’ve been trying to do for a while and you know can’t move you know exactly how to move and everything so I message my I you know I kind of finally realized oh man you know I’m trying to do it alone again right and then I message the group of exson employees right and I said hey guys there’s anyone that knows about this here and so you know few minutes later someone said yeah I can talk to you this afternoon and we had a great conversation you know just kind of clear out my mind and I start doing things that need to be done

[13:14] And so working to with people together is a big thing and so you know half I was talking about in terms of mentoring right it’s a lot about listening right understanding what people are understanding what what’s what’s going on understanding really what problems they have and then working together to do this right and I think that’s that’s for me I do hire several mentors I you know I’m als I also Mentor many people and for me the big thing is that you know you go a course you know you watch some videos and it’s not exactly what you’re doing it’s it’s it doesn’t I mean you hear the message and so I know how to do that yeah I was like I can follow that but then I don’t because I’m afraid because you know I have a question that I don’t know how to solve and you know I’m I’m stuck of not doing like consistent like half hour was talking about when I’m mentoring you can really work on those things right because it’s not only what you have to do it’s about understanding how to do it and how to do in our current situation right because

[14:19] It’s so easy I was talking to my mes this week and you know someone said me oh Bruno because that happened and that happened that’s why I didn’t do anything and I said yes you know things happen in life every single day right and the worst excuses are not the fake excuses those are easy to deal with the worst excuse are the real ones right I didn’t do this because those things happen yes I know right you know and that’s that’s that’s a true thing that’s a real thing but if you think about your job for example right you know you go to work every single day doesn’t matter what happens you know you do your work and you can you might spend 8 10 hours every day your job it doesn’t doesn’t matter if you have problems at home it doesn’t matter if you’re sick it doesn’t matter if you know if you feel a little you know sad today or if you don’t feel like working it doesn’t matter you just go and you do it every single day right but then when he gets our careers anything that happens like oh you know I couldn’t do this because of that oh I wasn’t feeling well I wasn’t feeling

[15:23] Motivated right and so we have to learn and that’s the thing right so when you talk talking to someone or discussing things when you’re going deep on what’s going on you know you actually listen to people understand what’s going on then it makes a big difference because now we can deal with the real problems right because the real problems are very are hardly the what’s what appears to be right it’s always something behind the scenes always something that’s that’s that’s not clear right and then so when you go deep we discuss things we understand that one makes a big difference so can we conclude Elder that every Mentor also needs a mentor himself and that you are the mentor of Bruno Bruno is my mentor or vice versa yes I mean me to when you have a mentor that doesn’t have a mentor question it because a good Mentor have Mentor as well so I know that Bruno has a mentor I know that Rafael has a mentor so every single time that you are trying to Leist to learn with someone is very important important that this person also is learning from someone we all are at some point of growing stuff so for me

[16:37] It’s super important that my mentors also have their mentors so I can learn from them if you’re growing in your career in a lot of companies you’re almost forced to turn from a developer into a team lead or a project manager of but those are completely different ways of working can you still be a developer when you retire and achieve a higher level or do you have to go into another role you can be a developer even if you go into management right you know that’s that I always always mention this you know this boss that hired me for son and you know he was a great boss he was a manager right he didn’t didn’t work on any technical things anymore he was man I mean he was Technic in the past but and he was a developer right you know to this day I have his wife’s you know Dr teas or something like this that it’s a whole software like a very very sophisticated software it’s a it’s a 3D application that you get movies right you know and then you importantly move into into the application and you connect the dots on people so you can

[17:57] Register movements it’s a whole thesis on how to preserve dances and you know soccer kicks and all these for posterity right and so you know you got like a 2d movie and then you mark the person and then you can see in all 3D directions a very sophisticated software that was done when Java was in the very beginning right he’s talking about Java 1.1 1.2 and Newton was doing that softare right so he was a manager that he did software every single day because it was something that he wanted to do right and so and he build that amazing very sophisticated solution all of that and that’s that runs to this day by the way right you know thanks to the power of java and so I think that you can do right and when you get to this level that Elder was talking about right then you get to the senior level and then you have to do the next step right and there are a few things that you can do and some of them are less technical some of them are more Tech technical you know I always say there’s like five five path that you can grow Beyond senior right and so and

[19:06] Yeah some of those paths are technical path right that you can be very very technical and you can continue to go deep into into into technology but at the same time if you want to cause a bigger impact and if you want to have more autonomy right you have to have those skills that half I was talking about right you have to have negotiation skills you have to have leadership skills you have because there’s no way for you to have a larger impact if you’re just yourself into into a bunker right so someone else has to create this impact for you right and so yes it gets to a point where you know I think that many many times and many that’s a question we get a lot from developers is that okay so now that I want to grow but my company wants me to do other things that’s not only development right and then the question is do you want to cause a bigger impact you know because if you lead a team for example and you know you can be the most technical person that team by the way you can really be doing but if it’s a team the impact is larger than your own impact right you know if if you

[20:06] Go to a role where you know you become instead of a developer let’s say you become an architect and then you define the architecture for the whole company your impact is way larger than the impact of your of you’re writing a code you know if you go even deeper than that you do like half is doing that you participate on a standard process like the JCP right and then your impact is even larger right because now you’re you’re defining the standard that impacts millions of developers all L the world right and so you know if you do what Elder is doing right that you become an evangelist and that you not only get people to think different and use new technology where you also get your company to improve the things right again you impact millions of people and so you get to a point where our technical skills can give us a larger impact right and that’s even true for open source you know you go do an open source project then your impact is much larger but an open source project you know there’s out it’s not only the technology it’s not only writing code

[21:11] You know you have to discuss with other people you have to participate on that there is politics around it right you know there’s even problems right you know so I was talking in December with Christian grm right that’s that’s an open source developer vice president of Apache and Christian is one of the Developers for log for J right and he was explain to us what happened when there’s this huge security breach on log for J that impacted people all over the world right so they so the developers had to deal with that you know had to answer those questions had to fix the code and the same same time work with everyone to actually make so those are not only development skills right those are people skills those are negotiation skills so if you want to have a bigger impact you have to go beyond the technology what changed a lot in my career was that indeed I joined an open source project Java on the Rasberry pipe off J Library started writing about it started communicating as you said Rafael so started writing content going to JS all these can they help others too so

[22:20] So joining the I think all three of you are part of su Java the Brazilian jug yes I’m actually actually have the t-sh right now how can a jug help you as a Java developer then specifically how can that help you in your career as soon as I joined so Java like in 2016 I believe once I know I met Bruno my first time started a project that by that time we called Java e the next Frontier because we were about to release the Java EA version and we decided to interview a lot of people involved on the Java E8 build the whole specification the whole implementation stuff and I used to say that for example if I try to interview res Aden bean and all the people David deasi and all the people involved with jav by just saying hey Elder let me interview you they probably I don’t know maybe they are good enough to give that time for me but it’s not the same approach to do by that time hey I’m Elder from so Java and we are interviewing a lot of people so when you have this power of community behind you it will it’s kind of multiplic your results because when you are in a group that

[24:01] Have the same challenges the same desires everyone is getting together it’s increasing the skills of everyone and the results of everyone in the same group so that’s why we used to say that when you would like to go fast you go alone and I us say that if want to would like to go faster and farther you go with a group because you commit less mistakes and you can learn from each other you can learn faster H you have the whole experience of the whole group so my story of so Java is incredible because I own a lot of my results to this amazing group so that’s why I really believe on beauty communities I GNA tell the first story like before I getting a job here in Dublin because my career dream was to move abroad to Europe and get a job as a Java developer and by being part of Soul Java I could meet The Jug leader from dub jug before going before coming here to Dublin and that was great that was amazing because like when I was in s Paulo I already sent an email to the J leader from here I offered help help to them like with you know maybe finding

[25:33] Speakers or giving a lightening talk and in the first week I was here in Dublin I already met them so I met Barry Alister and Barry Evans and then it was very good for me because I started getting involved in the Javis group from Dublin and I even volunteered to work for them to help them to build their website and without so Java for sure I wouldn’t I wouldn’t meet them like the way I did I wouldn’t know them before coming to Dublin so and besides that like I met so many amazing people within so Java like Bruno Elder otavio amazing people amazing Java references and you know that’s the part of community we learned so much with you know those amazing people in the community and yeah I got involved in dub jug and it helped me a lot to get my first job I also saw Java opens the doors for me to participate on JCP as executive member so it’s really good to be close to what’s going on with the newest Java versions like how the community can impact with the future of java so like I wouldn’t be able to do that without so jaob it would be almost impossible and like that’s the part of community

[27:30] There’s there’s an interesting story that that’s I want to tell two stories here one that’s about ha one is about Frank right so and I already tell told you one so when hael you know the whole thing about Community right so when hael gave his first presentation in an event right not was not on a stage it was just like a in a table in the corner right and the other day we found a picture of that and hafa is giving a talk to you know maybe like five or six people right sitting down a table and then around hael right you know you can see in the picture five or six Java Champions or future Java Champions right and so that’s that’s the power of community know when you’re working with the with when you’re working with people right that’s that have achieved that are trying to achieve they’re trying to grow what happens that push on it’s you to grow and to do things right and so I we looking at that picture other day right half was pretty funny to said man look look at this look so many Java champ around you and you didn’t even realize that at that

[28:40] Time right and so and that’s what we want that’s what a job a user group can do with you is help you be together with people that want to grow right because once you’re there makes a big difference and it’s all about this whole notion of community of meeting people I love online I love the what we doing here love we can reach more a lot of people but even better than that actually meeting people in person it makes such a big difference and so a couple of years ago I was participating here on this podcast Frank I’m not sure if you remember that but you know we had a conversation and one of the things that we talked about because I was getting ready to go to Europe and visit several user groups right and because of that podcast several user groups reached out to me and said oh you’re coming to Europe and so my trip extended and I visit a lot more user groups because because we were able to find even more people because they heard from you here in this conversation that was going to happen and so you know that’s what that’s what we when we’re in a community

[29:46] Everyone’s talking to each other people are meeting meeting and conversation sharing right and so that’s that’s that’s it right I shared I was going I was gonna travel and that created even more opportunities for this for that trip right and so when we share things and we share with each other and you know we get together right and by getting together we can all grow so from that trip I’ve met several people that today are my mentees and some of them have achieved amazing results already right and so you know one of the guys that I met in that trip you know that became my manty he was telling me the other day that he participated in four events right this past year because you know because because he start to speak more and go to place and all that so and so that’s I think that’s the power that’s the power of community the power of working with people that want to grow it’s being together with people that you know that want to do the next step and that helps you do the next step okay you mentioned being a yava champion we with four of them in this

[30:55] Podcast for some Java developers that’s that’s the final goal that’s something they want to reach is it a good objective or should it just happen what is the goal of becoming or being a Java Champion so let’s revert this a little bit right because as you said there’s four Java Champions here so for you Frank you know how important was for you to become a Java Champion well it happened because one of the other guests here nominated me thank you Rafael it happened only last year or the year before so I already evolved my career so it was just an acknowledgement of what I did the years before will it influence my career I don’t know because I’m not looking for a next step at this moment so yeah it’s it’s definitely that you get recognized by the other Champions if it’s really something that evolves your career I’m not sure I cannot say that I think you can all three well I think that’s that’s what you just said something very important right that’s the Java champ is recognition of what you already did right so you know it’s it’s not really that’s why I know I tell this

[32:15] To lots of people ask me this right is that you know you should not you should not aim to become a Java Champion you know what you should aim is to do the things that allow you to be recog I as a Java champion because those things are the things that going to make a difference you know is when you share your knowledge is when you know you participate on user groups when you lead a project right when you get involved when you do all those things those are things that we get gonna get you to become a Java Champion but those are the things that we actually going to change your career so for me the Java Champion label let say or recognition is maybe the cherry on the top right it’s like you know you already did that you grew your career you know because you’re doing those things and then not only you know that you did those things but other people recognize that you did those things and then you know kind of recognize that on you right it’s like it’s like an Oscar right you know you don’t you know the Oscar might even give you another opportunity right you if you

[33:16] Get an Oscar you might be called to another movie right you know becom a Java Champion might be called to another company that’s great right but the Oscar is a culmination right so you did lots of things you improved it you did things and then you win that recognition that’s what a Java Champion is becoming a mentor means that you spend time on your mentees so if someone has already a busy job and he has a lot of experience so he has a lot of work in his company why should they become a mentor of their colleagues or other people isn’t it just another few hours per day or per week that you need to spend well my perspective it’s one of the responsibilities of a senior software developer and you don’t need to use this time necessarily outside of your 9 to5 job you can mentor as experience developers within your work time and if you want to expand more than that then you can participate in Java communities you can give talks you can you know write an article create a video or know anything that will inspire other Java developers this is a way to be a mentor as well you don’t need necessarily to

[34:41] Talk directly with the person like if you create meaningful content for them to grow in their careers that’s a way to be a mentor but I would also say that for senior software developer or even an intermediate software developer it’s very important to help less experienced developers you know to learn faster or even to improve their soft skills because I know this is highly neglected by the vast majority of developers like like me I was one of those developers I thought that all the soft skills were useless that was my thought and I know that many developers think like me in the past and as a mentor as a more experienced developer it’s very important to teach them also the soft skills not only technical skills so like the technical skills are crucial you need to have it otherwise you’re not a software developer but if you combine with soft skills it’s like creating a super powerful career like if you know a little bit about soft skills you don’t need to know everything about soft skills because we are software developers like it’s if difficult to be as good with sub skills with someone who works right directly

[36:21] With sales for example or other areas where they are in contact with people all the time but if if you know a little bit about soft skills you’re going to become a lot better you’re going to become that developer that has a lot of more visibility who can negotiate the top salaries the best salaries in the market you’re going to become that developer who can Empower other developers to do better and so the role of a Senor developers is very important in that are because I had so many mentors helping me to get better Technic you know I had many senior developer mentors and that’s part of their jobs that’s part of our jobs as developers and the other benefit of a Senor developer being a mentor is that you fill out the gaps because sometimes a junior developer asks you something that seemed very basic and then you realize wow I don’t know exactly the answer and then you’re going to research the subject and then you can explain to the junior developer and you learn so much so it’s a learning process for both for the senior developer and for the junior developer so it’s crucial developers must Mentor other developers

[37:48] So if you are a senior developer and you have juniors in your team and you become their Mentor will it at the end not make your life even easier if you guide your Juniors to become better in their job in the team if they better know what tools you’re using so I guess at the end if you’re a good Mentor that your team also becomes better exactly that they will create a better code you’re going to need to give them less feedback and they’re going to produce you know they’re going to produce better quality code they’re going to deliver more soon enough they’re going to be mentoring other developers I think it’s like many things in our careers right so you know you might be mentoring people to ex all those reasons you’re talking about right to improve the team to learn more because there’s no doubt that when you Mentor people you learn a lot right there’s lots of things you know the biggest skill for mentoring is listening to people and that’s exactly same the most important skill for a leader also right so you know you improve in a lot of ways but then you might get to a point where

[38:57] You know this it’s actually causing so much transformation that’s what happened with me right you know I do I work for sun I do have a consulting company right so I’ve you know writing lots of code and all that but I was mentoring people through all those time right and then the more I did that the more the results that people were having because I was helping them out because I was mentioning them you know the impact on the user groups the impact on you know people becoming speakers and open source developers all that was so big that I realized that the impact I was having in mentoring people was larger than the impact I had right writing codes and so at some point I made a switch to actually spend more time you know and eventually my full time doing this to actually help people to advance because the impact that I have today is so much larger right than you know actually you’re seeing here right so you know because because I helped Elder because I help with hael you know they are now a Java Champions and how Fel helped you so

[40:08] Now you are a Java Champion right and so you know so the impact that this causes ends up being you know that’s that that’s a decision I think that’s in our lives are like this right at some point we realize that we have more results we have more impact we have more even even more salary right doing the things that we know how to do very well instead of trying to do things that other people can do better than you right and so that’s even a possibility and for me Frank I think that when you get to the senior level to you know you get like 15 20 years of developer career you should start looking at what is you know how do you get the maximum autonomy the Maximum Impact that you can have in your career and many times this going to be I know building your own company building your own product building your own service because then you can have full autonomy to do what needs to be done right you don’t depend on company’s decisions you don’t depend on you know on the time that someone else allocates for you anything like this you get full autonomy

[41:12] And then you go do the thing that cause the most impact for you and your family and everyone around you mentioned salary we didn’t mentioned that before we were only talking about knowledge and impact and getting recognition but increases is it right that you have to change company if you want a significant salary increase I heard it’s easier to change company than go in your existing company and ask for a salary increase how is this related with how good you are in your job or how good you can communicate one thing that I think a lot right that when you just use the right phrase you say it’s easier it’s easier to get another company right because because you know if someone else wants you and to take you from your job to their companies right there’s a risk involved so that risk there is a salary increase right it’s and because it’s easier people shy away from the confrontation of negotiating salary where they are so I think it’s possible you know I have a mentee that has this crazy story right and you know he even told presentation

[42:27] Some time ago where you know he was working for a company and you know he and his wife they not going along very well so he realized they’re gonna get divorced right and so his thinking was okay so if we divorce it my son will have to live with half my income and so what he did in six month he double his salary without changing companies doubt changing positions oh how do you do that right you know so that’s and so but that’s the point right so once you see the reason you see the needs for it right then you’re going to get out of your comfort zone of I’m I’m not gonna you know I’m not gonna negotiate I’m not gonna put myself in this confrontation mode you know I’m not gonna I’m not going to improve myself I’m just going to do my job right and so you put yourself in a position that you know I don’t need you should do anything and then when someone else makes the effort because it’s not you right someone else do all this for you right they come to you and they take you out of your company they create discomfort they create Conflict for you and then you and then they offer a larger salary

[43:44] So you just wait for that my point is if we just going to be waiting then we’re not going to we’re not going to increase our salary no matter if because no other company is going to take us out our compan is not going to increase us so we have to take control of our careers and we have to decide that is something I want to do and I’m going to figure out what kind of conflict I need to create what kind of what kind of discomfort I’m willing to do what kind of thing I need to learn to do those things I’m just showing that those things are possible but you know I do understand why people prefer to not do it some companies we because you know people are us it to oh we have an open position then we try to reach that position oh we have this plan for growing the career so let’s try to build but it’s in some situations there are companies that expect you to force this so for example here in my team we never have open positions but we do have people that are get increas in salaries that are getting promotions because we are forcing that so it’s important to create the love this story of this kind of divorce not

[44:59] Because I love the divorce but because I love this situation to force people to get to get action to get on action to get on moving because we are here I believe that we have good jobs not Bruno because Bruno has his own job but we have a good salary we have good lives we are in so it’s so easy to get comfortable to get use it to the stuff that’s why I am always seeking for the next level seeking for the next challenge seeking for that’s why I created my own mentorship beside my company beside my daily job I create a new business because I need to this kind of new stuff to get get me out of my comfort zone because it’s so easy to get comfortable yeah it’s so important because you know because many times we can put oursel in discomfort right or by not doing anything we just walk into a really bad situation that’s going to be in discomfortable anyway right and so you know I remember when I was working at Sun and I joined son as a trainee as I said and then you know after some time you know when I was incorporated I’m not sure that’s a word right so I was

[46:26] Like officially hired for son my salary was very small and so one day my wife come to me and said look let me show you something here right so and show she puts all the numbers down she says here’s your salary here’s how much money we spend you know here’s how much this coool for your kid work cost right so she’s said is any can you see anything wrong here right and that forced me to do exactly what Elder’s talking about so actually go discuss with my boss and negotiated with my boss and it was a lot easier than I expected so when I went to negotiate they were expecting me to negotiate right because they’re not going to do anything by themselves but the moment I start negotiating I have another situation A Mente of mine was telling me you know he was right before he became my mentee and he was telling me that you know he you know he had this problem because he was working you know he moved to another country and he was working for a company and he was making less money than than his his expenses right right and so basic I told him said man this is wrong right you cannot be paying to work you know you

[47:32] Have to fix that in said oh you know so that’s why I’m trying to look for another job I said no no no looking for another job is a good thing I’m not saying not right but right now you need to discuss with your boss you know because if you don’t discuss with your boss right now you know and he was in a special situation because he was in his small company so his boss was like one of the founders of the company right like the CTO kind of thing right and so I told him I said no we’re going to NE we’re going to talk to your boss today and so he did he reached out to his boss I think he met his boss the next day and he told this to his boss like no no no this is wrong of course he was wrong right and so his boss recognized it was wrong and his boss said look we’re gonna increase your salary right now and he said but now it’s too late for us to do anything for this month so I’m gonna I’m G to transfer money from my personal account to your account right now and then for the next month going to fix that and so and that’s something I’m not sure every company I’m not I’m not saying every

[48:32] Company does that but really it’s in on the interest of the company that you stay you know if you leave it’s a big problem for the company right you know it’s it’s hiring someone else training someone getting someone back to up to speed is a it’s a big problem so for me I always say this like as professionals we have some responsibilities and the number one responsibility that we have is to want to stay you know because everything everything else comes from that because I want to stay you know I’m not GNA be doing a good job if I want to leave right so my first responsibility of my company is that it’s true one I’m not saying that I don’t I can’t leave no if I receive another offer that’s amazing that’s okay it makes sense right but my main responsibility is to want to stay and for me to want St I should be working on interesting things I should be I should have a good salary I should have good benefits because if I don’t have those things I have pressure for my family that’s oh you know maybe should you should not be working with this company I have pressure for myself I don’t like what I’m doing right I have

[49:43] Pressure for my customer that’s you know you’re not doing a good job I have pressure for my boss so I’m not I’m not GNA want to stay so it’s a it’s our job guys do not run away from conflict do not run away from negotiation it is your main job to negotiate your way into wanting to stay where you are and if you do that then your career is going to be great because you’re going to negotiate you want to stay and for someone to take you out of that they need to offer a big thing right and so when everyone wants you you’re in the best position ever I really love this message so maybe we should set this as the goal for 2025 is thereare to ask to your current employer if you want to change something being your salary being your responsibilities being the job description whatever it is within your company that you’re not happy with just ask for a change and I think that could be already a first step in evolving your career correct for sure would be a great step a good question to ask your boss is ask your boss hey boss what do I need to do who I need to be to guarantee that I’m involved in the most

[51:01] Important project for the company indeed a very nice one maybe you all have a tip like that and I remember a story about loan Groner another Java Champion a friend of us here and she said that she now is live she’s living on United States she has a great job so on but once before going to United States when she was still Liv in Brazil in a 101 session she kind of said that she would like to move to United States and then he said but you never told me that you would like to move to United States oh yeah because I have this kind of objective and Target and so on so we let’s work on that so he her boss her and then in one year United States and the point of his story is sometimes we don’t have the results because we don’t share our targets our dreams so if you never told your boss what do that you have an increase that you have a promotion you have another position that you would like to work on that project maybe they are not just not moving you to that position because you never shared it so we need to and I know that some companies don’t have this culture of having oneon-one sessions if

[52:33] That’s your case ask for it hey boss I would like to have 15 time 15 minutes with you 30 minutes with you once a week or once in another week I don’t know but we need to ask for stuff that we want because once we W people will told us what do we need to do to read that okay so for that position you need to be this person or for that project you need to know this stuff so we need to ask for ask and then you show have it show you have it indeed and asking for 15 minutes makes a big difference that’s what I did this week right so I asked for 15 minutes and then end up like talking like 40 minutes with this guy that really helped me out I have an interesting story about that right so Vena Sanger right you know also a guy that helped us in so Java he’s on Amazon right now and you know he’s a Java Champion all that and so venicius know couple few years ago right when James gy is still working for Amazon V’s like oh man because I don’t know I really want to talk to James gy on Amazon and you know I would love him to Mentor me right and so we kind of working okay so

[53:46] What do we need to talk and I said and I said okay so ask for him for five minutes you know ask for him for whatever time he has right and so he did that so he sent a message saying you know if if he could talk to James go like you know for 15 minutes you know so he could mentor and you know if he had like 15 minutes on his week or something like this and then James said oh yes you know we should we really should do that but bump that to an hour right and so then you know Venus had this like every week one hour conversation with James goling you know to and you know so ask ask for what you want right but also you know try to make it easy for the other person to say yes you have to be vocal because if you don’t say what you want people will decide whatever to you so if you never tell your boss how can you create a plan to get to where you want sometimes there are some companies that they have some policies sometimes it’s difficult to negotiate they’re going to say the maximum I can increase here is 15% that happened to me already and I had to move to another company so on

[55:05] Those cases where you get you don’t get what you want from the conversation with your boss it’s a good strategy to also look for another job in the market it doesn’t mean that you want to do your best in your current position you’re going to keep doing your best delivering high quality code you’re going to keep striving to take your project to success but you have to realize that in some companies things might not work out and you need to always think about the big picture like the big picture could be in your job you could do your career in your job if you have the support of your manager but if this doesn’t happen you can’t say oh it’s my boss’s fault that I can’t to grow in my career no you’re responsible for that yeah you have to know what is going on in the market you have to know how to pass in the Java interviews you need to know what they are asking what the market wants from you technology needs to learn how you should behave in an interview because if you don’t have the support from your company you have to make your career work your manager is not responsible for your career and I

[56:43] Made this mistake myself because I was waiting for my manager to give me a promotion and it he he’s he’s not responsible for my career I respons for my career and the same thing for other Java developers and I’m totally in favor of stay the job if possible because it’s much better right it’s much it’s a much better position to you know earn a better salary or maybe changing conditions working remotely or having more free time for your family in your own job to negotiate that directly in your job that’s much better a much better position but sometimes things don’t work out and I think the main lesson is to realize that the developer responsible for their careers and they have to if necessary to be ready to get another job in the market this whole thing about taking responsibility I heard from in hicki from Oracle at the last developers conference event and he said a phrase that kind of shows his very well he says you don’t have what you want you have what you negotiate and so that is something that we have to think about right so you know if if if you want something you have

[58:08] To go and negotiate otherwise you’re not going to get anything yeah it’s indeed your manager who decides if you get it but what you want what you get is what you ask for and let me tell one thing Frank it’s you know very careful with this idea that’s your manager that decides it’s usually not your man manager is the manager of your manager or the manager of the manager of your manager right your skip manager or your skip skip manager those are people that decide so if they don’t hear about you know both half and now they’re talking about you know speaking and sharing if those people are not hearing about you and they don’t know who you are and they don’t know what you want you know if if you’re if you’re a skip manager it’s not talking about you to his manager right then you’re not going to get anything because usually your manager your boss does not have that direct power and in the company when I work for example I’m a princip I’m a position a principal and to get up to the senior principal not my boss not the boss of my boss it’s a committee that will approve my

[59:19] Promotion or not so I need to be known by this committee to be approved so we need to bring my case to this committee so I get approved to that position so that’s why it’s so important that your message your name it’s being talking to people around the so we’re back to the social skills and how important they are you cannot be just a programmer you know and one interesting way that you guys can actually do a little that right so I got together with had vanura right that’s that’s the head of the JCP right so she’s the had of the pmo of gcp and you know like a person that not only she has to deal with those kind of things negotiation all that but she has to negotiate with big companies and you know discuss all the ideas of the future of java so we got together and we wrote this book called The developer career master plan that has 15 Steps and we tell exactly what you need to do and all the skills and how to acquire them and to help you achieve all those those those skills and you know and we talk about negotiation we talk about

[1:00:29] You know management we talk about you know speaking and user groups talk about all those things so we we’re able to get with packed publishing that you guys can get the first chapter for free and the first chapter is a great chapter because talks about learning and in skills and how to acquire all those things right so it’s a great very very good chapter and so if you want to do that it is on career Master plan. DAV right so if you go right now to Career Master plan. DAV you got the first chapter for free and you know and another thing you’re gonna get is gonna get an email from me with the chapter so if any question that we have about your career that we didn’t cover this talk here you can just reply to that email and I’ll help you out and that’s could be the start of the changes for 2025 in your career okay thank you for your time thank you for joining this recording for sharing oral knowledge and being mentors very important and I’m sure you all influenced a lot of people and helped a lot of people so hope to see you again in one of the next

[1:01:37] Podcasts and maybe you have still a message to share yes so thank you everyone for listening to us thanks Frank for the invitation know thanks Elder thanks Rafael and you know hopefully I’m GNA meet you three here but also you this listen here somewhere around the world this year so hope to see in 2025 yeah do World T again yes and everyone for listening us and also Rafa and Bruno for the friendship thank you all yeah well thank you so much Frank for the invitation thanks Bruno thanks Elder and I encourage Java developers to take charge of their careers and find their own Mentor because that will massively accelerate their careers and which is a nice goal for this new year and will definitely help a lot of people achieve some new goals thank you all thanks for listening and see you in the next Foojay podcast give me a give me a give me the friends of OpenJDK