Part 15: What It's Like to Work in Tech (The Stuff No One Puts on LinkedIn)
Beyond the dark mode — the messy, hilarious truth of surviving your first tech job
Spoiler: It's not all dark mode terminals and hacker music. Sometimes, it's crying in a stairwell because someone replied to your Jira comment with "per my last message."
Let's talk about the truth.
Not the "just got certified and landed my dream job in six weeks" posts. Not the "here's a selfie in front of a glowing data center rack" content.
I'm talking about the real stuff—the unfiltered, nobody-warns-you-about-this stuff—the part where Jenkins breaks on a Sunday, Slack gives you anxiety, and you accidentally reboot a live server because you were troubleshooting the wrong IP.
Because here's the truth: nobody puts this stuff on LinkedIn.
Slack Anxiety and the "Quick Question" Curse
There is no phrase more terrifying than:
"Hey, got a quick question?"
It's never quick. It's never just one question. And it's never followed by anything relaxing.
You stare at it like it's a bomb. Your palms start sweating. You rehearse every mistake you've made in the last two weeks.
Is this about that firewall change?
Is this about that alert I snoozed?
Is this about the Jenkins build that failed because I forgot a semicolon?
Worst of all, they might not even follow up. So leave that message hanging there, like a landmine with a timer you can't see.
Sometimes, the question is simple: "What's the Wi-Fi password?"
Other times: "Can you walk me through how to rebuild the CI/CD pipeline, find out why the Docker containers are fighting, and help me because the printer won't stop printing error messages?"
Fun times.
The Ticket That Haunts You
Every IT job has that one ticket — the cursed ticket. The one that refuses to die.
You fix it. You document it. You close it with confidence. You celebrate.
And then, like a ghost in the machine, it reopens.
"Hey, it's happening again. Any updates?"
You consider deleting your whole identity.
This ticket becomes your arch-nemesis. It's personal now. You've seen less persistence in movie villains.
Eventually, you either:
Escalate it to a senior engineer,
Discover a weird fix that involves rebooting the user's router and their hopes and dreams.
Or… uninstall the app and call it a day.
On-Call: A Horror Film With PagerDuty Sound Effects
Nothing builds character like your first on-call rotation.
It always starts the same way: You're ready. Your phone is charged. Your laptop is nearby. You feel like Batman.
Then 2:14 AM hits.
Your phone buzzes like it's trying to escape the nightstand. You trip over your charger. Your VPN won't connect. Your dog is barking. You spill water on your hoodie.
And the issue?
A log file filled up. That's it.
You fix it with one command—one line—something you could've done in your sleep. But now you're wide awake, questioning your career and Googling, " What is the meaning of uptime and life?"
"It Worked on Friday…"
Some phrases haunt you.
"The client says it's slow."
We updated the firmware. Should be fine now."
And of course… "It worked on Friday."
No. No, it didn't.
It wasn't working. It just hadn't broken in your face yet.
You learn quickly that "working" often means "we ignored all the warning signs until something caught fire."
The Real Wins You Don't See on LinkedIn
Let's talk about the real wins:
Finding the logs without asking anyone.
Writing a Bash script that works on the first try (after 3 hours of Google).
Deploying something and not breaking staging.
Realize you understand what a ticket means before reading the comments.
These are not LinkedIn-brag moments, but they're everything. They're the invisible milestones proving you're growing — even if your title or pay hasn't changed.
What I Wish Someone Told Me About Working in Tech
Everyone is winging it. The difference is confidence, not knowledge.
Nobody cares if you ask a "dumb" question. They care if you silently break production.
Slack doesn't count as cardio. Mute what you need to.
Impostor syndrome is real. You're probably doing fine if you're questioning whether you're good enough.
Take notes. Your future self will thank you at 3 AM.
And the most important one?
It's okay to laugh at yourself.
You'll paste a production password into a public channel one day. You're going to shut down the wrong VM accidentally. You'll forget what directory you're in and rm -rf the wrong thing (hopefully not in prod).
It happens.
Working in tech is not about getting everything right. It's about staying curious, asking questions, fixing what you break, and laughing on the way to recovery.
Final Thought: You're Doing Better Than You Think
You may not have a hoodie with a unicorn logo yet. You might still be googling basic commands. You might feel like everyone else has it figured out.
They don't.
Keep showing up. Keep learning. Keep laughing. You belong here.
Coming Up Next: Part 16 – The Worst Advice I Ever Got About IT (And What I Learned Instead) Let's roast some of the worst career advice I've ever received — and replace it with something useful.
Your Turn: What's one thing you wish someone had told you before your first tech job? Drop it in the comments. Let's create the guide we all need.
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