Good morning to those of you who are celebrating their mornings or good afternoon or evening.
Maybe you're listening to this two weeks from now.
I have a very scratchy voice, so I'm going to try not to talk very much.
That's pretty usual.
I like to shine the light on my guests anyways, but I can be chatty too, as like right now,
right?
Anyway, so 99 Dev Problems.
Excited to chat with David Marshall today.
David, I would love for you to introduce yourself.
Yeah, thank you so much.
So David Marshall, I am Kansas City, Missouri based, not Kansas.
People seem to not know that Kansas City spreads out against both states, which is really interesting.
So if you ever think about Kansas City Royals or the Chiefs, they're on the Missouri side,
even though I think they're lobbying to try to get them on the Kansas side, but that's
a different story.
Yeah, so Software Engineer, I've been professional, so to speak, for about three years, currently
working for a company called Breakthrough Fuel.
They're based out of Green Bay, Wisconsin.
And yeah, so I've been doing that for a bit.
Married, have two kids, have five Scaly Pets and one, I don't know what you'd consider
a frog, like squishy, slimy.
I don't know.
She's a big girl.
She's a big dude.
But yeah, just do a lot of stuff with the family.
But yeah, I know we'll go over that a little bit more, but I've also been a professional
touring musician.
There's been a handful of things I've done over the years.
I love that.
And honestly, I think that's like, it's very much, you know, there's an essence, right,
in our industry of like, you know, either creative people or very just technical people
and, you know, all of the sort of melds together.
But it's really fun to see the creativity and like, I didn't actually realize how many
developers were like musicians or like creative in that way, which is, I don't know, I guess,
like, I mean, it makes sense generally, humans do have creative outlets, but I just think
it's interesting how many developers enjoy music.
Is there a genre or specific sort of, you know, sector of music you enjoy most?
Oh, man, that's a tough question.
So like, what I perform, you know, I'm more on like the heavy persuasion, right?
So like I've done like what people would consider like hardcore metal, death metal, stuff like
that, you know, vocally, but like, I mean, musically what I listen to.
Lately, there's this band called Sleep Token, but I've listened to a lot.
They're based out of the UK.
And it's like, I can't even explain how interesting this band is like instrumentally really heavy
vocally can be kind of heavy, but more like his vocals would sound, I don't know, it's
I'll send it to you later.
But if you haven't listened to them, I think the newest album is called Take Me Back to
Eden and it's just it's phenomenal.
But like I love jazz, I love old country jazz classical, I listen to a lot of classical
I even listen to like Swan Lake, you know, I was listening to that the other day, like
it's just it's whatever.
I mean, music's music.
So I honestly, I feel the same way and like I can really, I don't know, I get like sort
of like therapy for music, but the same time I can't listen to music with words when I'm
working, it has to be very like classical like wordless music.
I'm not sure the actual phrase for that.
Like instrumental.
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, very much instrumental.
So I end up listening to like classical or things like that.
Honestly, I should bring jazz into it.
I just like love music.
I love like what it does.
Like it just gives me a vibe and if it's sort of a negative music, I like can very much
sort of relate and ebb and flow emotionally to music, which I feel like is, I don't know,
probably usual and normal for everyone else, but I love it when I'm like in those moods
and I want to sort of maximize the mood that I'm in.
Oh, I've met people.
I've met people who don't like or listen to music and I'm like, who hurt you?
Like, how is this your life?
Oh, who hurt you?
I have a friend.
He was actually on the show, so Joe Casabona, shout out to you.
He doesn't like animals.
You and I can relate to that.
And I'm like, yeah.
And I'm like, what?
I'm like, I'm really, really like you, Joe, but like, I almost don't know if I can be
your friend because you don't like animals, but I will say he got his kids a dog this
last Christmas.
So he is like, he's, he's, he's opening up.
So I'm like, oh man, you're my favorite person, Joe.
It'll turn around.
He'll, it's always the whole thing of like, you get your kids a pet and you're like, ah,
whatever, and then you end up owning that pet more than your kids do.
He won't be pleased to hear that.
So Joe, don't listen to that part.
But I mean, it comes around, right?
Like I actually told him the story, like my dad's a major curmudgeon.
He is such a grump about most things in life, but he's definitely a grump about animals.
And my mom's dog had passed away.
And so he came to me and he's like, I want to get your mom a dog.
And I was like, are you sick?
Are you drunk?
Hi?
What's going on right now?
What have you been doing?
And he was like, no, I just, I just want to get her a dog.
And I was like, okay, like shocking thing for my dad to do, right?
He hated the dog she had before.
And so I was like, okay, whatever.
So my long story short, we get a dog, but now that dog is his dog.
Like that dog is at his feet, in his chair, sitting on his lap.
Like it is, my mom did not get a dog.
My dad got a dog.
And so it's just, it's just funny to me.
And I also joke that I'm like, you know what?
I want that dog's parents because like he is spoiled rotten.
They are my parents, but they do not treat him the same.
Yeah.
That whole thing is, tail is old as time, right?
I've seen it so many times, like you don't like the dog or you don't want one, then
you get it.
And then like, you can't imagine your life without it.
So I don't know.
Isn't that the truth?
Well you have different forms of pets, right?
So we get to talk about it a little bit on the pre-show and nerd out about it.
I'd love to dive, I mean, we'll dive into some techie stuff too, but like, let's get
to know David and I want to hear about your pets.
Yeah.
So the funny thing is, so I grew up with dogs, right?
So boxers mostly.
And then my wife was like, well, I don't want, you know, animals that shed hair.
Sure.
Right.
And I'm like, I get that, but she never said anything about shedding skin.
So we started out with some bearded dragon.
Well, ours, ours, well, I'd say our bearded dragon is pretty free roaming.
So yeah, we have a bearded dragon.
We have leopard gecko, ball python, crusted gecko.
We just got a pacman frog for my son.
But then I also have a toke gecko, which if anyone knows about lizards, these are like
the ones that bark and bite.
But like I've tamed her down where like, you know, she crawls all over, I can hold her.
It took a while, but like, yeah, it's just, reptiles are awesome.
I think people just assume like they're cold and, you know, just, I don't know, but they're
they're good pets.
Especially the dragon.
She's awesome.
Yes.
Yes, I was literally just going to say that.
Like, I agree.
Like, and we talked about this pre-show, like I had a leopard gecko for a little bit and
then my son had a bearded dragon.
And like the bearded dragon was hilarious.
Like just full of personality.
Like would jump up on the rock.
If you were there, like bounce back and forth.
Like it's just really, really funny.
And like, I could totally see how your bearded dragon would be like more of like a house pet,
right?
Where it's like sort of free roaming.
He didn't have as long enough as I'd shared in the pre-show.
We moved so he didn't have his as long as like he could have to get to the point of like
a larger size, right?
But we had a lot of fun when we did.
So that's how honestly I bet one of my kids are going to want one of those pretty soon.
We just got a hedgehog.
I don't know, back in like October, November.
Super freaking cute.
We don't have any, any lizards or anything in that realm.
So.
Our, so I actually have a set.
It's a ramp that goes from the tank down.
So if I'm working from home, if she wants to get out, she'll climb down the ramp and
you know, go around the office and then go back up.
That is so freaking cool.
Oh my gosh, I love it.
Well, you should share pictures with me later.
I would love to see that.
Okay.
So let's dive into like some of your career stuff, some of your tech stuff and probably
get back to pets because you know, that's the nature of my existence.
Yeah.
I love animals.
Yeah.
I feel like I've shared this so many times, but like it's fun though.
I don't get tired of sharing it.
So I'm, I'm 35.
So I'm in my mid thirties literally.
And I started like web design and stuff.
I don't know, six, seven ride around that range.
Like, you know, this is back when you had like dial up and you'd go to whatever grocery
store and it'd be like net zero, Juno, they'd have the CDs, right?
And I remember at one point they're like, Hey, you know, if you sign up for this ISP,
you get free web hosting.
So when my parents signed up, it was like, what is that?
So I'm looking at this and I just out of HTML.
I don't even think I'd used CSS.
It was all in line.
And anyway, I made like this Pokedex, right?
And I was like, okay, this is cool.
So you know, I'd taught myself HTML, but like even though throughout high school, I know
everyone jokes around about like, Oh, I used to do CSS on my MySpace page.
And it's like, okay, everybody did.
But like, I was doing these things.
I even had classes, you know?
And like I had teachers who knew I could do this, but no one once was ever like, Hey,
you could build a career out of this, right?
So I pretty much had this opportunity, by the way, like I've been doing that back then
because the same thing happened to me.
But like, you know, this is still the early 2000s, right?
So like, I don't think any, not saying there weren't careers, but it was a little different.
And you know, so like after that, when I graduated high school, you know, I played music.
I was kind of just bouncing around jobs, right?
Never did much of anything seriously until I met my wife.
And then I was like, all right, I kind of need to figure this out.
So you know, I actually, my first quote unquote professional job, I would argue was a shoe
shiner at a barber shop, at a high end barber shop, right?
And that's where I ended up meeting a client who I then took a job at his property management
firm.
I got into car sales for a few years, and then 2020 happened and that upended everything.
Yeah.
But that's kind of what made me reconsider.
I'm like, maybe I should look at a different career.
And I had a friend who was like, oh yeah, like didn't you used to do web design back
in the day?
You should look at getting into coding.
I'm like, okay, so you're doing the job my teacher should have done.
Thanks, Sean.
Yeah.
So I started a boot camp in 2021, started at Springboard, ended up getting a job.
Yeah, ended up getting a job a few months and I didn't finish the boot camp.
And then from there, it's just kind of been steamrolling since then.
Yeah, that's awesome.
Okay.
So definitely non-traditional sort of path into engineering.
I love that.
Yeah.
How was the boot camp?
Obviously there was, you know,
The boot camp is great.
I mean, like I, even when I had started my job, like I haven't lost access to it, right?
So if I really wanted to finish, I could.
But like, the curriculum was great.
It was kind of a joint partnership between Rhythm School and Colt Steel, which most people
know who that is.
So like the actual material is phenomenal.
My mentor, Jack, he was such a great mentor.
But it was really just a matter of like, I needed to get out of car sales.
So like I leveraged some networking on LinkedIn.
And that's where I got my first job.
And it was just like, I didn't focus on that because my first job was in like view and
some other stuff.
I'm like, okay, my boot camp doesn't cover that.
So like, am I really going to take all this time to vote to boot camp or can I just use
that extra time and focus on my job?
And I just never been able to go back and finish it.
Nor do I think I would at this point.
Yeah.
It's kind of funny how sometimes that works, especially when you're like self taught or
sort of trying to dive in on your own.
Like I've had tons of courses that I've started and I've gotten through like a portion of
them and then it's like you get pulled into actual work or an actual project.
And then it's like, oh, I should go finish it.
And it's like, well, but like really should I, I mean, I'm already using those skills
in actual real life work.
And so it's like, what can the course provide maybe that, you know, that I'm already working
on it essentially.
So it's always good to learn.
But I think sometimes you just get pulled into doing the work instead.
Yeah.
So again, you know, I don't know how the state of bootcamp is now boot camps in general
are in a really tough spot.
So that's something else too.
I was a TA and a lead instructor for a boot camp for about a year and a half.
They're not even doing a web development course anymore.
You know, like it's just, it's a really, I don't even think the market is as bad as
what people are making it out to be.
But I think it's just realizing that like you can't just go to a boot camp and expect
a job.
Right.
You just get a CS degree and expect to get a job.
That's not how it works anymore.
And I think boot camps are wising up to being like, we're not, this isn't the moneymaker
anymore.
Yeah.
I think that, you know, like, of course there's tons of potential sort of chicken and egg scenarios
here.
But I think like if there's any trend that I've noticed the most, it's that companies
aren't hiring junior developers and investing in them anymore, which like maybe understandably
with AI, but at the same time, like you need junior developers to create senior developers.
Like you can't just, they're going to retire.
Like developers get paid well.
They're not going to keep working into their 60s and 70s.
Like an average developer age of retirement is somewhere in their 50s, right?
And sometimes even sooner, depending on the level of success they have found.
And so I think it's interesting too, because as you start to look at sort of the, what
I call like the caller devs, which I sort of joke about, like, I'm going to be 40 this
year, so I'm not quite in like, I'm in there, but I'm not in there, right?
And like, I think, you know, folks who are maybe turning 50 this year have really seen
it all in terms of sort of the internet rise and everything in that way.
And they're like, okay, we're sort of done, right?
Like we're over this, like we're either doing the things we want to do, you know, building
that business or building that life that we want, or they're sort of kind of checking
out and it's like, what, what's going to happen?
Like I realize that right now it seems economically hard, but there's, there's a huge gap.
And like that gap is going to come to fruition here very soon.
And I think it's going to be painful, especially with AI.
AI throws a whole wrench into the whole thing of like, we don't need you in your devs, but
then it's like, yes, but you need the devs that have not experienced one day.
No, I honestly want to know like what I could go on about Jenae.
I believe the, the amount of copium people ingest to be like, oh yeah, get a copilot.
It's just absolutely amazing.
I'm like, I can barely get anything good out of it when I'm doing this front end code.
You know, and I'm not saying it's worthless, right?
I think anyone with, with who's going to be honest, like I was, so I drive for Uber, every
once in a while too.
And I was talking to someone they're asking me about, you know, how do you feel about
AI?
I mean, I was like, well, the whole idea of like large language models and stuff, that's
been around for decades, right?
Like a lot of what we're seeing isn't necessarily new, but to your point, it's this like mass
buy-in where I don't work for H&R Block anymore.
So I guess I can say this, but like, I remember the day that someone in the C suite, like,
I had acknowledged us like, hey, you know what, like we had never really considered
Jenae.
And then now it was like full steam ahead.
And that's where it was by the time I left where like they actually monitor your copilot
usage per week.
There's metrics that you have to uphold all this stuff.
And I'm like, it is just, you're right.
Like people are going full steam ahead with it.
And to the detriment, not only of not hiring juniors, which H&R Block actually does a great
job of hiring juniors, but you're also giving juniors, you know, you're allowing them to
open this Pandora's box.
They're not ready to open, right?
Like I think a senior staff level engineer, sure, you scope out all you want.
But when you're in the beginning, you're still having to learn like you're short circuiting
yourself.
But again, that's completely separate conversation.
Yeah.
No, I mean, I agree for what it's worth.
And it is a separate conversation technically, but at the same time, it's sort of like, it
comes into our day to day, right?
And like, especially like the way you're seeing it with like copilot and it being actually
like a metric that's driving towards a productivity level type of an objective, right?
That the team is having to uphold to you.
That's a pretty interesting, I honestly haven't heard too much about that.
I've heard quite a few different statements of like, you know, leadership looking to like
improve productivity and sort of improve, you know, results and all the things.
But I guess an actual metric against a tool is interesting to me because it's not a program
or the developer can control.
So I'm like, okay.
But nonetheless, so steering in a different direction, but sort of similar direction.
You talked about how you're in sales before you got into tech.
And so how does that sales experience play into sort of the way that you can operate
as an engineer?
Yeah.
So sales, if I learned anything from sales, which I mean, there's plenty of horrible people
to monitor these stuff off of like Grant Cardone, Jordan Belfort, all those, you know, guys,
but like it really is influencing, right?
For better or for worse, you have the ability to influence people.
And I don't mean manipulate, but I do mean influence.
And I've realized in conversations where if you really want to make an argument for something
or if you're wanting to steer a conversation a certain way, which you do as a developer,
like you'll need to defend decisions you make, you may need to be like, Hey, this is out
of scope.
Like you have to know how to make that argument.
And it doesn't mean that I've done it perfectly, right?
But there's a point where when you've established that report, which always has to come first,
you cannot make an argument without establishing a report.
So like as a junior, it doesn't mean that your voice isn't worthwhile, but it what it
means is you kind of have to earn your right to like, I don't say right, but like you have
to prove yourself, right?
Before you're just out there throwing ideas.
But knowing how to, okay, I'm working with my lead engineer.
I know who he is.
I know what buttons to press, right?
And I know how to make an argument for, Hey, you know what?
I think maybe we don't write unit tests for this specific piece of logic because of XYZ.
It doesn't mean that we haven't covered it elsewhere.
It's been thoroughly tested.
But if we try to do this, we're actually going to go out of scope and spend more hours trying
to mock something that isn't actually needing to be tested, right?
Cause we've used like SonarCube and it'd be like, you have 95% coverage.
You didn't cover these lines.
I'm like, I know I didn't cover it on purpose.
So having to make that argument where he's like, okay, yep, you're absolutely right.
We don't need to cover that instead of just creating the PR and then he's like, well,
why don't you write unit tests for that?
Or Hey, you know what?
We're designing a new feature, but it's not going to work the way for a client the way
that we think it is.
So having to be able to go to design and product and be like, Hey, so I know you guys delivered
this to us, but like I have concerns about this, right?
And knowing how to phrase these ideas and these again, arguments in a way where it doesn't
come off as combative or whatever.
And it was the same thing in sales, right?
Where someone would be like, well, I don't want that car.
I want this car.
Okay.
Well, I understand that Mr. Jones, but unfortunately your credit doesn't allow you to get that
car.
So what we can do is we can sit down and we can explore options.
I mean, do you have 10 grand to put down?
Of course they don't.
Okay.
So let's look over here.
Right.
So you just, it really is a transferable skill for sure.
Yeah.
I mean, it's just interesting too, because like you said, and we talked a little on the
pre-show as well, is that there's a lot that goes into that, right?
You have to sort of just let water kind of run off your back when you're in a sales environment.
Like I was in a hospitality environment.
So it's very similar, right?
It's like, you get customers that are like, this is wrong.
I'm right.
And you just have to be like, you're right.
You are right.
I hope that you have a lovely day and just sort of move on with that, right?
And I think that those are skills that oftentimes like engineers don't always necessarily have.
It's interesting because like I, and it's not that I can necessarily tell, but like
especially in DevRel, right?
Where they're more sort of outward facing.
They're more in front of the public.
A lot of them have similar backgrounds, whether it be in high school or whether it be early,
you know, adult career where they're like, I was a server, I was in customer service,
or I was doing something with people, you know?
And so, and I think it really does play into some of those like super skills when you can
actually talk to a client or talk to a product team or talk to a marketing team about something
technical and be able to explain it.
But that's a superpower, you know?
100%.
And I think to that point, you know, we're talking about like junior devs and stuff like
that.
I think that's, you know, you look at like internships, which yes, if you're coming from
the traditional CS grad, you know, that route, it's easier to get an internship, right?
So I'm not going to say, you know, everyone has the same ability.
But I think that's kind of the conversation that needs to happen in my opinion when it
comes to experience and entry level roles, because up until the rise of boot camps, yeah,
an entry level role, you still need experience, but you would have had that experience in
an internship, right?
So it made sense.
And if you're a CS grad and you didn't do an internship, you're shooting yourself in
the fun, right?
Let's be honest, like, you know, you need to do that.
But for the boot camp people, that's where they're like, well, I can't get an internship,
right?
I'm 42.
I'm not going to get an internship at Nike.
So how do I get that experience?
And that's where I think that conversation needs to happen.
And that's where I feel like it just gets all conflated, right?
Of entry level means entry level.
Well, yes, but you still need experience.
You need to show that you can actually do something.
So on top of it too, I'm so sorry, I did not mean to cut you off, but I was just an
I'd like, but you're right though, right?
In that like the experiencing, I really want to double down on that.
And that's why I'm sorry.
I really interrupted you.
That's so true because because like, if there was actually someone who I just mentored recently
and they just shifted over into software engineering, they were still in technology, but in a different
form, they were not in software engineering, they were in different.
And they shifted.
And so as they were looking for jobs, they felt like they were like a junior again.
And they're like, dude, I've had 20 years of leadership experience at a big defense
tech company, you know, like it's a big deal.
But yet coming in and interviewing and feeling like you're nothing.
And I was like, don't like, don't come in and feel like you're nothing.
You have years of actual life and leadership experience that learning how to code, that's
easy, right?
That's a book.
You can pick a book up and learn anything that a book can tell you, but you can't learn
to be a good leader.
You can't learn to be empathetic.
You can't learn to be good at customer success.
You can't learn it caring about humans, you know?
So anyway, full of soapbox right there.
But yeah, so that's, that's so good.
And I don't know this person.
So obviously I'm just speaking broadly, but it's like, a the onus is on you.
You to prove yourself, right?
So if you have those 20 years of experience, like the recruiter is kind of expecting that.
And if you can't sell yourself and why those 20 years are transferable, again, I'm not
saying this person, but I've seen that right.
It's like, well, I've done X, Y and Z for so many years.
Why can't I find a job?
Well, we can blame the market or, and I know this isn't popular LinkedIn posting, but like
you can also take the onus on yourself.
And so how do you market yours?
And I hate the word market, but how do you make yourself more attractive?
It's just like dating, right?
How you know, it's a calculated risk.
How can you take this history and experience and distill it down into something that's
attractive?
But more than that, like you kind of also have to be humble and be like, you know what,
like I'm taking a step down potentially to start a new career.
So there, there's a certain, again, a certain element of self-awareness that you have to
have.
I sound like this person does, but again, I mean, you spend five minutes on LinkedIn
and you see it's like, people are struggling to find work and I am not convinced it's 100%
the market.
I am 50% convinced there could be some market issues, but I'm also, and I talked about this
privately and everyone agrees, people are most likely self-sabotaging themselves because
they don't know how to interview.
They don't know how to communicate and talk and share these ideas or these things about
themselves in a way where a recruiter is going to be like, again, it's a calculated risk.
It can work with you.
And it's like, yeah, yeah, it's a lot.
And it's not, there's no silver bullet with any of us, right?
Which is why I love that you're doing the mentoring because that's what solves problems
is the one-on-one relationships, nailing down the problems, not getting newsletter.
There's great reasons for that, but like you can't get mentored through a newsletter.
You can't get mentored through a LinkedIn post.
It's just not going to happen.
Yeah.
I know it's kind of interesting because I don't actually do it a ton.
I actually do coaching and like for the most part, try to get paid for it because I am
self-employed as you can relate to.
But for whatever reason in this scenario, it was just on my heart and I was like, you
know what, like just reach out.
I'm going to help you.
And like now we're dear friends and I adore him and many people who are probably listening
know exactly who I'm talking about.
He's a rock star and he definitely deserves the role, but it was just a, you know, it's
a mind shift, right?
The salary is different.
The levels are different.
You're going from something where you built a huge career, have a, you know, could have
anything handed to you at your company to like sort of starting over and it's just
a, it's hard.
Hey, Chris, I love the comment.
Sorry.
I just want, I was just addressing the comments.
Love the comment, Chris.
What you said, I'm really glad that this is helpful and insightful.
And I think it's just, you know, when you have those skills of being able to talk to
humans, like a lot of people don't have those skills.
So like leverage them and sort of help those, those technical people that don't have the
superpowers of talking to humans.
What do you think about AI reducing the need for juniors at a company?
Oh, I mean, we sort of talked about that.
Like, I mean, the thing is, is like, you need like humans, like you need humans to solve
real problems.
Like that's how I see it anyways.
And so I think like you said, you felt that AI was a good supplement to maybe someone
who had a bit more experience.
And I agree.
Like I think cursor, co-pilot, some of these other tools are like really powerful when
you sort of already know what you're doing, because like there was a bunch of posts I
was just seeing and we'll see if it's actually a reality, right?
Cause there's sort of this drama and like hate for AI versus like, oh my gosh, I love
it.
But I just saw a post the other day that got a lot of engagement around like here I am
cleaning up bad code that my, my CTO and my leader wrote because they don't know how
to write code anymore.
And they got into cursor and decided to like write some code, you know, and whether or
not that's all factual and true, like I'm not in a day to day to have that, you know,
trend experience, but I think it is going to be really interesting for us to see sort
of the ebb and flow of like all this like heavy investment from companies and then sort
of like the realization of where that actually is going to land here is as we start to see
it all come to life.
So.
Yeah.
Have you, have you ever watched the show Person of Interest?
Know what it sounds familiar.
I don't think not that one.
Yeah.
It's one of the, the Nolan's made it back and I think it started in like 2011.
I'm rewatching it now.
But it deals with artificial intelligence, right, but I feel like a lot of people have
this like baked in idea that AI will replace humans.
And what I mean by that is when I sit down and I talk to my, my UX designer, UI UX designer,
and we make decisions about things, about how a application should operate.
These are very human conversations we're having where it's not always the most long-term
logical decision we make.
Sometimes it's a, it's a gut feeling.
It's based off of years of experience that we've had.
Guess what?
You can't program that into a large language model.
You can't, you cannot be like, you know what?
There have been decisions I've made to them like I'm out of time.
I need to just make this decision and it ends up being fine.
Whereas a LLM has no concept of time.
Right.
So there's all these different things that you just, I don't care what anyone says.
You are not going to be able to program it or if you do, that's where we get into the
concept of technology and transhumanism.
And I'm like, I don't want to get into that.
Right.
Like I want to have a clear delineation between humans and technology.
So, you know, to that comment, what do you think about AI reducing the need?
I think it's misguided.
I think if to your point, if you replace, you know, if you just get a bunch of mid-level
senior engineers with AI, no juniors, then to your point, not only does everyone retire
but like there's so much insight and growth that you need from juniors.
We're like, when I was a junior, I was offering advice and perspective that my senior and
my lead and no one else had.
And you need that.
You need that diversity of opinions.
And if you just outsource it to AI, not only do you get garbage code half the time, but
you're definitely not going to have people well equipped to know how to deal with that
code when it's wrong because it will be wrong.
Yep.
That's, I used to, you know, I've gone through different phases of life, right?
Of like caring in different sort of missions and things as you go through your career,
you're sort of like invested in different spaces.
And for a few years, I was really heavily invested in sort of mentorship and this idea
of like junior devs need a chance.
Like we need to give them a chance.
Anyone that has software skills is not junior at this point, right?
Junior to me is someone who knows nothing and can do, anyways, lots of different sort
of sentiment and themes around it.
And that was, you know, always sort of my like lens with it is like if we don't invest
in them, we're not going to see the future that we want.
And by that, there is so much that they bring, right?
They were recently in whatever education program they're in, they're of a different age or
genre, they're of a different generation.
They've learned something new that we've probably been doing in our archaic way because that's
what we know, right?
And so they just, they completely bring in a different light.
And I think, I think it's interesting, like I got a couple, these are my curmudgeon things
that I'm like sort of comfy about lately is like the lack of junior developers and sort
of still continue to just not have a really good flow for that in some cases.
You know, the fact that like companies are actually getting rid of some education continuing
education stipends, I think that's trash.
I think that that's, that's how we get in this situation, right?
No junior devs, no continuing education.
We're building archaic code because we don't have the opportunities through our workplace
to go find new things.
And like, is it our responsibility to go learn new skills?
If it, if it's in our personal life, we do it by nature because we love to learn.
But it isn't technically our responsibility to stay up to date on technologies.
It's our employer's responsibility.
Like we are, we are working for them doing that job.
If they want us better, they should invest.
Then the third curmudgeon is the lack of investment from companies now in developer events, right?
Like they don't want to send developers and pay for them to go to conferences.
They don't want to sponsor and contribute to those conferences.
And I think it's, it's at a major disservice to our ecosystem at which like that's sort
of the foundation, right?
These junior devs, these, these developer events, these channels where we can learn
from each other.
Like this is how we operate.
We are not doctors.
We don't have licenses and codes and regulations and things that we get retrained every year
on all the new things that change, right?
Like we have to go figure that out.
So anyways, that's totally a soapbox rant, but like, yeah, it's interesting.
And I think it's a shame.
And I really hope that we see more investment into like, you know, general abilities and
developers for our future.
No, I mean, to your point though, like, can you imagine if a doctor had to relearn how
to use like, or if they had updates on their stethoscope every six to eight months, like
that would be crazy.
And obviously that's a very inane example, but like, but when you're in development,
you're like, Oh, hey, cool, we upgraded to this version of node, but then all these other
things broke.
So then I have to figure out how to get all this resolved or, Hey, you know what, create
react app, like what the other day, I think create react app is officially deprecated,
right?
So like, what's everyone going to do about that?
Which V, but yes, like, I think it's completely different.
So to your point, like you could be a doctor and learn things at 25 and 50 years later,
majority of your, your practices and your disciplines are going to be pretty established.
Whereas in coding, yeah, everything you knew about a certain framework could be changed
within a year, right?
Or it doesn't even support it anymore.
So then you have to go do something else.
It's crazy.
Yep.
Yeah.
And doctors on top of that to just add a whole another layer, like they get continuing
education, like it is a requirement of their job, right?
It's like, they cannot continue to practice medicine unless they stay up to date.
And it's like, we have none of that, right?
We have no, no sort of infrastructure for learning and we need it more than a doctor
does.
So it's, it really blows my mind.
Like I think, I don't know, COVID has changed so much and now I'm like getting on Chromagony
because I'm sick.
I'm like, yes, dang, dang all these things.
But you know, it's just, I think it's easy to sort of go back to like, you know, capitalism,
capitalism, capitalism and sort of like lose sight of like why you're even in business
to begin with and sort of what the essence is of the team.
And I think that can get really hard on engineers too, especially like, especially talking about
this, like that's our biggest imposter syndrome is like, who's telling us what's right and
wrong?
Like it's us, right?
It's just us and our peers being like, Hey, you shouldn't do it that way.
Or like, you know, that's, there's a better way to do it.
So absolutely.
Yeah.
Okay.
So let's see.
What is your preferred technical stack?
What do you like to build in?
Yeah, great question.
So what do I like to work in compared to what have I realized is the probably the most profitable.
So I actually fell in love with angular when I was at H&R block, I didn't like it at first.
So my first real job was in view, there's view and node and postgres.
And then when I came over to H&R block, it was angular C sharp.
That's really the main thing.
Yeah.
And I didn't like it at first, right?
But then as I'm leaving, there's so much I get at least about modern angular that I
think makes a lot of sense.
You don't have to deal with like use effects and all that, which one of the things, man,
I don't know if Ben, my staff engineer at breakthrough will listen to this, but I just
saw a PR comment.
The other is actually this morning, where he was like, Hey, can we not have that use
effect?
Can we not have that use effect?
Like we do not do use effect if we do not have to.
It's amazing because it's so unreliable and whatnot.
But anyway, yeah, I mean, I would, I would go, you know, angular, like Mongo, that kind
of stuff, but really like, if you want to get into coding, it's, I think you're doing
yourself a disservice by not doing react.
And that's, that's the tech stack I'm working with right now, right?
Is like react node graph QL.
It's all for me.
I mean,
Oh, that's awesome.
Yeah.
Sorry.
Yeah.
Cause I mean, I know you're fine.
Like I barely used react before starting here.
Like my freelance work I'd done, it was mostly like next, but it was very mental.
Yeah.
I just, I feel like if you're going to learn front end development, like even if you don't
stick with it, you got to know react.
Right.
Like it's, it's so hard.
Even the angular jobs, like there's so like we want to experience an angular or if you
have experience in a react and it's like, right.
You're, you're kind of shooting yourself in the foot.
Yeah.
Well, I mean, I think it's like, obviously it depends on the sort of work that you want
to do, but at the end of the day, like, yeah, if you have any app or any, anything, right?
It needs a front end for the most part.
I mean, yes, there are some.
I mean, sort of admin side only things, but yeah, it usually needs, and even that you
still need a dashboard, right?
So you still need some form of like a front end.
So it is, I think it is really helpful skills.
I think it's also interesting too to like sort of, and this is like me, like with my
caller dev old, older vibe here of like the downfall of some of this is like not, not
always fundamentally understanding the like underlying infrastructure and anyone who listens
to my, listening to me talk about this, but I think that's one of the downfalls of sort
of like developers today that do just sort of pick up that front end stack, right?
It's like, you obviously have dug into like React and Angular and you're starting to understand
sort of the fundamental differences and like how they're orchestrated and built.
And I think that part is key because if you don't understand sort of why decisions are
made and why those frameworks operate in the way that they do, you can get really stuck
in like, okay, I've, I'm using all these frameworks and bringing all these tools together, but
I don't understand how they're fundamentally working, you know, in the, in the root.
Yeah.
Well, and that's even like, I mean, to be honest, if you ask, if I had a personal project
and you're like, would you rather use react, React or vanilla JavaScript?
I would actually probably lean towards vanilla JavaScript.
It'd take me a little bit longer, but like, I can deal with it a little bit easier.
Like, I can be like, no, I want this thing to happen exactly when I want it to again,
use effect is just absolute controlled chaos.
But to that point though, yeah, like I remember at h and r block, I was working with some
on that, I had largely been a backend developer, right?
Or no, sorry, I'm, I'm confusing anecdotes.
So they had really been like a QA, right?
And they're like, okay, so h and r block on shore pretty much got rid of QA.
I mean, we still test, right?
But there's no QA engineers.
That's mostly their offshore.
And so she was moved over to be like an actual, like, you know, we'd consider like full stack
developer right back in front end.
But she had no point of reference for the front end.
So she's trying to learn Angular.
And I was like, okay, we have, we have access to you to me.
Here's Colt Steal's web development course, like start here.
You have to understand what HTML is.
You have to understand what CSS says.
You have to understand what JavaScript is.
This is not like, you know, you can dittle around, do a few things here and there, but
like you are not going to understand what any of this means until you have that foundation.
Right.
And so once you finally started doing that, started making more sense.
But again, yeah, if you don't understand what JavaScript is, like, it doesn't matter where
that you choose, view, reacts, felt, whatever, you're going to be so lost.
And it's not, you're not going to be using these frameworks for how they were built.
It isn't meant to replace anything.
It's just meant to do it differently.
Yep.
That's true.
I like that.
Okay.
So I like to ask this question from everybody just to kind of get different insights.
Like how do you get unstuck if you're ever stuck or kind of facing technical challenges?
Oh, yeah.
I mean, that's a great question because it really depends on what it is, right?
Sometimes, sometimes they'll just switch to something else.
You know, like, you know, like, depending on what you're working on, there's probably
something that's going to be related, but not dependent on that.
So just like, I don't know what on that instead.
Right.
Yep.
I think that's the, the, the tried and true argument of touching some grass.
But honestly, like, I think one of my biggest things is just being like, I quit and I don't
mean quit permanently, but like, I'm just like, I'm done.
Like I cannot solve this.
I'm time boxed it.
I can't figure it out.
Just move on.
Right.
And those are the scenarios where I'll be lying in bed and be like, it's 1130.
Oh my gosh, I know how to solve it.
I'll get out and run it out and go back to bed.
Cause I'm like, it's just this element of like, you can be too close to a problem.
And like, if you just keep running into that wall, yeah, maybe eventually you'll break
it down.
You're going to have a concussion or two.
It can be pretty bruised up.
And I don't know if that's worth it, whereas you could just take a step back and just come
at it later.
I mean, I've never worked on a team where like, if I was super stuck on something, a they
wouldn't help me or be, they're not like, Hey, no, it has to be done right now.
I mean, like, yeah, go, go figure something else out.
Right.
Like you can come back to this.
Um, documenting God, like actually reading documentation, right?
Not just going to co-pilot, but being like, huh, I wonder if this framework actually has
a solution to something like this.
But yes, usually just removing myself from the situation, even if it's temporarily, um,
I remember reading something like then a while ago and being like, how that's not a good
approach.
Like you could just, you just never give up.
And I'm like, no, that's horrible.
I mean, it sounds like someone who doesn't have kids.
I'm like, when my daughter is screaming at me, you know, she's like, it's time for bed
and she wants someone to lay down with her and I say, no, and she's screaming at me and
they're like, all right, well, I'll come back in the room when you're done screaming.
And usually takes a little bit, but I'm like, do you think a screaming four year old, if
I just sit here and keep trying to argue with her, like that's productive?
No, I'm just going to walk off and be like, Hey, I love you.
I'll be back.
Nine times out of ten, she just stopped.
You have your little fit and your emotions.
I'll be back when you're saying again.
Yep.
Exactly.
I love that.
Okay.
Well, we are nearing the end of our time.
Um, so you do, I want to shed light on this, uh, just in case there's, you know, an opportunity
in the network, um, you do fractional software engineering, essentially, right?
Do you want to sort of speak to that and like maybe you're, you know, your availability
currently and what you possibly would be interested in diving into?
Yeah.
So I had worked with a client last year for about a year actually.
Um, and obviously we had our handful of clients too, but, um, largely it's front end development,
right?
So again, angular view, whatever.
Um, but largely dealing with more of a format or explain this, but like, yes, being a developer,
but also being like refining the product.
And what I mean by that is I was working with the CTO pretty regularly and being like, okay,
so here's the product that we want.
We need to build it up.
Okay.
But like not just being, you know, the, the code monkey that just types everything and
puts it out, but being like, Hey, you know what, like this is a business requirement,
but I don't think it's going to work like this.
So let's sit down, meet up, talk about how to give the client what they're actually looking
for.
Um, because you and I had talked about this on the pre-show, like clients don't always
know what they want and being able to sit down and like hash that out and being able
to think critically, right?
Instead of just again, like, you know, if I could give any advice to like new developers,
you know, when you get a user story and they have acceptance criteria, don't be afraid
to be like, is this everything?
Right?
Because I guarantee whoever made this, they can't consider everything.
Right?
So like, don't just be like, well, here's all the acceptance criteria on paper.
So if I do all of this, it's the work's going to be done.
That's a horrible way to work on a feature.
Right?
So you're, you're more in like the strategy.
You like to be a part of sort of the strategic vision of it too.
And we're like orchestrating that, that big, that big, that bigger picture essentially.
Yeah.
And it's not that it's like, I have a million ideas, but I again, coming from a sales background,
you know, being able to sit down with someone and help refine that vision, right?
Where it's like, okay, you present this, but what about this?
What about this?
How can we prepare this down?
How can we not blow this out of proportion?
So, yeah, I mean, I'm definitely looking for clients kind of more of like an integrated
role where like, I'm not, I'm not that solo person, right?
I like working on a team, but I'm really, you know, look, I can probably do like, you
know, 10, 20 hours a week kind of thing.
But I've had some leads.
The problem is, it's just a matter of, we've talked about before, just kind of like people
reevaluating what they want right now and yes, a lot of companies like, do we need juniors,
do we need seniors?
And that's where that fractional kind of like, Hey, let's just make sure you're not like
stalling out.
Yeah, totally.
So that's kind of what I'm, you know, kind of aiming for is like an established team,
but not like someone that they want fully integrated and committed, you know, years down the road,
just being like, Hey, you need help with writing some unit tests, some automated tests, getting,
you know, getting your front end work, you know, converted from JavaScript to TypeScript.
Sure.
Let's do it.
Yep.
Yeah.
Yeah, totally.
Okay.
I love that.
Well, and I think obviously bringing that like sales experience too, like, and again,
we talked about this in the pre-show, like it really, it really like gives you that superpower
as a developer when you can connect that bridge between sort of the non-technical conversations
to the, the technical specs that are required to actually make it all happen.
So I think that's the super beautiful superpower that you have.
So hopefully there's some, I mean, I'm sure you'll find lots of great clients, obviously,
but I know what it's like, right?
I'm in sort of that low also, you know, due to improper selling of how I was operating.
And it's just, it's, it's a really hard time with like, you know, the beginning of the
year.
Now folks are like, okay, new budgets, new work, we're now we're diving in.
But you know, end of the year stuff is always tricky.
So it is.
And I've noticed my, my issue is almost all my work has been proprietary.
Right.
So like, I don't, I've been so busy over the past few years that I just, I haven't been
building a lot of like side projects, right?
And again, I didn't finish a boot camp.
So I don't have that capstone.
So like, I'm like, Hey, if you want to go to hrblock.com and if you want someone to
do your taxes, I can walk you through the application and how it works.
And I can talk about all this, but like, I don't have the ability to just like show
that to you.
Right.
Yeah.
And same with my current job, it's, it's all like buying NDA, all this stuff, but I'm
like, you know, you sit me down and we can have a conversation.
I just can't show that.
And that's how all my jobs have been.
Yep.
I mean, I think that's pretty usual.
I feel like that kind of happens in DevRel too.
Like DevRel is very like a sort of all over the place type of role.
And it's like, I can tell you the story.
I can tell you metrics.
I can tell you sort of results and things like that.
But it's like, you're not going to deeply understand the work that I was doing until,
you know, we can have a great, beautiful conversation, sort of unveil that, that story.
So that's great.
Okay.
So where can folks find you?
Honestly, on LinkedIn, that's the only social media I use.
Love it.
You know, outside of that, I do have a, just a joke.
I have a generic portfolio site.
It's davidmarshall.dev.
Perfect.
Not a whole lot on there, right?
But just, yeah, LinkedIn's really about it.
Because like we were talking about earlier, I want to spend time with my family and being
stuck on social media all day is a great way for brain rot.
So yep.
I agree there.
All right.
Well, I will definitely put your LinkedIn and your website in the show notes if anyone
is obviously looking for an awesome engineer like David.
Reach out to him please.
And it's been lovely chatting with you.
Absolutely lovely.
Happy Friday.
Yeah, Friday.
All right.
Bye friends.
I will see you all.
I think I have a show on Monday.
Let's look.
I do have a show on Monday.
Oh, it's with Becca.
Yeah, I'm excited.
I just have like the best guests.
It's so great.
So great.
That's awesome.
I know you're one of them.
So thank you for being with me today and thank you everyone.
Also really appreciate the engagement and conversation in the chat.
It's always just nice.
Yes.
Like it just really unseeds what we're thinking and feeling.
Right.
Yeah.
And it just is clarification, dude.
If anyone does like if you're breaking in, feel free to send me a request.
Just please engage with one of my posts first.
I get so many random requests from like no mutuals, nothing.
So if you want to chat like I'm happy, I just need to know that you're a real person.
I'm not the person that tried to solicit me to do their up work client facing role.
The other day and I'm like, block not doing that.
Yep.
LinkedIn can be tricky.
All right.
Well, this is fabulous.
I'll put the links in the show notes and again, have a fabulous weekend everyone.
And thank you, David.
So much for joining me.
Thanks for coming or anything else, I'll do more I can do it.