Stephanie Chiu, self-taught iOS Software Engineer with a B.S. in Chemical Engineering.

"Chemical Engineering?! Then how did you become a Software Engineer?"I asked Stephanie the above question. It involves shampoo and tooth paste. Only in 2018 Stephanie switched into iOS development. Now she works at PayPal.

• Stephanie's website on Tech Career Coaching
• Stephanie on Twitter
• Stephanie on LinkedIN

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Transcript

Jeroen Leenarts: 0:45

So welcome to another special episode with Stephanie. I actually met her through clubhouse, or iOS deaf happy hour, I'm not sure anymore. What I do know is that her voice is a very familiar sound to me by now, because I've listened to her on numerous occasions on clubhouse, and a little bit on Iris deaf, Happy Hour, which is fun, because she has some very nice insights on how people can get into a tech job. And she actually likes helping people get into a tech job. Because she also does some coaching on the side. She now works at PayPal, we won't really dive into that over work there. Because that's, of course, all covered by NDAs and horrible things. If you actually talk about that too much, but everything that happened before that, I think it's going to be an interesting story with Stephanie. Stephanie. Hi, how are you doing today?

Stephanie Chiu: 1:44

Hi, good. Thank you so much for having me

Jeroen Leenarts: 1:46

on. Um, so just to get things started. You're an iOS dev app. Just to get things started, you're an iOS software developer. What made you decide to actually pursue a career in iOS software development?

Stephanie Chiu: 2:04

Sure. I would say that it's a little bit of a like long story. But that long story short, I got into iOS development, because I was first teaching myself UX UI design. And when I was making mobile app designs, I found that I liked doing that a lot more than creating designs for web. And then so this was about three years ago, back in 2018, when I was teaching myself and the prototyping tools back then like envision, they're not as advanced as they are today. You can do like simple transitions. And, you know, if you tap on a button, it will take you to the next page or something like that. And I was noticing that, in my mind, I was already seeing like, the transitions to animations that I would want to do if this was a real app. So then one day, I had, I had a lightbulb moment, I was thought, you know, why don't I just actually code the app myself? Why not? And it still took me a few years to be able to actually be transition my career into Asheville development, because learning the coding part isn't that hard, like building a project is not that hard. But I would say that the big hurdle that I had to get across so many people who teach themselves is no learning the algorithm, the data structures, just, you know, getting past interviews and having to deal with a lot of rejections. That was, that was probably the hardest part. But then here I am today, as an iOS developer, finally,

Jeroen Leenarts: 3:46

it took a while, because what's actually interesting is you did chemical engineering. Back when you were doing an education, or actually following an education, how did you end up with chemical engineering?

Stephanie Chiu: 4:01

Yeah, so for chemical engineering, how that came about was that, you know, I was a 17. At least like in the States, so you are required to major in something like you can change your major once you get into into college, but you have to, you have to at least pick something to apply to colleges to and to get in. And so I originally picked chemistry and the reason why was because I was thinking, you know, how can I combine my love for the arts and design with something that's more technical in the sciences? And so I can't, I figured out like, oh, you know, one day, I could work as a chemist for L'Oreal. That was actually my dream at that time, very random to compare to where I am today. But I find that you know, I just have like an intense curiosity for D sort of the sort of things that are more like complex to other people. So for chemical engineering, how Alanna about that was, you know, I, I had this other light bulb moment where, you know, I had a bottle of shampoo and then I was wondering, you know, how do we have so many different types of shampoos? Although they all do the same thing, and they all have the same base formula. And then how how does it that you know, an engineer or a packaging does packaging engineer would choose like the appropriate material to have To like, hold the essentially chemicals, that is the shampoo, and to bottle, and then, you know, how does it get to the customer things like that, that was very curious about. And turns out that studying chemical engineering was, was very challenging as you can imagine, anything that's engineering honestly. And, you know, I realized early on, I think it was by my third year, I just realized, like, I did not like it. But in the States, you know, it's, it's, it can be challenging to change majors, usually will take some more years in order to graduate. And for me, it was such a specialist track at my college, that it would take me an extra four years if I were to change to something else. So I just stuck through it. And it's okay, you know, because I think that, you know, when you are studying something in school, that's completely different to maybe what you actually want to do, I think the most important thing is to, you know, network, learn to build, like social skills. And, yeah, there's a lot, there's still like a lot of things that I have learned back then, that I use today, like, you know, learning how to be very organized, and stuff about, you know, how to schedule something, how to deal with, like, complex situations, or something, like very relevant today for me is when you're given a problem, or you're given a ticket from a manager, and it's, it's not very detailed. So you have to teach yourself, you know, how you're going to research and come up with like solutions within a certain period of time. Okay, cool.

Jeroen Leenarts: 7:41

That's, that's quite a mouthful in your explanation there. But I really agree with what you're saying that that's no matter what formal education you you do at the college level, or the university level, it all ends you up with a set of skills that allows you to work in a structured way. tackle complex problems and dissect the problems into smaller components that you can then try and solve individually, with the help of your colleagues and your peers, of course, but just breaking down a complex thing into something that is more manageable. That's such a, such an important skill that really takes some, I think formal education to really get the hang of, I think, in what year did you finish your education?

Stephanie Chiu: 8:28

So I finished and John 16 and took me five years to graduate no shame.

Jeroen Leenarts: 8:36

So and and after your education, what, what was your first role that you did as a profession?

Stephanie Chiu: 8:45

So my first Ra was a production supervisor for Colgate the same Colgate as toothpaste that a lot of people know about. But they also own a personal care division. And so that was like the soft soap hand soap, soft soap, body wash, speech dish, deodorant. And yeah, so that was very interesting, because it was in a startup manufacturing environment. So similar to how, you know, there's a lot of challenges in tech startups. Same thing in manufacturing plants, you're going to have a lot of situations where you gotta wear different hats. You're gonna have to learn how to tell another team or a manager that you might not be able to miss meet a deadline, you have to push it out, things like that. Okay.

Jeroen Leenarts: 9:40

So you really have to be the DD cat with, with eight legs to be able to operate in such an environment, I'd say.

Stephanie Chiu: 9:49

Pretty much Pretty much yeah. And

Jeroen Leenarts: 9:52

so it's it's fun, though, that you you ended up at Colgate. It's not shampoo. I had the lightbulb moments that you had either under the shower or the bathroom or wherever. And he then Well, it's not exactly shampoo, but it's close enough. Right at

Stephanie Chiu: 10:08

at Gogo. Yeah. Honestly, it's very similar.

Jeroen Leenarts: 10:12

It's all chemistry in a container. So what happened then, because on your profile online, your coaching side business, you specifically mentioned that you had some challenges in your career that were part of your switch into tech. And can you like, dive into that a little bit and explain what happened there and, like, up to the point I got into tech.

Stephanie Chiu: 10:40

Mm hmm. So some of the challenges I was facing when I was working In manufacturing was that, for one, I didn't realize it back then. But having to go into work by 630, every morning was slowly wearing on my body and on my mental health. On top of that, other stresses as related to, you know, working at a start up facility. Because I was a production supervisor, it also meant that I had to work the the workers shifts. But like at that time, with Colgate, these were 12 hour shifts. And I often had to had to stay late for the night shift, to update them on what had happened in a day and what's like the expectations for the night like what they got to do. But yeah, slowly started to take a toll on me. And for a long time, I didn't understand why because I was seeing my co workers who were doing exact same job, but they were able to perform well. And I think it's also just a mix between learning to balance, personal life, so you know, taking care of your health, getting enough sleep, eating healthy exercising, on top of, you know, the high stresses that you might face like at work. So I ended up also working at two other manufacturing facilities, they were also in the startup phase. So also similar situations that I had to go through them. But interestingly enough, I was, I had quit the job with Colgate. And unfortunately, like I was laid off from the other two. Yeah. So that

Jeroen Leenarts: 13:09

those were outside influences that had like a big impact on your life that were mostly out of your control, and then ended up with a challenging situation and having to pivot into something else, I guess. Yes, yes. Um, so if you now look at your work as a, as iOS developer, in what ways is it different compared to the work that you did at these manufacturing plants?

Stephanie Chiu: 13:43

Yeah, I would say probably the biggest difference is that I get to work from home. It's really nice. And then the second part is that I don't necessarily have to be starting work until about 10am. Because that's when the rest of my team is like, online. So that's really, really nice change. You know, I still wake up early, I actually wake up about 630 to seven every morning, because I find that I'm most I have the most energy and the clearest, like minds before I work, so during that period of time, I'm just doing doing stuff related to my coaching business answering some emails or messages. maybe making some content for Instagram, things like that. Yeah.

Jeroen Leenarts: 14:36

Yeah. Chris, you're you're quite active on Instagram, right?

Stephanie Chiu: 14:40

Yes, I am. And it's very interesting, because there's, there's a lot of people who are software engineers on Instagram, but it's not as common as Twitter, for example. And I think it's because Instagram is very visual. And it does take time to make all that content. And developers are not necessarily people who care a lot about making all that stuff. But I personally enjoy it. Because originally, it started off as a just a simple like, microblog of me when I was like teaching myself to code, particularly in 2020. And as I found like, Instagram would be a good way to keep myself accountable. Because I'd be posting online, you know, it's more like a public obligation, if you will, now that I'm coding every day, you know, and it became a, something that's related. So I pivoted into pivoting into career coaching as a creative career coaching type of Instagram, Instagram page, because after I got my job with PayPal, you know, I started to share some advice about like, how I became an iOS developer. And I ended up getting a lot of questions from people wanting to know like, how I did this, how I did that. And I started to make some more posts that's related to things that people were struggling on. I learned that, you know, over my journey. Over the past three years, there's a lot of people who had helped me and people who are kindly, like, mentored me or given me advice. And I thought, you know, it'd be great to give back to the community and give that advice for free. There's not. There's like a lot of info online about how to become an iOS developer. But it's more like the tutorial part, like just the learning aspect, there isn't as large of an emphasis on technical interviews, and how to craft your resume when you are changing your career. And also how to use LinkedIn so that you can get more interview opportunities. So that's what I ended up doing on Instagram now.

Jeroen Leenarts: 17:06

So it's basically the skills you had to learn to make this pivot yourself. You're now Yeah, well, providing that to the community in a way that, yeah, of course, you have some benefits from it. But mostly the people that you coach with that they have a lot of benefit if they are able to execute successfully on the information that you provide them. Is it like really a side thing that creates some form of income for you? Or is it something that you just do on the side, because you enjoy providing this surface?

Stephanie Chiu: 17:44

I would say both, because if you don't really love something, it's really hard to continue through, so it does. So it's not like a steady stream of income right now. So I only officially started taking clients and whatnot, in the beginning of January, so it's only been about two months, two to three months. But I, I started to like expand my circle now. So I'm active on Twitter, if people ask me questions on their clubhouse, as you've seen over the past few weeks, over the past few weeks, I've enjoyed putting together some clubhouse rooms to you know, have more people dive into topics that I don't see a lot of conversations around. Like, there was one recently that I co hosted about AR in iOS. So I'm very interested in AR, but I'm not like an AR developer, although I was thinking, oh, you know, what if we can get people who are experts in the AR space, or who are AR engineers to like, talk about it with, with, with, with all of us. And yeah, that's what I really like with clubhouse. And then a few weeks ago, I decided I was going to like launch a discord community. I call it the self taught Academy. Because I remember when I was teaching myself to code, it was it was a very lonely process, because you don't know anybody else who's teaching themselves to code and like, like, your parents think you're crazy. Because like, oh, you know, you're not looking for a stable job, you're like trying to pivot to something completely different, you have like no experience or connections and, and so I wanted to provide a space for other people to be able to connect with others who are also on the self taught journey. And, and within it, I have a program I call lead accountability buddies, so that people can submit some information on a Google form. And I personally will match the person to somebody else. And that way they can help keep themselves accountable or keep each other accountable. Just build that sort of like relationship with somebody else. So they don't feel like it's a very lonely process along the way.

Jeroen Leenarts: 20:15

And and are you able to help people who struggled with the question that, okay, I know how to write some code, but how do I become really a software developer because the people that I've spoken to that actually are working on becoming a software developer are really struggling with making the leap from just following some tutorials online and basically being able to enter something in in an IDE, so Xcode in this example, getting it to run, but then the step of taking those skills to watch the step that you are able to actually develop or actually participate in creating a product.

Stephanie Chiu: 21:00

You know, I do see that a lot as you probably have. And I think it has to do with the material that's online. You know, a lot of link I'm I haven't done this yet, but I'm pretty sure the first thing that comes up when you type in how to become an iOS developer are going to be courses from like Udemy or Udacity. It's not going to be. But then again, like the true roadmap to becoming a self taught developer, it's not exactly a straight path. And not not a lot of that information is online. And a lot of times what I tell people, once I, you know, hear their story is, it seems like a lot of them. Do just afraid to make the leap to build the first few apps, especially in a very first one, you've probably seen that before, too. And yeah, it turns out that is a problem with one coming up with an idea and to actually executing because you've heard of like, tutorial how you just have like going through a thing you don't know. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And it's a confidence and an imposter syndrome, sort of situation that I see a lot.

Jeroen Leenarts: 22:22

So just as a side step, what was the first app that you created?

Stephanie Chiu: 22:28

So the first app was what I called lava Kanye say, that was the title of the app. Reason thing is that it's a very simple random quote generator, all you do is you tap a button, and some like stuff that Kanye has said before will pop up on the screen. And originally, it was supposed to be just originally supposed to be a little more complex, more complex. So it'd be Oh, you can choose like, what type of quotes that you want. And if you want, like Daisy quotes, so you can get like push notifications and whatnot. It turns out that those quote, API's are out there. The way they're structured is, it's pretty complicated. Even when I use like, postman and I had a, I had a senior I was developer friend helped me. I ended up finding this Kanye API, that was very simple. To understand the JSON data structure, I think that's really important. As somebody you know, building the first app is like learning when to pivot and how to pivot as well. And then from there, after I got the core app working, then it was about like adding some some flair to it. So ran like randomize colored backgrounds, but the background colors are based off a certain palette color, adding a little bit animation to the button when you tap on it, things like that.

Jeroen Leenarts: 24:04

So just make it more playful. Because the core concept is kind of silly with like a quote generate from Kanye West. But that's part of the fun of the product really. Something that's something that we didn't touch upon is I see just because I have a video here and I can actually see the background and your room. And I can actually tell by the stuff that is around you're seem to be a creative person. Is it some of the work in the background, your own work, or? Yeah,

Stephanie Chiu: 24:42

so I have a few paintings that you see. And I personally enjoy doing it because painting is it is hard. I taught myself oil painting by watching a lot of YouTube videos, and watching like time lapse videos on Instagram just like learning how people lay down colors and in what layer in order and how they blended and everything. You know, self taught and everything. But truly, it's because I don't want to spend the money to go back to school to like, go to a boot camp to take a master class, although I would really love to one day take a like a painting master class. Yeah, I think it's important for people to have some sort of hobby, even if exercising as a hobby, just because as you've probably experienced in your life, you know, having some sort of like enjoyment outside of work, keeps you sane, first of all, and then keeps you more like as a balanced person. It helps spark inspiration. And I think that's really important too, to keep yourself from like burning out.

Jeroen Leenarts: 26:00

And the painting that's that's something that you do. And you also mentioned that it sort of like keeps you level headed. But is it something that if you would not be able to do that, that it would that you would have to find some One thing that you could do to replace it as a creative outlet, or

Stephanie Chiu: 26:24

you know, funny enough, I think that over the past few years, I've so I've been in a lot of situations where I had to be by myself, this was even before I was coding and stuff. So during that time, I kind of learned how to find piecewise myself and find enjoyment in a lot of like, small things. So if today, like I couldn't paint anymore, you know, I can quickly come up with like other things that I would really enjoy doing. For example, like I actually enjoy writing. And I found that that's been a very useful skill, not just like, copywriting, but also in the form of like, essays and stuff. And, you know, that would be my other creative outlet one day, and I also enjoy, like tending to house plants. And I just love like diving deep into something once I'm very curious about it. So that's how I keep myself busy, besides, you know, the usual of like, exploring different restaurants or like catching up with friends, you know? So and

Jeroen Leenarts: 27:33

the, the creative aspect of your personality is something that you can apply in your coding job as well. Or is there is there room for that with, with PayPal?

Stephanie Chiu: 27:46

Yeah, I feel really lucky and blessed to be working where I am. Because there was actually a big emphasis on, on my manager, hiring people who, who really cares about the users. And then so for me, I'm able to kind of like channel that on the job. Because as I'm, let's say, I'm working on like, design update that designers gave me, you know, I'm going to, I'm going to be very detail oriented. And then if I think something might help the user, then I will bring it up to the designer, or like the product manager. And so, I think that's really fun. It's a lot for me, it's a lot more fun than when I was working in manufacturing, where there was zero creativity, like you can be creative and other aspects, but I prefer how to be creative in, in the tech. So yeah, you know, there's two different forms. So there is being creative in terms of design. But then there's also creative in terms of like, coding. So I love having both, you know, I get to exercise my both my left brain left side of my brain and right side of my brain, like every day, and that's what makes me happy.

Jeroen Leenarts: 29:08

It's good that you can actually enjoy that, that part of your life that that takes a significant amount of hours each working day. So you mentioned that you work remotely. And that that's something of course, due to the world's conditions right now. But this is also something that will be a permanent part of your working life when the pandemic is over, or at least in in handled in such a way that those kinds of things going back to the office is again possible. Yeah.

Stephanie Chiu: 29:43

So funny enough, I was actually hired as a permanent remote iOS engineer, which I find was is really great. That was actually part of my like, my 10 year goal is to eventually like work remotely, permanently, whether it's like if I'm an entrepreneur and working for myself Wi Fi, and like that, that company will allow me to do that. So I feel really, really blessed about it. And I think there's always the concern on team communication, when you're going to be working remotely a lot. I think I'm just fortunate that like my team, we are very good at communicating. And also we're open to like helping each other as well, if any of us are ever stuck on something because that was definitely my concern as a as a new iOS engineer, who hasn't worked in tech before, you know, there's definitely benefits going into the office, because you can see somebody and you can just like go up to your desk, but then online you're gonna have to, it's hard to read a room right online.

Jeroen Leenarts: 30:54

Yeah, because there is no room that you share with the same people. But considering that you How long have you been working at PayPal now?

Stephanie Chiu: 31:06

So it's been a really short period of time. So it's only been since September. So five, about five ish months,

Jeroen Leenarts: 31:16

and that's your first iOS The role that you were able to attain right? Yes, yeah. So that's quite amazing that like in the middle of like this whole mess that the world is in you were able to like land your first job. And how was the How was the onboarding for like a first time? employee? Remote? Pretty much you work on how onboarding would be in a tech company, I guess? Yeah. How did that work for you just, you know, just getting introduced just getting like to grips with your surroundings, which were like remote. So how did that work for you as a person?

Stephanie Chiu: 31:59

Yeah, I would say that. For one, my, my manager, she actually has like a really great onboarding process for everybody who on boards. So part of it is to meet every person on the iOS team, a pretty large team or about 12 people. And just to have like, some sort of FaceTime with them, just like a 15 minute chat. And I think that really helped a lot. Because when you're, you know, sitting behind your computer screen every day, and you get like almost no people interaction, you don't even know what your coworkers look like. I think, I think meeting them face to face of our webcam is really great way to break the ice for sure. And other than that, he also had like technical videos to watch. So they were basically like recordings of some of my other co workers who were stepping into the role of, you know, being kind of like, instructors on certain certain just to like, explain the code base maybe or explain like how, how we use this particular software, or, you know, how we capture data and whatnot. And then the other part is that, so, so this is my force job. In about four and a half years, I've gone through a lot of onboarding processes. I will say that the way Pay Pal on boards is probably like the smoothest onboarding process I've ever come across. Like they had everything ready for me from day one. And even though it was online, it was really easy to get in touch with like it, and HR if I had any problems on my first day. And I think you know, all those things really do matter to make a good impression on you, when you know you're joining a new company for the first time. So it was surprisingly smooth process.

Jeroen Leenarts: 34:07

So would you say that, that's finding a box knife to open up the package, which hardware was the hardest thing of your onboarding or

Stephanie Chiu: 34:18

Oh, my gosh, when I was a, they somehow were able to send me my my work laptop on the first day of work. And I've never had such a nice laptop, you know, it's like the latest one completely specked out, because my personal laptop is like a as a 13 inch from John 14. And it's one of those things where it's

Jeroen Leenarts: 34:42

like all together by by duct tape and bubble gum, most likely.

Stephanie Chiu: 34:46

Pretty much. I'm just like, I'm just really hoping that the next MacBook Pro is going to have the in one chip and then upgrade. And hopefully we'll also have some more light ports on the side too.

Jeroen Leenarts: 34:58

Yeah, cuz I have this. This 13 inch and one pro here and it's like to use before ports and it's it's difficult sometimes. And I know that Otherworld computing is putting out a USB hub. That is supposed to be a good one. But yeah, they delayed it again, I think so I'm like really, really hanging in there to till they are able to deliver that. And then hope that it's actually solid because I've had really bad stories about these these Thunderbolt based apps that are available on Amazon. Oh, I see. And so would you say that I was deaf Happy Hour is like a good practice for introducing yourself to new people because at iOS deaf happy hour, they have these breakout rooms that really caught me off guard the first time that I attended one of these events. I was like what's happening? Yeah, people. I'm supposed to talk with them.

Stephanie Chiu: 35:59

I know. I think it's it can be pretty intimidating for people who are introverted and you know, I'm naturally introverted, although I I've pushed myself to be more social. Because having having great social skills and you know, working on public speaking and yours, yours Social Presence, I think it's it's a really good skill in the long run. Yeah, I think those I was deaf happy hours, I think people who are iOS developers, or they are working towards becoming an iOS developer, it's like a really great place to meet other people who are probably in the same shoes that you are, you know, it's all about the community aspect. And like I mentioned before, when you when you have when you feel like you belong somewhere, it keeps you more motivated, and, you know, stops more people from deciding to like, give up, because I see a lot too.

Jeroen Leenarts: 37:00

And would you consider that if you guess you mentioned that you are, by nature, an introverted person. And I also know that you happen to like cats, because your cat is called Midnight, and he or she is blind? Yes. Would you turn into like this, this crazy cat lady if you wouldn't work on social skills consciously because you are on your own working remotely? Quite a lot of your time? Actually.

Stephanie Chiu: 37:29

Yes. Oh, my gosh, I would actually like that. But instead, I would, I would, I would get some acres of land and get some goats and like some chickens. And, you know, yeah, it's being off the grid, but like, maybe like in like, 30 minutes drive to like a city or something like that. So when I feel like I do want to be social again, I can just get away from the animals. And, like, be social with people.

Jeroen Leenarts: 38:03

Because you live in in the city right now. Right? Yeah. Lawson Yes.

Stephanie Chiu: 38:09

i Yeah, Los Angeles. It's a pretty I want to say like, it's pretty dead. But I I've been seeing the smog situation, go back to how it was normally. So a lot of people are, are going out and about again, and yeah.

Jeroen Leenarts: 38:30

How did you end up in Los Angeles?

Stephanie Chiu: 38:33

Right. Ah, so the short answer for that is that my last job was a manufacturing plant that was in Los Angeles. So that was able to bring me into the city. Especially because it is expensive to live in. So there's that part. And then because I was still looking for manufacturing jobs at that time. There are very few that are located in a big city there. Usually it may be like 30 minutes to at least like an hour away from the city. And I think I mentioned before that like, ever since I was young, I wanted to live in a big city, because I had this feeling that it would help me in terms of like, professional and my personal growth. So I feel really happy to be here. I have felt myself like grow a lot. Because I am living in a big city or now. Yeah.

Jeroen Leenarts: 39:32

Yeah. Who knows? Maybe the the animal farm somewhere outside in the country?

Stephanie Chiu: 39:40

Yeah, yeah, exactly. So

Jeroen Leenarts: 39:43

it's always good to keep on dreaming, I think. And, like for the for the talking about dreaming? What are your plans for the next like, few years, like two or three years out from now?

Stephanie Chiu: 39:56

Yeah. So I would say like in terms of work as like an iOS developer, I would really love to become like a UI developer. work more on like the front end. Because you know, as we have more apps on the App Store, and as like the older apps have been on apps or for a long time, like Uber, or Yelp. You know, they're, they're focusing a lot more on the front end of things. And there is this emerging, like new sort of role for engineers who are very interested in the design and UX UI aspect of things, but don't don't but but don't actually want to become like designers. So that's something that I'm very interested in, that I want to like grow towards. Currently, I'm just really focused on more like rounding out my skills, because previously, I've just been doing a lot of like UX UI stuff and a lot of other things like learning about conversions or about how to like handle like internal API's. That's something that is probably learn more like on the job and then So, so there's that aspect in terms of work, I do want to grow my my coaching business and be able to, you know, expand the number of people that I can help with those types of like services. And, yeah, continue just enjoying life in LA, I think that's like, the hard part is trying to balance all three, because like, My priority is always going to be like myself, because if I don't, if I don't feel awake, then I'm probably not going to be very productive. So it'd be like myself, and then paperwork, and then my coaching and content creating work.

Jeroen Leenarts: 42:00

So and if people want to, like, get in touch with you, or reach out to you, what are the best avenues to do that?

Stephanie Chiu: 42:08

Sure. So I am very active on Instagram on on Twitter. And, of course, I people can also reach me on my website. So that is Stephanie chu.io.

Jeroen Leenarts: 42:22

With the coaching business, what are the things that you can help people with?

Stephanie Chiu: 42:27

So with coaching, there is obviously like a one to one, long term coaching. So that what that really looks like is like I'm my target audience would be people who are really interested in becoming like iOS developers, but they are just like, too scared, or they just don't see like how they can build their first projects and get to that dream goal of theirs. So there's that and I'd be able to, like help them understand why they're having like the imposter syndrome, and be able to do some pair programming with them to create their first few projects, and update, I help them update their resume and their LinkedIn. I also do like one time q&a sessions, because sometimes people just don't need coaching. They just want the answers, either questions answered. And I'm always happy to do that best based off, like what my experiences are. And, of course, like, I'm always happy to help people take a look at their resume and LinkedIn and just do like a revamp of it. Because I also have specific methods that I've used on myself where I used LinkedIn, to find my jobs, rather than applying a lot online or using referrals. So that's something that i i I enjoy teaching people.

Jeroen Leenarts: 43:58

Okay, cool. Well, I think that pretty much wraps it up. This was Stephanie. She had like a lightbulb moment about shampoo then went into chemical engineering and ended up knee deep in toothpaste it seemed. And after some struggles there, she was able to like repurpose herself into an iOS tech role. It took a while. But then mid pandemic, she was able to land your first job at PayPal. And from what I've heard from her, she's really enjoying this new life as a software developer. And she found a new way to apply her creativity in her work. And in her side hustles and who knows where she'll end up in the next few years. I'm really curious to see what will happen to you as a software developer and a community member in the in the coming decades, maybe even? Yeah,

Stephanie Chiu: 44:51

I think there's gonna be a lot a lot of growth. I'm very excited about that.