Your Life After Tech

Ep 006: Simone Robutti - Choosing Ethical and Values-Based Work

• Life After Tech • Season 1 • Episode 6

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Simone Robutti shares the wild and interesting journey of transforming his career from data engineering to a path aligned with his personal values. He's also juggling multiple work areas fantastically... from consultant to a fermentation studio to organizational design/process improvement.

Simone discusses the pivotal roles and motivations that shaped his journey, including teaching political praxis and addressing workers' rights in the gig economy. He's truly a model of aligning professional pursuits with one’s core beliefs.

Simone's links:
Consultancy one-pager: https://bit.ly/robutticc
Tech Workers Coalition: https://techworkerscoalition.org/
Personal Website: https://robutti.me/
QU Fermentation Studio: https://www.qufermentationstudio.com/
Reversing.works: https://reversing.works/

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Debbie:

Welcome to the your Life After Tech podcast. This is episode number six. I'm Debbie Levitt. Don't forget to check out our lifeaftertechinfo multiverse, including our book, Discord, community coaching and more, Because you might be done with tech, tech might be done with you, or you're thinking about adding non-tech work to your tech career. Today's guest is Simone Robuti, S-I-M-O-N-E-R-O-B-U-T-T-I, and you can find him at robutiime. Oh, sorry, I said that in Italian R-O-B-U-T-T-I, dot, M-E, Plus lots of other links in our episode description. Simone is quite the storyteller. It's easy to fall in love with him, but sometimes a little hard to follow exactly where he's going with everything. But follow him down the path of so many interesting stories about different jobs he's done and what he's doing now, especially now that he's gotten out of tech. Let's get to know Simone.

Simone:

Hello everybody, I'm Simone and today I'm going to talk to you about life after tech. And I think I should start from my studies, or better, maybe even before. Like at four years old, I was put in front of a computer by my father to play video games and I kind of never left. So when it was time to pick a university course, it was quite obvious that I would have gone for computer science I'm from Italy, so there is called informatica. It would have gone for computer science I'm from Italy, so there it's called Informatica. It's slightly different than computer science, but you can think of something between computer science and software engineering.

Simone:

And I studied in Milan for six years almost seven, because I wasn't very good at studying, especially the first few years. Then I started working in a small consultancy as a data engineer, slash machine learning engineer my master thesis was also in those topics and I worked as a Scala Spark developer for around a year and a half, first as a consultant in a bank. That was the most hellish and you know a hellish circus with, you know, endless amounts of consultants, endless budget and the idea of how to make use of them, and a lot of you know managers on cocaine and projects that didn't make any sense, and here are keys and internal strife and so on and so forth and data leaks.

Simone:

That's what a soap opera wow yeah, yeah, I have a lot of characters that would you know fill a book from from that time. Then, luckily, after I finished my first project there that now would be illegal, illegal just, or better, illicit under GDPR, but whatever, I was moved to a small spin-off startup of my consultancy company. I stayed there a few months and then I moved to Germany because I was tired of this stuff so very hectic work, culture, stressful and, if you know, most of the money coming from banks or insurances and stuff like this. So I moved to Germany when I was 26, that was seven, almost not yet seven years ago and I kept working as a data engineer with a bit of machine learning in between, first in a startup doing crowd analytics on telco data. So we were checking how people were working around the city based on the connection between their phone and the cell phone tower. Then I moved to another startup where I stayed for four years working again as a lot engineer.

Simone:

This was, in self, like self-driving cars. It was before COVID and there was still belief that this would work. Now self-driving cars are kind of like is that they are not happening, and especially after COVID, here in Germany all the car makers were like no more money, let's close the faucet. And so, eventually the startup started going down and last year I did not much, let's say, because they were pivoting to food delivery robots without any previous knowledge of the topic. And yeah, and it was a doomed market because it just doesn't make sense economically. Like they smash one robot, you lose, you know, 10,000, 20,000 euros of equipment and, yeah, it's cheaper to exploit riders, and riders are actually the reason. The first, um, no, it's not true. So after that I was like I was like this, I'm doing nothing here, I'm earning money, it's nice, it's comfy, it's cozy. I held up for like one year, two years of this life, and then I was like even the one hour, two hours of uh work I do every day, like effective hours, were like a torture. Not because you know it was a bad life. I, I was living a very privileged and comfy life, but it was so meaningless and performative. I was like, okay, I saved the money, I saved enough money. Eventually I need to jump the ship. And, uh, because also the company was going down.

Simone:

So, um, the chance was these requests from a friend to start a cooperative in italy to do consultancy to other cooperatives. So it was politically motivated to some degree. It was closer to what I wanted to do. And because in the meanwhile, in this startup but also in my political activity in an organization called Tech Workers Coalition that is concerned with unionizing tech workers, I was getting interested more and more in the topic of organizations, how to build organizations, how to make to take decisions, facilitation and so on and so forth and so in.

Simone:

In this consultancy for other cooperatives, the you know the package, the idea, the, the business proposition was like we give you, we help you with the software, but we help you also with the process, with the governance. We teach you how to build this stuff without reproducing the bad patterns of startups or corporate environments. So democratic decision making and more sustainable work, pace and stuff like that. Then the cooperative after some months of working on it, we understood we weren't aligned on a few things. So before signing and forming the cooperative, we understood we weren't aligned on a few things. So before signing and forming the cooperative, we were like it's better not to do it, and I was talking about riders.

Simone:

So the next real job I had after this short attempt to start a cooperative was in a research that was doing research on social harm of AI and recommender systems and social media in general, but also doing research on food delivery platforms and how the workers, like the riders, are surveilled through their app, and we did.

Simone:

I wasn't actually directly involved in that it was done before I actually joined the organization but I was hired to kind of continue that. But then, you know, things changed. So in this research group I was supposed to be a data engineer working on this stuff, but then I was like and this was like democratically run, no bosses, no managers. It was around 12 to 15 people, let's say over a course of two years, and I was like guys, none of you ever had a real job like half of them were researchers, the other half were hackers. I was like I don't want to work like this. It's so fucking messy and uh, and I'm like I quit the tech industry to to quit with the. I don't want to to do stuff like this. So for nine months I focused almost entirely on building up the organization and structuring their processes and making it.

Debbie:

When was this? This was three years ago, okay so about three years ago, okay, so about three years ago you were done with the bullshit from tech and you started shifting out.

Simone:

Shifting out. I was fully out because this job was against tech. Even though I was a programmer. It was politically very openly against the tech sector Interesting. For example, some of the research we did was proving that TikTok was supporting Russian propaganda on war. Or we proved that Microsoft Copilot at the time it was called Bing Chat was giving misleading information on elections in Germany and Switzerland, or like effects of like recommender systems of Amazon, facebook, whatever so this was. It wasn't in collaboration with these companies, it was openly adversarial to these companies, and we did a lot of meaningful research, very impactful in that space. The group was called Tracking Exposed when I joined. Then we changed name to AI Forensics Look it up if you want to see interesting things on how the tech sector works and I stayed there for two years because, all in all, it was a very nice experience.

Simone:

After I cleaned up the mess, let's say, people were very happy about what we were doing. It had meaning. It was a change of pace because I was like like one of the things that matters to me, that touches me the most after leaving tech and changing job is like that. Now people are like kind of grateful or at least impressed, but not impressed that's maybe a big word but like they have a positive uh reaction when I say what I'm doing. That is something that if you are doing self-driving cars, maybe they say it's cool, but for but they are hardly grateful. So, um and so when I was doing this kind of research, there were people like when I, like after introducing myself, saying what I do, they were like thank you for the work you're doing and you know, it's not like being a firefighter where you're kind of here by default, but it's a step towards that.

Simone:

And I stayed there for two years and after we finished this project on Microsoft Copilot that I led, even though I have no background for research, but I'm just good at organizing stuff so they put me in charge of the project. The project was successful to a degree and I was like I don't want to do research, like I'm not shaped in the form of a researcher, it's not my thing, because the uncertainty of the outcome or like especially in this case, where you're adversarial against these companies that might change their software overnight and you're like I spent six months analyzing something that doesn't exist anymore and we don't probably share anything and we go. So I was like I, I, it's fine, I don't want to do it again and so I quit, but in good terms, like we, we had a very emotional separation. They bought me in Adidas tracksuit with the logo of the of the group because I, for tech workers coalition, the organization I talked about before, uh, in italy we use trucks, so it says the kind of uniform to go speak in public as if, as a meme, like to to promote the other tech workers, where adidas tracksuits, whatever like it's, it's a it's between an inner joke and the static performance.

Simone:

But so I have endless Alistar assets and they bought me a green one with the logo of AI forensics as a gift that nobody gave me, a parting gift when I was working tech. You know, maybe they need to buy, you know you have to buy croissants and bring them to the office. They don't even buy them for you. But you know, a custom gift is not a thing. You see, also, they printed in France. They printed me a paper with a bunch of memes from when I was there or like photos of me and this kind of stuff.

Simone:

So it was a very nice experience, but I was like guys, guys, if you start doing something else, fine, but if we stick to research and we're a research group, I'm like I'm done with this. So, um, we're still in touch and we're in good terms and after that kind of started the phase where I'm in now, where I am working several different jobs um, somehow all related but also not the main one being organizational consultant for cooperatives, political collectives, associations, ngos and whatever I feel is aligned with my values, plus a music school, because I'm like it's like it's a berlin music school. I'm like that's full of cool kids, I'm like I want to be a cool kid too, and it seems like a nice environment anyway. So I'm also starting working with them. But, um, yeah, so that's I had these kind of like democratic small organizations to work better, to take decision making done in a different way, processes done in a different way, because even if some of them studied organizational sciences or management and so on, often that's tailored to big corporate or startups that have different values, different needs, needs, and it just doesn't work.

Simone:

So I try to, you know, specialize somehow in, uh, in this. It's not even a niche, because there are a lot of these organizations but they just don't think they can afford and they or they deserve to have a consultant for this kind of stuff, but somehow economically, economically and you know I make it work. So I have packages that kind of change, how they work positively, and that's my main thing.

Debbie:

You said you have a lot of things.

Simone:

Yes, that's the main one, at least in terms of narrative. Then in terms of time, I'm not sure I should track the hours, but the other thing I do is I work with the fermentation studio of my partner that gives classes about, let's say, from beginner to advanced fermentation, let's say, from beginner to advanced fermentation, and we also organize community events here in Berlin and the studio is called True Fermentation, q-u Fermentation, and and there I'm a community and program manager, that is a fancy way to say I publish stuff on social media to promote events. I write the copy and they wash the jars before the classes because they have to be clean and sanitized.

Debbie:

A quick question on fermentation, since we've ended up in an interesting world here. When I think of fermentation, I feel like that could be anything from alcohol to tofu, to something else. What are you fermenting?

Simone:

So in the studio we do mostly koji base Stuff, koji is the mold that is at the base of miso, sake, soy sauce and so on. So our main, you know, best selling class is on miso how to make miso. But we do a bunch of everything. We also do more basic stuff sometimes, like kombucha or kimchi, but the bulk is a bit more advanced. So miso. But my partner is also working in a restaurant so she also does fermented tofu. She does like 20 products for the restaurant different types of misooyu garum and whatever that sometimes enter the program.

Debbie:

Yeah, yeah, just in case you're into ancient rome yeah, it's not the same thing.

Simone:

It has the same name, but it's not like letting the fish rot in the sun like the romans did. It's kind of the same process on a chemical level, but it's not the same, so you can make. Garum is like anything that through enzymatic fermentation like you leave, for example, I don't know bread, or we made one with parmesan you leave it at 60 degrees for several weeks and it produces this very flavorful liquid that you can use as a condiment.

Debbie:

So I we've got organizational design. We have helping your partner with a fermentation studio. What else is on the list?

Simone:

so the third one this happens a few times a year. I teach political praxis, mostly in a school in Italy called the squad aola Capitale Sociale, where basically it's a primer on how to build a political organization from you know, grassroots political organization. So I give them a bit of everything, from how to build the strategy, how to facilitate meetings, how to like the software stack you might want to use, because otherwise they end up with WhatsApp chats and Google Drive files. So I teach them a bit of this, a bit of everything. But sometimes I do just workshops, like one time one-off workshops, like the course is like five weeks, but sometimes I do like two hours, three hours workshops in different spaces.

Simone:

Yeah that's the third one and the fourth one is still in research. So when Tracking Exposed became AI Forensics and they changed name, the rider stuff was kind of pushed away and now it's a group called the Reversing Works. This is kind of the same people that were there before, but it's continuing that kind of research, let's say. And so we investigate food delivery platforms. Mostly. I cannot reveal too much information on the ongoing investigations because it's an investigation, of course, so I cannot make names. But we're also doing platforms that are used for data labeling, for AI and checking how the workers on these platforms that do, you know when they give they're used by stuff like Google or OpenAI to say this prompt was offensive or like write three lines of this and that.

Simone:

And there are humans behind, mostly in the third world, doing this kind of work. But there are also some in Europe and we kind of check what. But there are also some in Europe and we kind of check what these platforms are doing to them. But mostly this is focused on riders and so the kind of information and data rights that are violated by companies where, like the workers' rights and data rights violated by companies, you know, like stuff like Foodora, deliveroo, glovo, liferando and all these companies that I'm talking about. So in that I'm doing mostly project management, because on the technical side it's not my expertise Like we have a super hacker guy from Italy doing all the heavy lifting there. I just try to keep the pieces together.

Debbie:

Well, I'm going to take you in a new direction now. I want to ask you about these things that you're doing now. How do these new areas of work match your core personal qualities, like who you are at your core?

Simone:

like who you are at your core. I think at some point I became this person that is responsible and organized and structured and accountable and it keeps growing, meaning that before I was that person in my relationship. Then I became that in the political environment. Then eventually in the startup job I was slowly taking that role, mostly shielding my team from work, but also somehow I was perceived as a figure of not of authority in the sense of commanding authority, a figure of not of authority in the sense of like commanding authority but like reliable in uh, doing my role as, and people were looking up to me and coming to me for advice and whatever, and this kept growing. So at some point somebody called me an organizational daddy and I like I don't use it because obviously it's inappropriate and vaguely sexualized, but that's kind of the relationship I tend to build with people and it's not paternalistic. You know I don't say it in a paternalistic sense, I try to avoid that at all costs. But eventually, when there is trust and there is, you know, understanding of my abilities and that you know they have the experience that I can make their life better and easier, they kind of start relating to me in that way. So I would say that's the main element and it keeps working. Like I rarely take on too much work and I'm like, guys, I have to cancel. I try not to make it happen and usually it's a sign that I'm doing something wrong. It happens very rarely. So, yeah, that's the hinge. I am kind of the hinge of a lot of these things happening and I hold people accountable. So I'm the one going to them like so this was supposed to happen, what's what's the problem, what's the issue? And they untangle their provinces. So they I okay.

Simone:

Another element of this is like I always see myself as subservient in the, in enabling people to do what they want to do. I'm like I have my ideas and my opinions, but I'm like I don't want to turn this into work, or like I you know my projects are mine and I work on them kind of alone. When I'm in an organization, I'm like you put the ideas and I, let's say, I make the execution happen. This is in a political setting. In a work setting. You put the ideas and I, let's say, I make the execution happen. This is in a political setting.

Simone:

In a work setting, I try not to put too much my opinions on the table, and this builds a lot of trust, because some I don't. I don't actually have a stake in one option rather than another, and so people always perceive me as neutral, and I can do that what I think is the interest of the organization. But yeah, that's another role I tend to take a lot. I'm like okay, let's try to bring your idea out and make it happen, rather than be like I think the right way is this one. And somehow this sometimes sounds very badly, because people then need to deal with the consequences of executing their ideas and they're like Simone, but how did it happen? Why did it end up this way? Bro, you are the one that wanted this to happen. Now it happened, and so I mean I also push back when I see something completely unreasonable.

Debbie:

But yeah, I enable people, let's say, All right, let's say that for sure, thinking about when you were leaving tech and distancing yourself from all of the tech work you had done. Is there any mistake or regret or something you wish you did it differently?

Simone:

Not really Meaning that. I mean, I'm not a person that has regrets in general and I you live better without, so I don't really think I don't really frame the past in this way. That said, I think there are things I understood afterward, but they wouldn't have really changed my course of action, because I saved money for a lot of time to be able to pursue this path. And, yes, I could have argued like I could have left one year before and saved less money, but that's I don't know. Like I don't really regret it. I'm like it's I just have more money and more tranquility to keep doing this, like what I'm doing right now. It's kind of getting sustainable, but, yeah, it's still a long way before it's anywhere close the salary I was getting in tech. So I don't regret saving money and actually, but let's say, okay, one point that was really complicated and I think it's very useful for people that want to leave tech was to set it couldn't.

Simone:

Like I was in a comfy position. I was in a very privileged position, so I always had the dilemma of like I always had the choice of entrenching myself in this privilege and then spend it, for example, in political activity, because I had a lot of time and a lot of money that I could spend or donate and and that's always on the table. But I was like at some point point I need a point of closure where I just leave, because if it's not coming from the outside, I need to be the person doing that and giving a privilege, especially when you know there is covet, global collapse, economical collapse and whatever, and also the tech industry is on a trajectory where the kind of privilege on average from tech workers is only going to get worse because there are endless layoffs, a lot of dynamics and for sure, in 10 years the job I had, like cozy and well paid, will be a total rarity compared to now. So at some point I just had to do it and like, uh, it was. There was no rational argument to do it, to do that in that moment, but so this was also up until now. It's. It was up until recently.

Simone:

It was, um, let's say always a point like should I go back? Like when is reasonable to you know? Put your values or desires in front of like stability, because what I'm doing is destabilizing. I mean it's I still have again for the given, for the bridge I talked about before. It's not like I'm taking big risks, you know I'm not. I'm not like at san francis, like giving away all my wealth and being naked in nature. It's not.

Debbie:

It's nowhere risky, okay, yes, san francisco, for the ones watching on youtube yeah, sorry for those listening, I'm wearing a san Francisco shirt, so when he said St Francis, I just wanted to make the visual connection there. Yeah sorry, go ahead.

Simone:

San Francisco is totally not that place. But so it's not that kind of change and I would advise people not to frame it in that way, like there's no reason to take risk and it's just going to make it harder. But that said, in the long term, when I think of my next 10, 20 years and I think about how the world is going, I'm like it's not the safest option leaving the tech industry. But I had to sit with this feeling for a long time until a few weeks ago that I think it's my. I got my point of closure where at the in summer I wasn't having too much work because a lot of my clients were italian at the time and italians don't work in summer, and so I was like no money is coming in. Maybe I made a terrible decision. This thing is not working out. Let's apply to some uh tech positions just to, just because just let's see what's up, what can happen.

Simone:

And I did the first interview with the company here in Berlin that and I was like they asked me how much would you like to get to be paid? I was like between 90 and 100 K. That for Berlin is like euros, quite good money, euros, yes, um, it's, let's say, four times the average salary in germany, something like that. So, and it's like, yeah, almost double what I was earning. No, it's not double, it's one third higher than what I was earning when I left. And it was good money. But it was the first interview and so it's not certain that they would have offered it to me. But the interviewer was like okay, she noted it down, no problem. And after I feel like when she was talking, she was talking about you know, she explained me how the teams are structured and the hierarchy and who I would respond to. And they were like four or five people between me, possibly more, four or five people between me and the ceo and and the office.

Simone:

I don't think I don't want to go back into that. I, I really don't want to. And uh, and some, and I, after the first interview, I was like I'm gonna cancel the interview process, i'm'm giving up on this salary. I had my point of closure no, no, going back. And luckily then jobs started coming in again nice, you know, mid September. So everything is fine. But that moment I really had to make you know it was a moment of closure, because I had to give up every Lee, it wasn't an offer yet, but in my mind was like if they actually give me this money and it's a real offer, I don't know if I have the strength to uh say no. So I had to do it before and it was emotionally very, um, very involved.

Simone:

For, you know, my average relation to work, that is like I'm Italian work is not important. I know this is the wrong podcast to say this, but, like you know, life is somewhere else.

Debbie:

I had it in my book and the Italians made me take it out.

Simone:

Yeah, yeah, ah, okay, but yeah, anyway, the life is somewhere else. But I spent one day after this interview writing down the things I would lose if I went back into tech. It was a long list of stuff, including croissants in the morning at 11, because now I'm a freelancer, I can go to eat a croissant if I want. If I don't have meetings and I really want to, I can go and eat a cardamomissants when you want.

Debbie:

That's it. That's the. That's the name.

Simone:

Yeah, that was the first item on my list and I came out of these emotional exercise hungry more, more than anything else. But there were a lot of other stuff like flex net. Like naps was not the second, but quite close, because that's another thing. But I took naps also when I was working in tech. Like work from home was a blessing and that's one of the privileges of tech. I was also taking naps in the office at some point, but that's because I'm very good at maneuvering in office. I don't know, like the fact, somehow this was registered as me working hard and so I had to take naps even though I wasn't working hard. But this is an advanced technique that you need to be very Italian to achieve. I wouldn't suggest everybody to take naps in the office in front of your boss. It takes a while to spin it as a good thing.

Debbie:

Simone, your stories are endlessly wild.

Simone:

In all of this. Just to finish, on my departure from tech, when I left the startup I was talking about and not working much and taking naps the manager was like Simone, it's it's clear that you really cared about this job and you were always so passionate and so, coming away, sure, like this, this manager was a good guy. It wasn't the bad manager, but uh, yeah, I was like the disconnection was quite a lot. I still I, I mean I I liked him but I didn't want to you know, to show that, bro. That's not what happened, but okay.

Debbie:

Oh my gosh, and I thought Sardinians were storytellers. So, simone, I have pretty much one last question for you, and that is our listeners and watchers might be considering leaving tech or starting to add non-tech work to their universe. What advice would you give them?

Simone:

um, yeah, visualize what you want to do. That was my, my recurring thoughts. Rather than focusing on what you don't like about tech, focus on what would happen next and try to plan it and make it, you know, realistic a little by little, because a jump into the unknown might not not happen, or like focusing too much on what's not working in the present might develop coping mechanisms, like you went about it with your friends, but then you don't necessarily act on it. Some people do, some people don't. Um, then for me, the, the other thing was like political, so I didn't want to be complicit in a lot of stuff that is happening in tech and every company, even the, you know, I was in a decent company, like we weren't killing anybody, we weren't exploiting, you know, labor of anybody, with no weapons, no, whatever, no surveillance, because, yeah, we were doing algorithms for celebrating cars that are not the most evil thing the tech sector is doing these days. But a lot of companies are doing this, and you might regret it going forward and say, but a lot of companies are doing this, and you might regret it going forward and say I didn't do anything even though I could, and that's another thought that was recurrent in my change and doing something valuable with your time.

Simone:

It's also a matter of dignity, like my experience in the tech sector was doing mostly useless stuff, either because it was intrinsically useless, like it shouldn't have been developed, or because it was developed in an environment that had no chance of turning these into a product somebody would use. And for me it was a matter of dignity. I felt like stupid, uh, spending offers more frustrated spending my day perform writing code that would have gone nowhere. And in startups this is very common because most startups fail. Cope with it. If you're working in a startup, there's a very high chance it's going to fail and therefore you're wasting your time. You are not mandated to participate in figuring out what's going to be the next Unicorn, like de facto after like, when you will look back, you will be like those four years I pulled all-nighters, I worked on weekends, whatever, for something that left zero marks on the world on the world. And yeah, think about it, because for me, these were all very important elements to make this decision. Not everybody feels the same but yeah, all right.

Debbie:

Well, our last question is if people want to get in touch with you or follow you or, you know, reach out to you, what are the best ways to do that?

Simone:

So I have a personal website called robuttime where you can find a bunch of my stuff and some contacts. Otherwise, you can find me with the same name on Instagram or Telegram or otherwise by email if you want to be professional and not sketchy. Simone at robutime, for sure I'm gonna check it out and respond well, thank you all.

Debbie:

Right. Well, with that, that wraps up our show and, uh, thank you so so much for for coming on and telling us your story thank you.

Simone:

thank you for having me and good luck to all the listeners if they want to leave. Tech, we are waiting for you on the other side.

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Debbie Levitt

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