2024
2023 was a good year for me, both personally and professionally.
I have a toddler and she is awesome. She’s gotten really good at talking, started preschool, and learned to use the potty. I love spending time with her.
I completed my first year at Microsoft. My team successfully brought an acquisition to general availability, which was a huge win. I helped implement a bunch of developer productivity improvements, saw my mentee grow tremendously, and started working as a tech lead in a new product area.
I’m not big on resolutions, but I do have some goals for 2024. Personally, I want to be more consistent with exercise and nutrition. Professionally, I want to be more intentional about growing as a lead. The former is a lot easier to quantify and measure than the latter.
For both personal and professional reasons, I want to be more consistent with my writing.
In 2023, I stopped updating my other blog, typeofnan.dev. Search engines have stopped prioritizing “how-to” content, perhaps because their generative AI models are going start answering those queries. As a result, my traffic took a nose-dive and I was discouraged from writing. In hindsight, I’m thankful for this: how-to posts are helpful to developers in their day-to-day workflow, but they weren’t helping me grow any, especially as I start taking on leadership roles.
As I move forward, I plan on writing articles that help me grow, either by codifying my existing experiences and opinions or through the research required to do the writing. I would love it if others find my writing helpful as well, but it’s not the main goal.
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